Senior Manager, Regional Payroll Lead (South Asia and CEMEA)

About Us
Visa is a world leader in payments technology, facilitating transactions between consumers, merchants, financial institutions and government entities across more than 200 countries and territories, dedicated to uplifting everyone, everywhere by being the best way to pay and be paid.

At Visa, you'll have the opportunity to create impact at scale — tackling meaningful challenges, growing your skills and seeing your contributions impact lives around the world.

Join Visa and do work that matters – to you, to your community, and to the world. Progress starts with you.

Job Description

The Senior Manager, Regional Payroll Lead role oversees payroll operations across South Asia and Central Europe Middle East and Africa (CEMEA), focusing on strategic leadership by translating priorities into objectives and roadmaps, managing payroll delivery with compliance and efficiency, developing governance policies and handling audits, engaging stakeholders and vendors, supporting acquisitions and leading projects, and fostering talent development and a safe work environment.

The high level role requirements are listed below -

• Payroll Operations oversight and execution

  • Lead team to deliver end to end payroll, ensure compliance, maintain GL, improve efficiency.

  • Partner with global organization and stakeholders to develop and execute policies, handle requests, ensure alignment.

  • Provide context to the team in order to enable them to understand and execute efficiently and effectively.

  • Challenge the status quo.

  • Handle internal and external Payroll audits.

• Stakeholders engagement and management

  • Lead payroll projects or change requests to improve the current processes and communication.

  • Build relationships with internal and external stakeholders. Communicate with them in a way that the message is tailored to the audience.

  • Share and retrieve information of strategic value to all parties. Use this information to create an execution strategy.

  • Ability to explain why work matters, what is the long-term value it delivers, and how it aligns with organizational goals.

  • Lead reviews with third parties vendors, ensuring adherence to SLAs.

  • Work with third party vendors and internal partners to remedy SLAs and delivery issues.

  • Facilitate regular payroll vendor discussion on service level and expectations, keeping the vendors accountable for their service delivery.

  • Use information acquired from conversations with stakeholders to enable our team to do their work.

  • Empower upstream reporting line and stakeholders by communicating information and events timely and with context.

  • Set or reset expectations around solutions, speed of execution and deliverables.

• Project management and transformation

  • Support acquisitions and lead projects.

  • Engage stakeholders early to avoid surprises.

  • Keep detailed records of roles and responsibilities, minutes of meetings and take initiative to drive accountability.

  • When projects involve change, develop concise summaries of outcomes and expectations, provide timelines and clarify what is required from each stakeholder group.

  • Engage timely and proactively to communicate any change to the parties involved and impacted by such changes.

  • Focus on delivering beyond the task at hand.

  • Regularly review progress and adjust plans to maintain strategic alignment.

  • Apply prioritization frameworks to focus on high-impact initiatives.

  • Support to build a roadmap that connects initiatives to strategic outcomes.

  • Validate assumptions through experiments and data.

• People Leadership and Talent Development

  • Drive team performance, fostering accountability, and enabling long‑term career growth for each team member

  • Focus on measurable impact, not task-based metrics.

  • Empower team to take ownership of their work.

  • Support career growth and development planning with documentation, roadmaps and conversations.

  • Create and maintain inclusive, psychologically safe environment.

  • Create and share recognition and foster engagement as part of strategic leadership.

  • Coach team members on writing OKRs (Objectives and Key Results) that reflect organizational vision.

  • Use performance calibration conversations to set clear expectations and promote a growth mindset.

  • Ensuring every team member understands the strategic link between their work and organizational goals.

  • Ensure that the team is appraised on discussion, projects and that as such, they are enable to participate in conversations themselves and live changes and our values.

  • Include stretch goals that push the team beyond comfort zones while remaining achievable.

  • Define objectives that are qualitative, outcome-driven, and business-aligned.

  • Translating high-level strategy into actionable team OKRs.

  • Review build and execute an effectiveness framework.

  • Role-play and feedback sessions (for example using the GROW model) to refine strategic thinking within the team.

Visa requires at least 3 days in office, expectations of these days will be confirmed by your Hiring Manager. ​

Qualifications

Basic Qualifications:

• 12 or more years of relevant work experience with a Bachelor Degree or at least 5 years of experience with an Advanced Degree (e.g. Masters, MBA, JD, MD) or 3 years of work experience with a PhD 

Preferred Qualifications:

• 12 or more years of relevant work experience with a Bachelor Degree or 7 or more relevant years of experience with an Advanced Degree (e.g. Masters, MBA, JD, MD) or 3 or more years of experience with a PhD
• Core Leadership and People Management (Non-Negotiable):
• More than 15 years of progressive leadership experience in Regional or Global Payroll or Shared Services environments, with a demonstrated track record of building, leading, and sustaining high performing, multi country teams at scale.
• Minimum 12 years of people leadership experience, leading mid to large teams (more than 10 FTE), including developing future leaders, managing performance, driving engagement, and leading through change, particularly in remote and matrixed environments.
• Proven ability to lead leaders, not just teams — with experience coaching managers or SMEs, setting clear accountability, and establishing strong people management rhythms in a shared services model.
• Stakeholder and Executive Leadership:
• Exceptional stakeholder management capabilities, with a consistent track record of partnering with senior business leaders and executives to balance service excellence, risk management, and operational efficiency.
• Demonstrated ability to communicate complex payroll topics clearly and confidently to executives, people leaders, and employees, including ownership of employee facing communications during sensitive payroll matters or changes.
• Strong executive presence with the ability to influence across regions, cultures, and functions, operating effectively in cross regional, highly matrixed organizations.
• Shared Services and Vendor Leadership:
• Strong experience operating within or leading shared services models, with clear accountability for service delivery, employee experience, and continuous improvement.
• Proven vendor leadership and governance experience, including managing strategic vendor partnerships, contractual negotiations, service level agreements, and performance management to outcomes.
• Technical and Regional Expertise (Enabling Skillset):
• Bachelor’s degree in Accounting, Human Resources, or equivalent experience.
• Deep working knowledge of payroll operations and labor regulations across South Asia and CEMEA regions, with key markets including (but not limited to) India, UAE, South Africa, Ukraine, and Egypt.
• Strong understanding of payroll risk, compliance, and controls within complex, multi country environments.
• Operational Excellence and Ways of Working:
• Experience driving service metrics, process optimization, and transformation initiatives, with the ability to translate data into executive ready insights and actions.
• Highly organized and outcomes focused, with the ability to prioritize, lead multiple initiatives, and deliver results in fast paced, evolving environments.
• Comfortable operating in hands on yet strategic roles, balancing people leadership, executive engagement, and operational rigor.

Visa is an EEO Employer

Qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, national origin, sexual orientation, gender identity, disability or protected veteran status. Visa will also consider for employment qualified applicants with criminal histories in a manner consistent with EEOC guidelines and applicable local law.