Senior Manager, Payroll

Staff - Non Union

Job Category

M&P - Excluded M&P

Job Profile

XMP - Accounting, Level F

Job Title

Senior Manager, Payroll

Department

Payroll Operations & Control | Finance & Integrated Services | VP Finance and Operations

Compensation Range

$10,459.67 - $15,675.58 CAD Monthly The Compensation Range is the span between the minimum and maximum base salary for a position. The midpoint of the range is approximately halfway between the minimum and the maximum and represents an employee that possesses full job knowledge, qualifications and experience for the position. In the normal course, employees will be hired, transferred or promoted between the minimum and midpoint of the salary range for a job.

Posting End Date

October 13, 2026

Note: Applications will be accepted until 11:59 PM on the Posting End Date.

Job End Date

Ongoing

Please include a cover letter which includes the rationale of why you are interested in this position, why you would be a good fit for this role, and how you meet the required qualifications.

At UBC, we believe that attracting and sustaining a diverse workforce is key to the successful pursuit of excellence in research, innovation, and learning for all faculty, staff and students. Our commitment to employment equity helps achieve inclusion and fairness, brings rich diversity to UBC as a workplace, and creates the necessary conditions for a rewarding career.

Job Summary

The Senior Manager, Payroll provides strategic and operational leadership in the delivery of payroll services across the University of British Columbia. Supporting a diverse employee population, including multiple unionized groups and complex compensation structures, this role ensures payroll is administered accurately, timely, and in compliance with applicable legislation, collective agreements, and institutional policy. This position plays a key role in financial reconciliation, labour relations support, internal controls, and payroll system development, while fostering a culture of service excellence, equity, and continuous improvement. The Senior Manager acts as a subject matter expert and escalation point for payroll issues, collaborating with Human Resources, Finance, Labour Relations, and Information Technology Services to support institutional priorities and employee experience. Key aspects of the role will include leading the team to deliver a high level of service and various projects, business engagement, change management and analysis of emerging trends to ensure that the University is enabled to deliver its mission. They are expected to be a subject matter expert, providing expertise on all regulatory and contractual obligations on payroll matters. An emphasis on managing risk exposure and strong control environment is expected.

Organizational Status

The Senior Manager, Payroll is a key position for internal controls and governance over the payroll function. This role is a key position for governance over the payroll function by developing and executing a payroll transformation strategy aligned with the University’s goals and objectives. This position will collaborate with Human Resources, Finance, the Integrated Service Center Teams and business units to gather payroll requirements and define payroll transformation initiatives by accessing current payroll processes and systems, identifying areas of improvement, and implementing best practices to streamline workflows.

This position will also support the Director in representing the University and leading interactions with audit, banks relating to payroll, government and other external stakeholders. The Senior Manager will liaise with senior faculty, staff, and teams within the Finance, Tax, Risk Management and Human Resources departments. This position also plays a key role in ensuring that these Clients receive excellent customer service, appropriate system support, and service level agreements in order to achieve their mandates and objectives.

Work Performed

• •Manages day-to-day payroll operations for a large and complex workforce including unionized staff, faculty, students, and administrative personnel. Ensures workforce plans encompasses essential services performance.
• •Oversees accurate and timely processing of semi-monthly payrolls and related financial transactions.
• •Ensures full compliance with federal and provincial legislation, collective agreements, UBC policies, and audit requirements.
• •Leads a team of payroll professionals, providing mentorship, coaching, and technical guidance to support professional development and high performance.
• •Interprets and applies provisions of multiple collective agreements and employment policies related to pay, leaves, and entitlements.
• •Serves as a payroll advisor on labour relations matters, supporting grievance resolution and bargaining processes with payroll data and insight.
• •Maintains internal controls, manages risk, and ensures privacy and confidentiality of payroll data.
• •Oversees preparation of statutory filings such as T4s, T4As, and ROEs; coordinates with Financial Reporting on year-end reconciliation.
• •Collaborates with Human Resources, Integrated Resource Center and Information Technology on Workday configuration, payroll integration, and automation initiatives.
• •Responds to complex payroll inquiries and escalated issues from employees, department administrators, and senior leadership.
• •Provides training and communications on payroll processes, policies, and changes to the UBC community. Partners with comms and change teams to ensure change readiness and successful execution.
• •Contributes to university-wide initiatives that support employee engagement, operational efficiency, and financial stewardship.
• •Develops strategies for ensuring procedures, methods, standards and controls are created and followed to foster operational efficiency, monitor compliance, mitigate risks, and achieve desired results.
• •Partners with others to implement a continuous improvement lifecycle: gathering University requirements, understanding user experiences, identifying areas for improvement, evaluating and prioritizing and assists with implementing product enhancements.
• •Ensures strategic alignment between teams within Payroll Operations.
• •Develops and fosters influential partnerships across the organization, including internal and external customers and stakeholders to improve payroll operations.
• •Partners with IT to lead, design and enhance Robotic Process Automation (RPA) to help solve process issues.
• •Develops and monitors the Payroll operational performance framework and service portfolios, and Service Level Agreements.
• •Design and maintain a set of managerial & operational metrics that define performance of the business, opportunities, and progress to goals.
• •Develop and foster the team's ability for "out-of-the box" thinking by developing new solutions through collaboration with payroll team members and internal customers.
• •Key resource on the Workday product and strategic roadmap; engages in Workday Community groups to ensure UBC’s perspective on enhancements are well understood.
• •Learn the Director's role to be back up [ emergency and vacations]
• •Leading paymaster payroll processing and escalations [ i.e. Unions, Triumf]

Consequence of Error/Judgement

• •Payroll errors can result in financial loss to the university, legal exposure, non-compliance with legislation, damage to labour relations, or a loss of trust among employees. The Senior Manager must exercise sound judgment, ensure accuracy, and maintain confidentiality while managing sensitive and high-impact processes. Poor decisions or lack of oversight could compromise the university’s financial integrity, reputation, and employee satisfaction. Due to the incumbent's responsibility for financial systems, the decisions and recommendations made will have a significant effect on departmental standards and operations.
• •Errors could result in serious sig