Do you need strategies to communicate payroll’s value at the executive level? Find out how your peers do so in The Payroll Community’s CPO Forum.

This invite-only online community, launched in October 2025, has already sparked its first strategic executive discussion among your fellow payroll executives.

“Payroll leaders do more than run operations—we drive strategy,” posted Linda Obertin, CPP, Senior Director, HR and Global Lead Payroll at Hilton Worldwide. “How do you highlight payroll’s impact to senior leadership and ensure payroll has a voice at the table?”

“Using the company’s strategic goals and showing how payroll data, as developed using analytic techniques, can support the goal,” answered PayrollOrg President-Elect Jim Medlock, CPP. “Developing KPIs that support the strategic goals and provide the C-suite with a dashboard regularly showing the status of the progress toward the goals.”

Karen Settembrino, CPP, Product Director, HCM, at Alithya, responded with a list of key strategic points for the C-suite that hit on the myriad functions and roles of the payroll department, which include the following:

• Payroll as a Trust Builder

• Payroll as a Data-Driven Partner

• Payroll as a Brand Ambassador

• Payroll as a Compliance Guardian

• Payroll as a Catalyst for Employee Experience

“Payroll is more than a transactional function—it’s a cornerstone of the employee experience,” Settembrino said. “Every paycheck reflects the organization’s commitment to accuracy, timeliness, and fairness. When payroll is seamless, employees feel valued and secure. When it’s flawed, trust erodes quickly.” 

Another question posed in the CPO Forum addressed the importance of analytics in the payroll space—adding to the key discussions that drive payroll at the highest levels.

 What KPIs or metrics do you use to show payroll’s impact?

“Accuracy and timeliness are a given, but what other measures help you demonstrate payroll’s value to leadership and the broader business?” asked Nadia Camerena, CPP, Director of Global Payroll Operations at Netflix. 

“Indeed, some baseline KPIs include accuracy (input, output), timeliness (payments, filings), and efficiency (e.g., time to pay), but those may be more operational/tactical,” said Max van der Klis-Busink, MCIPP, RPP, Owner and Author of “Passion for Payroll” and PayrollOrg’s Vice President of Global Strategy. “The question is, what matters to the execs?”

You too can share your insights with fellow C-suite payroll professionals and help shape the future of payroll in this invite-only community. Be a part of the latest CPO Forum discussion today.

Bryan Kirk is Senior Writer and Editor of Membership Publications for PayrollOrg.