Humans of Payroll Podcast: Real-World Insights from Payroll Luminaries

The first time I met Melanie Pizzey was about 4 weeks after I started at Immedis, during the summer last year. For those of you who don’t know, Melanie is the CEO of the Global Payroll Association, one of two massive membership organizations for global payroll professionals.

The GPA does lots of things as part of its remit – the website provides resources, training courses, and in-depth country data. Melanie also brings the community together at payroll events across the globe, as well as delivering best of breed content through webinars, podcasts and symposiums.

The global payroll community is small, compared to the domestic payroll alumni. The level of knowledge their jobs require is very challenging – with highly complex payroll and taxation changes happening every week. COVID-19 just added to that complexity but also brought the people who are responsible for the delivery of global payroll to the fore. And it is this increased prominence that inspired Melanie to develop her new podcast – Humans of Payroll.

Before Humans of Payroll, Melanie produced and presented the Women in Payroll podcast, which featured inspirational women from all over the world who help to lead and transform global payroll. The guest list included women leaders like Debbie Piacitelli from WL Gore and Associates and Angela Wagner from Hilton.

Melanie established the Humans of Payroll podcast to celebrate the first-rate people in payroll teams all over the world. The initial question we typically ask at the start of every interview, which I love, is: “How did you get started working in payroll?” Because even though payroll is such an important role in any organization, global or not, little kids don’t usually dream about becoming payroll managers! We talk about what they have learned in their career, the challenges they have experienced, how they grew their roles, what they love about it and much more.

And because we were in the middle of COVID at the recording, we also talk what they look forward to most after lockdown, and generally these are small things – a pint at the local, seeing their friends for the first time and tasting their favorite meal from a restaurant.

These chats help us get to know some of the most influential and charismatic people in payroll, on a human level. Melanie’s interview style gets people talking about their good times and bad, in a really natural and honest way.

We co-host the podcasts, but really it is all Melanie. It has been a privilege to join these conversations and to get to know some fascinating people.

The inaugural Humans of Payroll podcast is with Ricardo Reinkopf, Senior Director of Global Payroll at Delivery Hero. Ricardo talks about how he came to payroll by chance and caught the bug. He travelled the world on his payroll journey, helped by the multiple languages he speaks. Ricardo champions collaboration with other departments and the promotion of the payroll profession.

We then spoke to Andrew Finch, who is the HR Operations and Payroll Manager at Cambridge Education Group - to discuss his payroll journey and views on the industry's future. In this conversation, Andrew talks about the project that his team won in the Transformation Project of the Year category at the 2020 Global Payroll Awards. This is one of the most coveted awards and it’s the last one given during the awards ceremony. During the podcast, Andrew offers lots of advice for people taking on massive transformation projects and talks about why and how this one was so successful.

There are many more podcasts to come, and during my time as co-host, I have met some really extraordinary individuals, all who are making global payroll more strategic and relevant to modern business.

Finally the idea behind these podcasts is to support, inform and inspire other people working in global payroll. Melanie has also developed a lot of resources for members wellbeing, like a Mindfulness for Wellbeing session they did for all members in April which you can see here. This evolved into a new mindfulness and wellness section that the GPA has for all its members.

Melanie is one of those rare people who unites people to work together and do better. She is an exceptional speaker and highly entertaining, and she gets the best out of people. Once COVID is over, I cannot wait to meet her for a drink in London!

You can listen to Melanie’s podcasts wherever you listen.