Payroll Is a Trust Function with Special Guest Kelly Westfall

[00:00:07] [SPEAKER_01] Welcome everyone to another episode of the HR & Payroll 2.0. I'm Pete Tiliakos and as always, I'm joined by the legendary Julie Fernandez. Welcome, Julie.

[00:00:15] [SPEAKER_03] Thank you, Pete. And I think we're excited to talk to Kelly Westfall today. So let's get rolling.

[00:00:22] [SPEAKER_01] Yeah, very excited to invite Kelly. Kelly is a payroll leader in the community that I've gotten to know by way of our good friends, John Bernatovicz and Tammy Gillenwater over at Willory Consulting. They got me connected with Kelly, good friends of Tammy's, and I was like, we got to get you on the show. So welcome to the show, Kelly.

[00:00:39] [SPEAKER_02] Thank you so much. I love being here today. Thanks for having me.

[00:00:42] [SPEAKER_01] Yeah, absolutely. I'm excited. I don't know, Julie, if you follow Kelly. She's quite passionate about what she does. She's been in this payroll game a minute. We're going to learn about that. But I want to talk about that passion a little bit because I've been experiencing some things lately that I want to kind of talk about here and see what your thoughts are and all that. And yeah, go from there. So, Julie, you want to do the honors?

[00:01:02] [SPEAKER_03] I do, because, Kelly, we love to find out how people even got into this space. We know it's not, you know, the thing you grow up wishing to be. In fact, if you had been asked, like we asked our young folks today what you were going to be when you grow up, what would you have said? And then how the heck did you get here?

[00:01:18] [SPEAKER_02] Well, I definitely wouldn't have said that I was going to be a payroll leader at all. I actually did a fun Toastmasters icebreaker and it said, payroll, how in the world did I end up here? But actually, earlier in my career, I started off just I thought I was going I wanted to go into business and I was an office manager. And then I switched careers and I started going. I enjoyed HR.

[00:01:45] [SPEAKER_02] I found out that I really loved HR and I was really good at onboarding. I like that personal connection and really helping people figure out what they need to do when they started working at a company. And I'm outgoing and I'm an extrovert. And so it just really spoke to that part of me. But what I found out in my 30s is that my manager had realized that I was really good at terminating people.

[00:02:15] [SPEAKER_02] Oh, no. I was in HR. I ended up at a staffing agency from several moves and I ended up working there. There, my manager found out that I was really good at not just onboarding, but also offboarding. And so I became known as, you know, lovingly called the Terminator. And so that's pretty heavy.

[00:02:40] [SPEAKER_02] And and so what I used to love doing became something that I actually dreaded doing. I really like connecting, you know, good employees with good companies. I don't enjoy terminating people. And so I had to take a good long look at myself and say, OK, am I going to continue down this path or I'm going to do something else? And so I'm a former military spouse. So I was I had actually come home.

[00:03:08] [SPEAKER_02] My husband was on an underway and I took a side gig just to do something while I was at home because he was like, you just need to go relax your mind a little bit and just, you know, go to your family. And so I came home. I took a it took a temporary job. And the person that they hired to do their payroll had ended up leaving and they were looking for a payroll person. And so I raised my hand. I said, I would enjoy doing this.

[00:03:36] [SPEAKER_02] And that's actually how I started my payroll course. I was just an HR, never even thought like, I'm going to go for payroll. It fell in my lap. And I have a much extent because just like I took pride in connecting good companies with good people. I think it's I think it's very honorable work to pay people. You know, people, unfortunately, in this day and age live paycheck to paycheck. They just simply do.

[00:04:06] [SPEAKER_02] And if I can get the paycheck right for the employees and also get just the taxes right for the employer, you know, I can really I really go home and I take pride in that. And I can look at myself in the mirror and say, man, I make a difference. And I think that's what a lot of us want to do. We want to make a difference in this world. And I believe in what I do. And so that's how I kind of ended up payroll. That's awesome.

[00:04:28] [SPEAKER_01] What an awesome story. You went from what's the movie with George Clooney where he would fly around?

[00:04:33] [SPEAKER_03] I couldn't remember the name either, but they made a movie about your exact role. Yeah, right.

[00:04:39] [SPEAKER_01] He was a consultant, I think, that flew around and terminated, you know, did downsizing type work. And it was like, you know, he had all the perks, but he was had a soulless job that he didn't really love, you know. So we're glad you're glad you're made your way to the positive world of payroll. So for sure. But why do you stick around? What keeps you here?

[00:04:55] [SPEAKER_02] Again, I think I just, I love what I do. I love what I do. I love being able to pay people. I love being able to pay them rightly. I've seen companies that haven't or they don't know what they're doing. And so payroll isn't really under finance and payroll isn't really under HR. It's its own niche. And it really, I nerd out on both. I am, I am a nerd on math. I love, I have games on my phone. That's just like, how quickly can you solve these math problems? And no, I'm a dwarf, right?

[00:05:26] [SPEAKER_02] But I'm also an extrovert and I feel like it's the best of both worlds. I really get to connect. Like all of my customers are the employees that work here at the company and I get to help them. And so I guess, I mean, I guess that's why I say I'm very passionate of what I do. I love being able to pay people and pay them well.

[00:05:44] [SPEAKER_01] Yeah. Well, people are emotional about it, right? It's their pay. It's their livelihood. It's their, it's everything for most people. And why they, why most of us work. Why they go to work, right? Exactly. We do it for something. Pay the bills, right? It's emotional. I learned that young that, you know, again, I was fortunate to be in the military maintaining HR data. And I figured out really, really early on that that data was everything to their promotion and their pay. And all of that made, made so much, you know, it wasn't just a data point.

[00:06:12] [SPEAKER_01] To me, it was something meaningful to them as their careers, their futures, their family. And I think that's the part that, that people don't think about, about payroll that aren't in payroll.

[00:06:20] [SPEAKER_03] And it's also just as often as we hear, nobody starts out trying to be in payroll. Very few, few people have, you know, followed their father's footsteps. I remember there are some others, but, but, but the thing universally that keeps a lot of folks in payroll and HR is that human touch bit. And just the, it's a self-satisfaction, the rewarding part of your job and knowing that it does matter, even if it's the most unsung hero role in the entire organization, right? You know, you know that you're getting their pay right.

[00:06:50] [SPEAKER_03] And you know what antics you'd have to go through to keep it right and to solve issues. And even though they'll never appreciate that probably or understand how complicated it was, it's enough to bring you self-satisfaction. You know, it sounds like for you and for a lot of others. We've heard it regularly.

[00:07:07] [SPEAKER_01] Yes, indeed. From day one that you got into payroll to now, what's like, what's changed in your lens? What, what do you see that's the good and the bad of, of payroll now and then?

[00:07:16] [SPEAKER_02] So when I started off, things were very old school and it was like a do as I say type of atmosphere and tends to lens to toxicity, right? Like I can push the button and get the output that I need, but can you tell me why I'm pushing the button? So when there is a kink in the chain, I can figure out why it's happening.

[00:07:41] [SPEAKER_02] And when I was first in my career, I didn't get very much support in that aspect. And I feel like over the last, I don't know, at least last 10 years of my career, maybe even more heavily in the last seven, there's so much more support out there. And maybe it's because I didn't know about maybe some of the, like the local chapters, like I'm a part of a chapter now, but there's so much room to say, Hey, I don't have to be

[00:08:10] [SPEAKER_02] the holder of all the information. I want you to be able to be knowledgeable as well. And it shouldn't just be the CPA in our firm. It should also be you. So I feel like that has changed a lot from the beginning of my career to now. And now I find that companies want to go ahead and say, yeah, you know what? These payroll professionals need to expand their knowledge. How can we get them resources and tools? And there's resources and tools everywhere. There are free webinars that people can attend. There are local places that they can get networked with.

[00:08:40] [SPEAKER_02] When I first started out in payroll, I never heard of payroll networking. At all. And now it's rampant. I mean, I've never even heard of a payroll podcast. You know what I mean? There's so much. So technology is great. And I feel that it's really becoming its own niche. As you said, Pete, it's not really under HR. It's not really under finances. It's its own house. And so that's where I think that things have changed from the beginning of my career to now.

[00:09:07] [SPEAKER_02] And like I said, I know that it does differ from company to company, but I feel like more and more companies are saying, how can we empower you to be the best that you can be? Because we want the best of the best. And so how can we do that?

[00:09:20] [SPEAKER_03] I think what's fun about that, Kelly, that you're highlighting is, you know, a lot of times we talk about how the payroll technology has evolved and how much better it's gotten and how much more automated and how much smarter. But a lot of the points that you're making are just even our connectedness in society. So it's the social media platforms. It's the collaboration tools in your own organization. And then being able to take what maybe was always a chapter meeting locally, but then being

[00:09:47] [SPEAKER_03] able to have more robust and kind of constant contact with peers that are doing the same thing. So, you know, I think that just changes the nature of how we work. And it's a different dimension that we don't always talk about either on the show. And it makes it feel like there's community there. Yes. Yeah.

[00:10:05] [SPEAKER_02] I'm just so grateful for all of the chat rooms, LinkedIn chat rooms, podcasts that us payroll professionals can be part of and listen to and learn from and grow from. I'm just incredibly grateful for that.

[00:10:19] [SPEAKER_01] Yeah. Agreed. Yeah. I say this all the time. Like payroll has fundamentally has one of the best communities I've been around. HR, I think is as well. In looking out for each other, sharing knowledge, helping people grow, helping people answer questions. And I always tell payroll leaders, like don't sit in silence and suffer in silence. Like somebody out there has the same thing, problem that you're dealing with. Someone out there is, is facing the same challenge and, and, and you can get that answer from the community. They're more than willing to help you.

[00:10:46] [SPEAKER_01] So get, you know, find a buddy, find a peer, find a community that they'll help you. And they're everywhere. They're Facebook, there's Reddit, you know, you name it. But there's another part of this that you talked about that I literally, literally in these last, I'd say in the last, um, let me think about this. Maybe the last two to three weeks, I've had probably three pair of leaders who are career professionals in payroll that are finding themselves in an organization that just fundamentally won't mature. And not just necessarily the investments in payroll, but I'm talking about the attitude towards payroll.

[00:11:16] [SPEAKER_01] If I released all of the, all of the qual qualitative feedback from the payroll profession confidence index, it would be absolutely, it's heartbreaking to listen to the way that some of these payroll leaders are being treated and it's burning people the hell out. There are a number of people, like I said, that I have talked to that are like, I don't, you know, not, I'm not saying they're questioning their careers or they're questioning continuing with their employer necessarily, but they're at a point where they're like, well, is this ever really going to change? Like what, what, what is the end game here?

[00:11:42] [SPEAKER_01] If my employer doesn't care, how can I really invoke any change? Right. And I, I feel so awful for them, but I want to ask you that. Like you sound like you're in a good culture, right?

[00:11:52] [SPEAKER_02] I am in an amazing culture. I'm at an amazing company.

[00:11:55] [SPEAKER_01] Yeah.

[00:11:56] [SPEAKER_02] Now, sometimes you have to be the change that you want to see. And sometimes you have to be that consistently. And sometimes you have to invest in yourself. You were talking earlier and it just reminded me, my dad has told me throughout the years, he was like, Kelly, he was like, you learned something from everyone and there's never wasted time. You could wait the pain of these experiences or you can learn from it and say, okay, well, whenever I'm now leading this, this, this team at work, or when I'm in a different company,

[00:12:24] [SPEAKER_02] I'm not going to lead that way from how I'd seen, or man, that, that person was amazing. Or this company was made. I'm going to take this nugget of what they've given me. I'm going to take this into my career and I'm going to share that with others. So I want to say my heart does break for people that do not get supported. You hear it everywhere. Like you were saying, Pete, but I can't.

[00:12:47] [SPEAKER_01] It's everywhere.

[00:12:48] [SPEAKER_02] Many times I have paid for things myself because I am simply worth the investment because the investment isn't.

[00:12:55] [SPEAKER_01] Yeah. Agreed.

[00:12:56] [SPEAKER_02] Time thing. No other investment really is in the networking. I do multi-state payroll and I have networked with people that when I, perfect example happened just within this last month, I think it was like three weeks ago. We had a new employee working remotely from home in Kentucky. I'm used to Kentucky, Louisville, Metro, and the non one. I'm used to those taxes, but I know that Louis, that Kentucky has different taxes just like Ohio does.

[00:13:23] [SPEAKER_02] I now had a point of contact that I could pick up and talk to my friend, Tim, that I've met through this networking event. And he helped me be a success instead of way spinning my wheels, trying to look for an hour to what the laws would be. He was able to, oh, this is what you need to do. And oh, listen, I'm going to give you the resources for you to be a success. So Tim Wallen, I love him. He's out of Kentucky. If you guys know Tim Wallen, he's amazing. Shut up. So yeah, I'm shocked. Yeah.

[00:13:50] [SPEAKER_01] No, that's great. That's the, that's the community though. Right. I mean, I agree. And I think I, you know, what I've been telling, I love what you said in the beginning about, about, you know, leading the change you want. That's what I've been trying to tell some of these leaders. Like, listen, you're going to have to, you may reach an inflection point where it's, it's, it's whether or not this employer is right for you and, and, and maybe you have to move on. I hate to say that, but, but I think it's a lot about just leading, right? I think a lot of, I think payroll has historically been led and they have to start leading and

[00:14:16] [SPEAKER_01] speaking up and having a point of view and using data and, and invoking change themselves. But there are organizations that are never going to change. Right. And that's where you have to make that, make that tough decision. And I've been encouraging some of these leaders that are getting tired of it and saying, Hey, look, you know where you can go, where they value payroll, payroll providers, right? Their, their businesses are growing because we're losing people incredibly fast out of the payroll space. We were never bringing people in very fast to begin with. And we're burning these people out and we're, and we're telling the world that we don't need

[00:14:46] [SPEAKER_01] them anymore because of AI, which is just bigger suicide than what, what, what you were doing already with ignoring payroll to begin with. So it's like, you know, I, I've been telling them like, look, lead to the best of your ability, right? Do what you can with what you have. But if you reach a point where you recognize you're, you're, you're just treading water in the ocean, you may have to swim to another Island. And if that means going to, you know, another employer, fine, but maybe they'd go to somewhere where payroll is actually a product and they value it and they'll train you and invest in you. And you know, so.

[00:15:15] [SPEAKER_03] This is a universal message too, for the younger generations as you get in, because you don't start out as a leader, typically, you know, you have a lot of one person payroll organizations, but if you start in it and you see things you like, or you don't like about it, take those into the next opportunity and recognize it doesn't happen just in payroll or just in HR. Anything you start out doing is going to feel like it's got its bumps and you're going to not like everything about it.

[00:15:41] [SPEAKER_03] And so, you know, rather than, you know, abandon, change course, you know, get another master's or whatever the heck people do these days, you know, realize that you can take those lessons learned and plan to make that difference happen yourself. And I, you know, I don't know that that's the instant thinking anymore. I think a lot of times folks are like, oh, well, that wasn't for me. Let me try, you know. Yeah. We try construction, you know, like dramatically different.

[00:16:07] [SPEAKER_01] We've been doing some, we've been doing some episodes. I do a lot of work with vendors or my clients. Typically I'm working with them from a strategic perspective. So a lot of that ends up being marketing and brand and go to market. And I've been trying to really, in some of these episodes that I've recorded, try to draw out the points of view that, that, that practitioners can use for how to market their own organizations and their own value. Right. Because I think that's one of the things that, again, I've been trying to do in my research as well is try to articulate to the C-suites that there is more value in payroll than just saving money.

[00:16:36] [SPEAKER_01] There's more value than just printing checks, right? There's a significant amount of org agility and other things that payroll can provide or take away if you don't invest, but you gotta, we gotta get that mindset flip. And I just, I don't know that everybody is in that same, same place. So I'm, I guess what I'm asking you, Kelly is like, how do you, how do you feel like you influence in your organization? Like you, you sound like you have a good open ear that will respect you guys. How do you, how do you influence with that and build your brand? Right. I mean, as a, like, cause you have to build a brand as an organization to say, Hey, we

[00:17:06] [SPEAKER_01] need to make some improvements and changes. And in order to influence that, you're going to have to have a brand, some brand equity with the business. Absolutely.

[00:17:12] [SPEAKER_02] And, but I want to talk about something that I'm very passionate about. I like empowering others to level up within themselves. What do I need by that?

[00:17:21] [SPEAKER_01] We need it.

[00:17:21] [SPEAKER_02] How do we get from payroll processor to payroll supervisor to payroll manager to be a trusted employee in the C-suite's ear? And that's by one thing, you cannot act the same way that you did when you were younger as you are now. You have to show up consistently. You have to come to listen and not to just give the correct answer per the letter of the law. You have to be able to listen and to be able to give input.

[00:17:49] [SPEAKER_02] But so I have a colleague of mine who I love, but she has been stopped being asked into rooms. And I'll tell you why she's been stopped being asked into rooms. She had all of the subject matter experts. She had the letter of the law, but it was how she was communicating to the table members that were there. And you cannot go into a, you can, I highly recommend not going into these rooms being combative.

[00:18:20] [SPEAKER_02] You know, I told her, I said, you are now with decision makers. You are with decision makers and what these decision makers are doing. This is not your company. Although I'm glad you're taking pride. This is like, this is the company that you were getting. You want to do, but you were being brought to the table for your subject matter knowledge. And so when you were asked for that and you give it, they then can determine, are we going to take that risk and not do it? Are we going to go ahead and go with that?

[00:18:48] [SPEAKER_02] I said, that is not your decision to make. And every time you come back and you say, well, that's not how it's supposed to be done. And we're not following the law. This isn't your company. I mean, yes, it's where you're working, but like, what are you arguing about really something that's less than worth a thousand dollars to this company? And now you're being stopped being asked to these rooms because you did not know how to communicate once you got there.

[00:19:13] [SPEAKER_02] So I told her, I said, think about all of the managers that you have ever worked with before when it is a firestorm of, you know, answer this, this, and this, and oh my gosh, this is going wrong. And who do you like working with? Do you like working with the ones who are saying, okay, I'm going to bring calm clarity to this situation and I'm take this in and I'm not going to react and respond off of my emotions. We're allowed to feel what we feel, but if we can calm ourselves, calm our mind and steal

[00:19:42] [SPEAKER_02] our nerves to say, okay, I'm going to show up in a calm manner, even though I felt might feel chaotic on the inside, I'm not going to show that on the outside and, and, and show up that way consistently. This is how you get into the C-suite. You cannot, you cannot act like you did when you were a teenager and you cannot engage with others who want to talk about, have a side meeting after a meeting.

[00:20:10] [SPEAKER_02] You cannot engage in those things anymore. You have to be the person that you, that you look up to, you start emulating those characteristics and those qualities.

[00:20:20] [SPEAKER_01] Yeah. You've got to be an influencer now. You've got to have imminence. And I actually have a slide with a mountain on it where I talk about what payroll leaders need to do to get to the top of the mountain, right? The table or whatever we want to call it. And one of them on there I have is a dress for the job you want, not the job you have. Or remember our parents used to tell us that I actually had someone tell me that that's offensive. I don't know why that's offensive to behave. In other words, I may because the word dresses in there, I don't know, but behave the way you want,

[00:20:47] [SPEAKER_01] act like the leader you want people to respect you to be, right? Or whatever. Or you're aspiring to be is what I would say. And that's going to happen exactly like your point. Like it's not necessarily about telling them they're doing it wrong or telling them what to do or not to do. It's about influencing their decision based on your expertise and your data. And Anne-Marie V, who we had on here, shout out to Anne-Marie. One of our early episodes on the whole table conversation is you can't wait around for them to invite you to the table. Payroll is not going to get invited to the table in a lot of cases.

[00:21:18] [SPEAKER_01] You're going to have to get invited. And the way to get invited is you might have to create your own table and start having others invite, come to that. And you build the table you want people to be sitting around. And I think that's wonderful advice. And it goes back to my thing about leading and not being led, right? Influencing and not being led around. And I think that that's the way you're going to do it is you're right. Coming in with data, with facts, with calm and showing the ROI and showing the business

[00:21:45] [SPEAKER_01] get people's heads turned a lot faster than, you know, if you could go in and show a CFO, hey, I saved $50,000 for your business unit last quarter. That's going to stop his, his, his, what he's doing. And he's going to listen and go, wait, wait, tell me more about that. Right. I saw it at Disney in our shared service center. When we first started bringing that to the, to the CFOs of each of these business or the controllers, the very first one we did that with was like, hey, can we do this? Can we talk about other things that I see I want to do now? Now we're having a dialogue, right? Now we're doing this every quarter.

[00:22:13] [SPEAKER_01] And then his, you know, obviously his peers, he starts talking to his peers. Now his peers are trusting us. Now they're showing up to the meetings. Now they're wanting to do the same thing. Now we're making material impact to the business that before no one would have ever even thought to talk to us about. And all we did was do our job and just communicate.

[00:22:29] [SPEAKER_03] I think we have to look at some things as, you know, influence isn't necessarily just a point in time either, you know, influence is something that you build and that you establish. And so whatever that key decision that is being made seems to be irrational or absolutely the wrong thing in your mind, that's okay. That, that, that topic is probably coming around again and again. It will come around with new leaders. It will come around with new business situations and circumstances.

[00:22:56] [SPEAKER_03] And if you didn't have data the first time it came around and you're really passionate about it, then you might ought to think about using the time until the next point of influence to actually collect and be more articulate about what the impact is and, and figure out better. How, how do I influence this when I get the next chance? And, uh, and, and I think otherwise we can be short sighted sometimes and you really have to play the long game.

[00:23:19] [SPEAKER_01] Yeah. It's very consulting, big for consulting mindset you have to have. I think, and I think that's what payroll leaders are going to likely become are very much advisors to their businesses should be, should be advisors to their businesses. And yeah, exactly what Julie's saying. I think you gotta, there's a lot of art and science to that. There's a lot of skill that goes into that. It's not just hard, you know, the, the hard stuff. Like it's, it's the, it's the emotional skills that you have to have internally to negotiate and build eminence and all those things. It's the word of communication. That stuff's really hard.

[00:23:48] [SPEAKER_02] It is. It takes practice. And, oh yes, it does take practice. Yeah. I remember I was, uh, several years ago, two companies ago, I was telling a young lady, we were trying to get at, we were having just our payroll team meetings. There were several of us on the payroll team and certain people would never speak up. And I remember having just a conversation with, um, my colleague and I said, go ahead and just speak up. I said, your face is going to get red and it's okay.

[00:24:16] [SPEAKER_02] You are allowed to have a red face. I said, because nobody's going to judge that red face. I said, and then the next meeting, say something again, even if it's just your opinion on something. I said, your red face will eventually stop. You'll stop getting red and you'll be able to communicate. I said, but you have to begin. I said, and it's just amongst us. We're not even sitting with anybody else. I said, we all care about you and we're not going to say, oh my gosh, you stuttered a little

[00:24:43] [SPEAKER_02] bit or, oh my gosh, your face got red because you were saying something, but you just have to start. And so.

[00:24:50] [SPEAKER_01] What do you think? You're obviously very involved in your chapter. I believe it's the Ohio, the Ohio chapter. Yeah.

[00:24:56] [SPEAKER_02] Greater Agro Canton Payroll Association. Yes. Okay. Okay. Yes. ACPA.

[00:25:00] [SPEAKER_01] Yeah. Yeah. I love it. I love it. But, but like, look, you're, you're obviously, obviously a payroll leader, obviously speaking to other leaders all the time. What do you think is the one thing payroll leaders need right now in, in collectively in the world?

[00:25:13] [SPEAKER_02] Well, I can tell you what I need. I need connection. Yeah. I need connection. I need, because listen, we are responsible for a lot and most of us are in multi-states. And so for me, it's being, it's having a network of, of collaborators. Cause not every person has all of the answers. And you know, one of the things that I love that my chapter does is that you can submit a question and it'll go out to the chapter and then someone will respond to it and say,

[00:25:41] [SPEAKER_02] okay, this is the answer, but this is how I, this is where the answer is on the DOL. So you can take this to your director and show them, okay, not only do I have the answer, but I have the backup for it because listen, we, we don't all have all the answers. And so I, what I think what we need is connection. Cause sometimes I just need to say, Hey, I call D gray from my chapter and Patricia backer from my chapter. I love them.

[00:26:08] [SPEAKER_02] They are my phone of friends and I, and I'll tell them, I'm like, listen, am I tracking correctly? This is what I've read. And I haven't done this for a year. And am I doing this rightly? Am I reading? And they'll either say yay or nay, and we'll talk through it. So that's what I think payroll leaders need. I think they need connection with other payroll leaders.

[00:26:26] [SPEAKER_01] Yeah. Yeah. But Kelly, look, I gotta, we gotta wrap this up. I really, I really appreciate it. But I want to talk a little bit about your, um, you do a lot of public speaking, a lot of contributing to the payroll community. Um, what inspired you to do that? And what's, uh, how's that, how's that helped you like as a leader personally?

[00:26:40] [SPEAKER_02] Well, I was asked to do it. And so that I, I didn't have that on my horizons to do, but I was asked. And then, uh, I've always led trainings here on a company level, right? I speak to teams. I speak to C-suite. I speak to it all, but I've never spoke to other payroll professionals. And so I was asked if I would do it. And of course I was nervous, but brave, you know, talk about being brave. I'm, I'm, I'm courageous.

[00:27:07] [SPEAKER_02] I'm going to do it, whether I'm shaking in my book or not.

[00:27:10] [SPEAKER_00] Shout out, shout out to Tammy and John and their book. There's a big segment on being brave and payroll like a boss.

[00:27:15] [SPEAKER_02] And so I was just brave enough to do it. And, and from there, the doors have just kept opening up. And last year was my only true beginning of public speaking. And I ended up having six speaking engagements and I've already have five on the books for this year. And it's, I realized that I like empowering others, you know, girls compete, women empower. Period. And I'm not a girl, I'm a woman and I empower.

[00:27:41] [SPEAKER_02] And so, and so it's just brought a whole new dimension that I didn't even think about before. And so I'm passionate about knowledge sharing. I don't think one person needs to have all of the information. I think together we're better. I think together we can do great things. And I know I need people. I need a community of people and I want to be a community for somebody else. And so this is one way that I can give back.

[00:28:06] [SPEAKER_02] And it has just been the most wildly bizarre, crazy, fun, exciting ride that I've ever been I had no idea that this was, this was not something that I was gunning for that I was going to go after. But now that it's here, I'm just like, yes, of course.

[00:28:24] [SPEAKER_01] Yeah. It's a good skill. We've talked a lot about this, right? About influencing and, and building eminence. And that's certainly a great way to do it is, is teaching and giving back and public speaking. And, and by the way, it builds your network, right? Your network grows infinitely and your, your network is your net worth. As they say.

[00:28:40] [SPEAKER_02] And then like, I have, I have a, this viewpoint of, I try to give very meaningful information. I talk about taxes and I have been in tax seminars where you're just like, you want to poke your eye out. It's like watching paint dry. I know. It's a Bueller, Bueller, very monotone. I know. Not very interactive. And just, again, where you just want to knock your head. But I'm able to bring a fun factor into it or they, people allow me to.

[00:29:10] [SPEAKER_02] I try to make it as fun as an entertaining. And I try to explain it in a way that's very practical, that they really have tools. I try to explain it in a way of how I would want someone to talk to my parents or talk to my siblings or talk to my nephews or talk to myself. How would I want someone to train me? And so I bring that perspective to the table and I just try to bring fun to it. And I don't know, I've been enjoying myself. It's been wild.

[00:29:33] [SPEAKER_01] Good. That's good for you. It's good for you. And I think it's good for payroll leaders to step out of their shell, right? We're all very, I think payroll leaders are very, I wouldn't say, what's the word? Like inward focus. They're just, they're focused on the job, right? Like they just get it done. It's not a me. It's not a me place. Like you can't be a me person in payroll. It's a team. And at the end of the day, I think most payroll leaders just don't think about putting themselves out there like that. But there's a lot of great leadership and knowledge and thoughts that we need to share. And that's a great way to do it.

[00:30:01] [SPEAKER_01] And again, it builds your network and it builds your ability to present to people and get your storytelling down. And I think that's a key part of what payroll is going to be doing in the future is storytelling to influence. Storytelling to influence.

[00:30:14] [SPEAKER_02] And hopefully driving outcomes. Yes. I'm sorry. I didn't mean to overspin. Yes. No, it's okay. You have the ability to storytell and you can get your story down. You can then go to your C-suite and make an influence or get into that space. It's all interwoven connected. Everything is. The way you communicate with your team, the way you communicate with yourself, being kind to yourself when you make a mistake. Listen, we're all human. Your internal dialogue has to be good. Be brave. Do the courageous thing.

[00:30:42] [SPEAKER_02] I mean, it's just, it's all interconnected. And if you can have a fun balance, find a balance of working on each one as you go, eventually everything that you have to overcome will make you rise up. There is a quick story. I know that we're ending. There is a story that I want to talk about. There is this farmer that had a donkey and the donkey fell down the well. And the farmer was like, you know what? This donkey is old. He's done its job. Okay. You know what? Maybe I just need to bury this donkey. So he's like, okay, you know, he's had a good life. I'm going to bury the donkey.

[00:31:12] [SPEAKER_02] I'm going to call some of my neighbors over. We're going to bury this donkey. So the donkey's crying, trying to get out of this. Well, they're, they're go ahead and they're, and they're doing shovel loads of dirt onto this donkey. All of a sudden the farmer hears the donkey stop crying. He's like, okay. He's like, well, maybe, you know, maybe the pressure has gotten to him enough. Maybe we're really burying him. And when he looked over the edge, what he found out is every time that someone would

[00:31:37] [SPEAKER_02] throw some dirt on him, the donkey would shake it off its back and step up. And another dirt would fall onto the donkey and the donkey would shake it off and step up. So every adversity that we have to go through, everything that we put our minds to, it's not just one area. If we can learn from it, shake it off of us and say, okay, this is really hard. This was a very hard learning opportunity. Maybe I didn't speak rightly in my last meeting, or maybe I messed up someone's file and I didn't do something.

[00:32:07] [SPEAKER_02] And now I have to run a payroll correction. You know, every time we go through something hard, if we can shake it off and learn from it and not waste that pain and step up, it's going to level us up. And we will eventually be from payroll crosser to C-suite. It's just how you're going to get there.

[00:32:25] [SPEAKER_01] Yeah. I love it. I love it. Kelly, where can, where do you like folks to connect?

[00:32:29] [SPEAKER_02] I'm on LinkedIn. Please come find me on LinkedIn. LinkedIn, I would happily connect with anyone. Come find me at the Greater Akron Canton Payroll Association. I am going to have, can I do a shout out to my five speaking engagements? I'm going to be at Payroll in Focus, which is Uniontown, Ohio. It's a one day conference hosted by the GACPA Payroll Chapter. Next, I will be going to turn and burn and go down to Arlington, Virginia. I'm going to speak at the Capitol Summit.

[00:32:56] [SPEAKER_02] I'm going to speak on local payroll taxes, not just Ohio, just local payroll taxes in general. I'm then going to come back home. I'm going to go up to Toledo Payroll Chapter. I'm going to talk about Ohio State and local taxes there. Then in April, that's on March 19th. On April 16th, I'm going to go to the Greater Cincinnati, Northern Kentucky Payroll Chapter. I'm going to speak on multi-state payroll, navigating complexities and regulatory differences.

[00:33:24] [SPEAKER_02] And then I've been asked to come back to Payroll Congress in May. So I'll be in Tennessee. And I'm going to be paired with the wonderful, beautiful Linda Wirtz. And we're going to talk about Ohio State and local taxes. And I did give a shout out at the Capitol Summit. I'm going to be speaking with Tim Wall. And he's amazing. If you haven't found him, you can find him on LinkedIn. And I'm also going to, I created an opportunity to speak with somebody at Payroll in Focus, Indeed Gray CPP. She's on LinkedIn.

[00:33:53] [SPEAKER_02] And she's stepping up and she's going to speak with me at Payroll.

[00:33:56] [SPEAKER_01] Nice. Nice. Full schedule. Full schedule. I love it. Well, I'll see you at, I'll see you at PayCon for sure in Nashville. And yeah, we'll be back with more episodes. Thank you for having me.