Confessions of a payroll manager – “we are the champions”
W hen I first started in payroll, our main tasks were all pay-based… the clue is in the title. However, things have changed substantially over the past couple of decades, and payroll has now become an essential part of facilitating and supporting staff well-being. Over the last few years, and mainly because many of the health benefits have been offered through the payroll team (such as the health cash plan), we’ve become known as the leaders of well-being across our organisation. Recently, the agenda has expanded further to cover physical, mental, financial, social and environmental well-being, with payroll providing education regarding a variety of products and services. Mr. Crumbitt has always been at the forefront of well-being initiatives. This is probably what prompted his email stating he wanted Crumbitt’s to have a ‘well- being champion’ for each of the five areas of focus (physical, mental, financial, social and environmental). He also wanted the payroll team to help him host an event to seek out volunteers. Ever happy to accommodate Mr. Another anonymous episode revealing the world of payroll featuring payroll avatar, Penelope (‘Penny’) Fortham, who is payroll manager at the nation’s favourite biscuit makers Crumbitt’s Confections.
Crumbitt’s requests, I gathered the team together to plan for the launch day. We started coming up with marketing ideas, slogans and concepts for the champions and the five themes. We’ve become pretty adept at organising events, so we were quickly able to set up a well-being event, and invited several benefit providers to join us and showcase their offerings. As they all started setting up on the day, Crumbitt’s became very noisy, with laughter yoga in the reception, a bingo session on the factory floor and African drumming in the packing room. Tom had organised a demonstration of e-bikes in the car park to show how environmental well-being and physical well-being could work together. The highlight involved an opportunity to complete a cycling proficiency test on an e-bike by navigating an obstacle course and taking an online test. Tony decided the best way to promote environmental well-being was to host a University Challenge -themed quiz called ‘Environmentally Challenged’, in which a team from sales took on a team from new product development. The outcome wasn’t even close and seemed to suggest that salespeople have way more time to digest the daily news as they emerged victorious, with a clear win. Having allowed everyone to dip their toe into well-being, the final task of the day was
to look for some well-being champions, to be ambassadors for each of the areas across the business. They would all wear lanyards and be sources of expertise and assistance for any employee questions. Amazingly, the day had gone so well that Mr. Crumbitt was able to appoint two champions for each area. Additionally, every staff member who came along was given a sapling to plant in their garden and a free sample of Mr. Crumbitt’s new self-bake kale and cucumber cookies. I’ll let you decide if they sound like heaven or the stuff of nightmares… It’s easy to be a bit dismissive of work- based initiatives sometimes but, ultimately, we all know that well-being plays a significant role in creating a happy, productive and resilient workplace. The payroll team have become important cogs in facilitating schemes to support, and are ambassadors for all aspects of well-being. I couldn’t be prouder that we’ve naturally transitioned in this direction. The launch has also reminded me that us payrollers also need to make sure we keep each other well and follow our own guidance. o The Editor: Any resemblance to any payroll manager or professional alive or dead, or any payroll department or organisation whether apparently or actually portrayed in this article is simply fortuitous.
| Professional in Payroll, Pensions and Reward | April 2022 | Issue 79 48
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