HR Specialist - Payroll & Compliance

We are seeking a meticulous and proactive Payroll & People Operations Professional to oversee payroll processing, HR operations, and labor compliance across our Southeast Asian markets—Vietnam, Taiwan, Philippines, Indonesia, and Thailand. This role is critical to ensuring smooth employee lifecycle management and adherence to local employment laws and regulatory frameworks.

1. Key Responsibilities

• Manage end-to-end payroll processing
• Liaise with local payroll vendors and ensure timely and accurate salary disbursement.
• Maintain payroll records and ensure compliance with statutory reporting and tax filings.
• Reconcile payroll data with finance and accounting teams
• Support in budget allocations and chargebacks
• Stay up to date with labor laws, social security, tax regulations, and employment standards in each country.
• Ensure HR policies and practices are compliant with local regulations.
• Coordinate audits and respond to government inquiries or inspections.
• Develop and implement internal controls and documentation for compliance tracking.
• Support onboarding, offboarding, and employee data management across the region.
• Administer benefits programs and ensure alignment with local market standards.
• Maintain HRIS systems and ensure data accuracy and confidentiality.
• Partner with cross-functional teams to improve employee experience and operational efficiency

1. Key Requirements

• Bachelor’s/master’s degree, with a certification in labour law or compliance is highly desirable.
• 8-10 years of experience in handling statutory compliance, payroll compliance, payroll operations is preferrable
• 5+ years of mandatory experience in payroll and HR operations, preferably across multiple Southeast Asian countries.
• Strong understanding of regional labor laws and statutory requirements.
• Experience working with international payroll systems and HRIS platforms.
• Excellent communication and stakeholder management skills.
• Fluency in English; proficiency in one or more local languages is a plus

1. Skills & Competencies needed:

• Excellent written and verbal communication skills; highly capable of exercising tact, discretion, and diplomacy
• Superior analytical skills and the ability to approach problems flexibly and creatively.
• Customer centricity
• Positive display of motivation (attitude) and lead by example
• Expertise in effectively balancing workflow among team members
• Exceptional problem solving, time management, and organizational skills.
• Excellent communication and people skills for effective collaboration with employees and regulatory authorities.
• Unrivalled diligence and consistent delivery of the highest quality of work
• Skilled at effectively managing and prioritizing tasks, escalations or business critical situations
• Cultural awareness & sensitivity across countries
• Strong ability in MS excel, and its functionalities.