Interview by Ben Mundy

Diana, can you offer our readers clarity around service channel payroll oversight versus Central Payroll? 

There is confusion, especially among employees. They may have a payroll issue yet have no idea who they need to go to for resolution.  For example, they were hired at a rate that's not reflected on their paycheck, so they come to us. That’s an issue for the department service channel and the employee. Our function is to ensure the timely and accurate processing of payroll.  We also do a lot of analysis using reports, and if there's an issue, that's when we start looking at payroll. A high-level way of looking at it might be, the departments and service channels make payroll requests, UCPath processes the payroll requests, and Central Payroll audits for accuracy.
 

Like a service credit discrepancy?

We do get a lot of service credit audit requests. Somebody may not understand why they are contributing to UCRP or DCP Safe Harbor, or not understand the difference between employment service credit and retirement service credit. Students often want to know why they are contributing to DCP Safe Harbor. Employees want to know why they are in a specific retirement plan, or any other myriad of deductions that they see on their paycheck they don’t understand. We get those inquiries. 

Would you consider Central Payroll a forensics team?

Honestly, yes, that is a major role we play. To work on this team, you have like deep analysis and putting pieces together. Because sometimes it's not black and white. You might look at a situation and not totally understand it at first. I'll use the student example. They think, “I'm in a student position so why am I contributing to DCP Safe Harbor?” They may not realize that although technically true, they’re not carrying enough units to qualify for that deduction.  But over the summer they might work full time, which kicks them out of that exemption.  There's a lot of things to consider. When I'm interviewing somebody to be a payroll processor, I'm looking at their ability to analyze and see beyond the surface.

To be successful do you need certain personality traits? 

Not necessarily. Everybody has strengths and weaknesses. When I meet with my staff, I’m more successful when I meet with them individually. They each learn in different ways. My job is to play off their strengths and ask a lot of questions. For instance, for a student pay scenario, I might ask, “what’s the first place you would look to find a root cause?”  They need the ability to analyze, but the way in which they get to the answer might be slightly different for each.  If I meet with two team members at the same time, I might end up confusing one of them due to learning differences. 

What’s the best thing, and not-so-best thing about your job?

One of the best things is when you have resolved a longstanding issue for somebody.  They may have been passed around, turn to you as a last resort, and you're able to resolve their issue. I love that.  One of the saddest, most emotionally difficult things about the job is navigating a deceased employee case. When I first started working them, I was afraid to pick up the phone and call the family.  But there’s important business to address so I’ve always strived to be sincere. At first I thought I had to be overly empathetic, but what I realized is, families just need the information.  They don't know where to go, what to do, or what to expect. You feel a sense of relief when you have given them a roadmap and lifted that burden.

UC Path can also be challenging. At times we have figured out ways around roadblocks, making us better at our jobs.  But the root question always is, as central payroll, how are we going to resolve this problem? I'm fortunate to work with a team of great people, and for the most part we have been able to tackle what comes our way.  One of the issues we encounter with UC Path employee cases is time to resolution.  A case may be open for 30 days before the employee finally gets a response to reach out to campus payroll.  So our solution was to come up with a way of intercepting those cases to resolve them before even going to UCPath. That was a big win.

How do you escalate something to UC Path?

We do have some special escalation powers in our office, but only for certain scenarios.

You have a direct line?

Well, even that is not always necessarily a remedy. We have limited escalation powers due to payroll schedules.

Do you plan on retiring from UC Davis?

Hopefully!

Finding an organization with a pension plan is a rarity.  We're fortunate.

Not only that, but when I first started working here, one of the things that blew me away was how people really loved their jobs. I absolutely love that even on days when it’s super hard, and I run up against roadblock after roadblock, at the end of the day I love what I do.

What is your superpower?

I'm very analytical so it's very easy for me to think deeply.  If you tell me to do something, I’m also going to understand why I am doing it. When I first started working here, I would hear “this is the process that we do for this” and I would ask why. Many times what I got back was the classic, “that’s the way it’s always been done.”  That answer wasn’t going to work for me.  I may do it that way because you asked me to, but I'm also going to figure out why we have to do it that way.  This comes easy to me but can be difficult for other people.  I mentally process very quickly when analyzing data. Sometimes I hear back, “you’re going too fast for me.”  (Laughs.)

When you identify an efficiency, do you find it easy to put it in place or do you encounter bureaucracy when you want to change process?

Not in the Central Payroll office. I think everybody is pretty good about that and we collaborate a lot. I might bring something up, or somebody might bring something to my attention, and we work it through.  I’m proud of the way we updated the 644D form, which was in legacy PPS language.  It didn’t work in the UC Path world.  So from top to bottom, the entire team collaborated on the project and it was a very affirming to affect change. And we had carte blanche to do it with no red tape.  For the most part I've had a lot of support for anything I've wanted to do.

Tell us one thing people don't know about you and are surprised when they learn.

I am one of 16 children.