Professional June 2017

Confessions of a payroll manager – “And the winner is…”

Another episode in a series of occasional yet insightful / inciteful, anonymous and whimsical reports revealing the arcane, weird and sometimes torturous world of payroll frequented by payroll professionals. I I’ve never won anything in my whole life that wasn’t the result of a tombola or a lucky dip. And surprisingly in both instances the prize was a matchbox toy car which I neither wanted nor kept – but my younger brother Martin was a very happy recipient. So, given my history of (not) winning things, I was more than a little surprised when Mr Crumbitt burst into the office a couple of weeks ago, blew a fanfare on his beloved kazoo and announced that the team had been shortlisted for the Confectionery Manufacturers Technology Implementation Team of the Year! My flabber was ghasted, as was that of the rest of the team when I passed on the exciting news (without kazoo accompaniment this time). Such scenes of jubilation had not been seen at the factory since Mr Crumbitt bet Towering Tony he could beat him in a roller skate-off around the factory car park – and won! I’m not the competitive type – well, I didn’t think I was – but I couldn’t help myself that evening when Google beckoned me to ‘search’ out the other nominees. Before I knew it I was scouring web pages like a tenacious detective, looking for any clues of flaws or potential ‘winning’ formulas. To be honest, by 2a.m. the following morning I had convinced myself that we had about as much chance of winning as Mr Crumbitt had of making his latest offering of toffee and green

bean biscotti even vaguely edible. These companies were massive and always in the Confectionary Times. Still, I told myself to stay positive for the team and so, on awards night, we made our way to the hotel and prepared ourselves for the ceremony. ‘Prepared’ to me means a nice dress, a bit of straightening of the usually frizzy mane and a pair of kitten heels, but to Evie it seemed to mean a whole hair, face and body makeover that rendered her almost unrecognisable. I walked past her twice in the foyer completely oblivious before she tapped me on the head with her long cigarette holder – sans cigarette – and waved in my face. A stunner no doubt but, honestly, I missed our Evie and felt happier when she wrenched her impossibly high heels off about half an hour in and put her bare feet on my lap. Much better. We were seated on the same table as one of our main rivals – Brookfell’s Bits and Biscuits – which initially filled us with dread. Jace had sent some slightly ‘challenging’ tweets their way a year ago (which had only been deleted when I spotted them three hours later) that meant the first few minutes were spent apologising for the ‘rashness of youth’ and ‘the passion of an apprentice’. Thankfully Jace had done a lot of growing up since then and managed to completely smooth over the whole thing while securing himself ‘a business lunch’ with their head of social media. Before long the two teams were chatting away like old friends, sharing business cards and biscuit based catastrophes! It finally came to the awards themselves and we watched – me with little expectation but the rest of the team seemingly with

prepared speeches – as each award winner was announced. Our category was one of the last to be announced and, like every country’s Eurovision entry awaiting the results, we all linked hands under the table. I took a moment to look at their excited faces and realised how close we’d become and how much this meant to them. For the first time I allowed myself a little bit of hope too. As the host read out the nominees then started to make allusions to the winner my heart started fluttering…”an amazing apprentice”, “moving payslips online” and then a “biscuit factory with a lovable owner”. As he read out our name we went crackers (fittingly) and near skipped to the stage to collect the award. Although we all went to the stage the team insisted I carry the trophy for the subsequent photos. Though initially I thought they were being kind I realised quickly that this singled me out for interviewing. I didn’t mind though as I was proud of them all and was happy to talk about them to the Confectionary Times (yay, at last) and other publications. So, I learned some valuable lessons that night: principally, to believe in myself and my (awesome) team, but also to not be scared to shout about our successes. Everybody likes some recognition so when you get the chance to be in the spotlight, take it and celebrate it because who knows when the next chance will come. ❑ 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 | June 2017 | Issue 31 54

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