Director, Process & Design Engineering – Payroll

Working with Us
Challenging. Meaningful. Life-changing. Those aren’t words that are usually associated with a job. But working at Bristol Myers Squibb is anything but usual. Here, uniquely interesting work happens every day, in every department. From optimizing a production line to the latest breakthroughs in cell therapy, this is work that transforms the lives of patients, and the careers of those who do it. You’ll get the chance to grow and thrive through opportunities uncommon in scale and scope, alongside high-achieving teams. Take your career farther than you thought possible.

Bristol Myers Squibb recognizes the importance of balance and flexibility in our work environment. We offer a wide variety of competitive benefits, services and programs that provide our employees with the resources to pursue their goals, both at work and in their personal lives. Read more: careers.bms.com/working-with-us.

Position Summary

As the Director, Process & Design Engineering for Payroll, you will lead the strategic design, oversight, and optimization of payroll processes across global operations, ensuring that systems are highly reliable, compliant, and cost-effective. You will set the vision for payroll service excellence by establishing robust standards, procedures, and service level agreements to deliver predictable, high-quality outcomes. In this leadership role, you will partner with HR, legal, benefits, and technology stakeholders to drive special initiatives and continuous improvements, mitigate risks, and elevate the employee experience. Your expertise in process and design engineering, payroll operations, and automation will shape the future of payroll delivery, supporting organizational growth while ensuring data privacy and regulatory compliance. Your passion in life is for a user to be pulled through a process with little to zero “how to knowledge and/or documentation”.  Therefore, at the forefront of process assessment and implementation is the goal in ‘consumerization’ of employee and operator processes!

Key Responsibilities

• Strategic Oversight & Process Design: Lead the end-to-end design and ongoing maintenance of global payroll processes, ensuring reliability, consistency, and scalability across all regions. Develop and implement standards and procedures for payroll, billing, and related transactions.
• Process Optimization & Automation: Identify and implement improvement opportunities using methodologies such as Lean Six Sigma. Champion automation and digital transformation to reduce manual intervention, minimize errors, and accelerate payroll processing.
• Data Analytics & Reporting: Collaborate with analytics teams to develop KPIs and dashboards, monitor payroll data, and leverage insights to inform strategy and continuous improvement.
• Service Excellence & Performance Management: Establish and oversee internal service level agreements (SLAs), key metrics, and performance reporting to monitor payroll service delivery. Drive initiatives to optimize cost efficiency while improving customer experience and satisfaction levels.
• Vendor Relationship & Contract Management: Manages contracts and vendor agreements related to payroll services, ensuring compliance with organizational standards and optimizing service delivery.
• Risk Mitigation & Compliance: Develop and maintain robust controls to mitigate risks related to audits, data privacy, security, and visibility. Ensure payroll processes comply with internal policies, SOX requirements, and country-specific legal standards.
• Cross-Functional Leadership: Partner with HR, legal, benefits, technology teams, and external vendors to execute special initiatives (e.g., bonus processing, acquisitions, vendor transitions) and ensure seamless integration of payroll systems globally.
• Continuous Improvement: Foster a culture of innovation by regularly reviewing payroll operations, soliciting feedback, and implementing best practices to maintain payroll excellence and elevate the employee experience worldwide.
• Change Management & Implementation: Lead and support the rollout of newly designed payroll processes, overseeing change management activities, training, and documentation to drive adoption and operational excellence.

Qualifications & Experience

• Bachelor’s or advanced degree in Industrial Engineering, Business Analytics, Operations Management, Human Resources, or a related field.
• 10+ years of progressive experience in payroll process design, operations, change management, and leadership roles within large, complex organizations.