Why is payroll so complicated?

Payroll isn't just a button. 

Once you have more than about 50 people, your payroll tool becomes one of the biggest software expenses. Why?

Because nearly everything that happens in the company goes through payroll. And the person managing it needs to have the skills of an accountant, IT, lawyer, insurance agent, and operations manager, all rolled into one.

Maybe they also need some HR skills as well.

🧮 Accountant

Sure, the tool calculates the taxes. But who do you think sets up the taxes and fixes them when they go wrong?

🧑🏽‍💼 Lawyer

There's no ambiguity in numbers. Nothing makes people more litigious than when you mess with their money. The person managing payroll needs to know the law and how to talk about it to keep a misunderstanding from turning into a legal issue.

💾 IT

Most work done by people flows through computers. All of those people need to get paid. Correctly. Managing payroll requires a surprising amount of technical know-how to make sure that everything is working properly and people have the tools they need to do work.

📄 Insurance Agent

Your broker is only paid to work with you once a year. That leaves your payroll department to do most of the day-to-day work of making sure enrollments happen and deductions are correct. Since insurance still works on faxes and paper, payroll must translate IT skills to the ancient language of insurance.

🚉 Ops Manager

Payroll is an intricate ballet of timecards, onboarding and offboarding, troubleshooting, and moving data back and forth, all with an unforgiving deadline. To make it all happen, your payroll department is constantly designing and tuning processes to make it all run smoothly.

🤐 HR

You see everything in payroll. Not just what people earn and their performance issues. You see divorces. Bankruptcies. Family emergencies. Medical issues. Death. Tragedies and humiliations of all kinds. And you need to be able to handle them with discretion and compassion. 

So no. Payroll isn't just a button. It's the beating heart of your organization.

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