Payroll Conversations with Brittany Furr - Can payroll pros be creative ?

[00:00:00] Esquivar, and Walter William Duncan III. Whether you're new to the payroll game or a seasoned veteran, we have something for you. Welcome back folks. This is episode 115. It's about payroll. We're rolling along. We have an amazing guest today. But before that, how you doing, Walt?

[00:00:34] I'm doing good, bro. I appreciate you man. And just in a state of being, try to keep my joy and stay grateful in today's society, man. There's a lot of people going through stuff. I always say that.

[00:00:47] So if you're listening today, make sure you give yourself some grace. Give other people grace as well. Go out there and try to make the world a better place. Take one step at a time and just keep trying. That's the kind of energy I'm on today, man.

[00:01:00] How about you? I'm chilling, man. The same thing you said, give people grace. It's interesting because I've been watching one of my favorite shows is The Shy. I don't know if you guys watched The Shy and some characters were talking about that, giving each other grace.

[00:01:13] And I heard this, I keep hearing it somewhere and I'm like, let me find out people listening to the show as a fan who want to come up giving people grace. Hey, I'm about the only one. I'm about the only one giving people grace, man. That's good.

[00:01:25] The first person that I ever heard use that term, that phrase and that I understand the concept of it. But using that phrase, you're the first person I've ever heard say it. So I'm like, let me find out what got a fan base out there going on.

[00:01:39] We got a small fan base, but I appreciate that, man. But I just feel like we all could give people grace and we all nobody's perfect, man. I've made mistakes. I've messed up. I've hurt people.

[00:01:53] I've done stuff at the work that I shouldn't have done and I needed grace at the time and I still need grace to this day. Every day, all of us do. That's right. All right, y'all. Let's get into our pay news updates before we get into our guest.

[00:02:08] So what do you got for us today, Wal on pay news? I've got a quick article. I think it's an interesting read. It happened about another cyber attack figure that happened in May of this year.

[00:02:21] The Ministry of Defense in the UK had a significant breach that exposed personal information of current and former members of the armed forces, including the Royal Navy, the Royal Army and the Royal. The leaked data was described as personal HMRC style information included names and

[00:02:41] bank details from the payroll system of an external contractor. I'm going to go into some stuff about that really quick. The location of the attack, as I spoke to earlier, happened in the UK and impacted multiple members of the armed forces there.

[00:02:56] The nature of the breach, it leaked information, like I said, of personal details and banking info from the payroll system and the compromised system was managed by an external contractor. So this is like the second case that we've seen that there was a third party vendor

[00:03:13] or something involved that was hacked in and stuff like that. Because they backdoor on things. Yes. So number three, the response and investigation, right? So the Ministry of Defense, MOD, notified all the individuals or is in the process of notifying all the individuals.

[00:03:30] It was a multi-point response plan that was being prepared and the payroll system as a result was taken offline for investigation. So they had so whatever payroll system was shut down completely because of this hack. The culprit, the potential culprit.

[00:03:48] I don't know who did it, but they won't specify. They did warn against the cyber espionage risk. There are some reports out there that say China is under suspicion, though China has denied any involvement in this. Of course. Yeah, that's the new warfare nowadays.

[00:04:10] Yes, there's still war going on, but cyber attacks, countries cyber attack each other all the time now. The breach is a part of a broader trend of increasing cyber attacks on payroll systems, highlighting the ongoing vulnerability of sensitive data that PPI data within public and private sectors.

[00:04:31] So if you're listening to this and you use a third party provider or third party payroll person that's doing some work for you, you might want to make sure that you have the back end of your stuff sewn up so you're not getting worked around by anything.

[00:04:50] So that's all I had, man. It's like we said when we covered the last time, it's like not only do you have to make sure that your stuff is secure, you have to make sure all your integration partners or integrated partners are secured.

[00:05:05] You got to hold them to a higher standard as well because if their stuff isn't encrypted and secured, then they could possibly backdoor into yours. So a lot of stuff to be considered when it comes to cyber security, man. This is just really important that we cover that.

[00:05:20] Yeah. What you got? So Pete Tiliakos has done an amazing job and we were actually part of this. I don't know if you remember doing the survey, but we were part of this survey. They did a payroll profession confidence index and Pete Tiliakos works over at 360 Insights.

[00:05:42] And I put the link in the show notes to go look at the full report. And I just wanted to share a little bit, the report is long. It's a nice thing to keep revisiting and keep sharing these things, the

[00:05:53] insights from the report, because some of them are a little eye opening or telling or just, oh wow, I didn't know that. Great information. So let's see, I want to run through some stats. So he says as it concerns the state of payroll operations, 12%, only 12%, not

[00:06:11] only, but 12% of payroll operations are functioning in a transformed state. Meaning they've transformed right to a new state. 51% feel that they're unfit to support the strategic direction of the company. That's a big number. Right? 51% of payroll folks surveyed feel that they're unfit to support the strategic direction.

[00:06:37] That's a big, as a leader, you want to know that because you need payroll. Payroll is 45, 50% of your revenue of a company's gross revenue. You have to address, you have to make sure that your payroll department is tight. 34% are currently delivering a high or high level of

[00:06:56] strategic impact value. Awesome. 74% lack confidence that their orgs are doing enough to unlock the full strategy impacting value from their payroll ops, right? So they, Hey, they, maybe they are working to that strategic direction, but not as much as they could be. These are telling things folks.

[00:07:16] And this survey was done with payroll professionals. It's not like asking the CFO or asking a leader that's disconnected from the process that Pete did this with payroll, again, me and what were part of this. Let's see, what are other, what are some other good ones?

[00:07:31] Strength of partnership. It has a grid here where what are our biggest partner? Basically it translates to me is where our biggest partners. Number one, HR number two, finance. And that makes sense because payroll usually reports to one of those domains. Right.

[00:07:49] The number three and yeah, number tied number three, IT makes sense. Other is tied for, tied for number three is other illegal. HR seems to tide also with that number one spot. And then at the end is business operations and executive leadership being the last one.

[00:08:08] And that's telling that loops back to the whole 51% under the utilization or unfit to support strategic direction because guess why you're not partnering well, or we're not partnering well with executive leadership and that's not because of payroll it's because some, what did someone said recently?

[00:08:25] Folks don't think they think it's just data entry. So these are some telling, right. It's just telling, right. I'll give you one more thing and then we can wrap it up. But the top investments sort meaning these are what payroll folks are looking

[00:08:45] for to be like these are payroll folks saying, Hey, we need investment and here's where we need it. Top five investments sought education and training. Number one, right? We say that all the time. Number two, championing payroll as a center of excellence. Wow. Number three skilled talent.

[00:09:07] That's skilled talent. That's a good one because not, yeah, I get it. Have talent, but not be skilled. Number four transformation and change. Yeah. And the number five is cloud technology. Okay. I like that, man. That's great stuff. And this is one slide of a, I don't know.

[00:09:28] I probably got a, was it 33 slides in this deck. So I just went over one. It's such a tremendous amount of good information here. I'm going to make a point. Yeah. Shout out to P and Julie over at a payroll and HR podcast 2.0.

[00:09:45] Hopefully we'll be partnering with them soon and doing a swap cast and doing some, having a conversation with them, having some fun talking about payroll with them. But yeah, again, I'm going to make it a point to keep revisiting this survey. It's out there.

[00:10:00] The link is in show notes. It's free. Go check it out. Go, go get it and go read through it. Cause as a payroll professional, these are some great insights. So thanks Pete for doing that and sharing that with us. And that's it.

[00:10:13] When we get to the main topic and introduce our guests, we got a word from our wonderful sponsors at Time Track Go. Yeah. Shout out to Time Track Go and our sponsors who are reminding us that effective July 1, the threshold for salaried employees is being raised.

[00:10:30] Now, what does that mean for payroll professionals? You, we always become part of this conversation. They, your organization has probably already asked you for reports on where are people falling and evaluating this, whether you need to do it or not as a payroll professional.

[00:10:47] If you haven't spoken about it already or looked at it already, go ahead and look at your employee workforce and your salaried employees specifically, they're raising the threshold and what's going to happen, they're either going to get a raise or millions of employees will now become overtime eligible.

[00:11:07] Yep. And so as a result of that, those millions of employees are probably going to now be required to track their time and attendance. So whether you're new to time tracking or you're looking to make a change,

[00:11:18] consider Time Track Go because they provide a simply better solution that can have you up and running in a matter of minutes. So if you follow the link in our episode notes, then you can also get your first month free. So don't miss out.

[00:11:32] Take advantage of this amazing special offer. Use the link in the show notes to start your 14 day trial in the month of June to qualify for that first month free. And again, if you want to learn more, you can go to www.time track go.com

[00:11:50] that's T I M E T R A K go.com or you can call 888-321-9922. Let's go. Let's go. Look, I'm excited to get into our guests, man. Go ahead and give Brittany an intro. The great, the one of a kind Brittany Furr.

[00:12:11] She's a seasoned payroll pro and a continuous improvement advocate. Who's also known for her and innovative contributions as a Udemy content creator. Right? She's passionate about AI prompt writing, which is big. And I think a lot of us could learn from her example.

[00:12:27] So check Brittany out on LinkedIn. She's really big on payroll innovation. She's dedicated to revolutionizing the payroll process out there and enhancing efficiency through cutting edge solutions. Welcome our guest, Brittany Furr. Welcome Brittany. How you doing? It's me, your favorite payroll person. That's right.

[00:12:48] The intro guys and having me on the show. Absolutely. It's our honor. Like when Walt hit me with, he sent me this, like it was like the game and we're going to talk about the game, but it's something about payroll

[00:13:02] mystery game and please frame it better for us. But I was like, when I first saw the text, I was like, did Walt come up with this and I'm like reading it. And I'm like, wait a minute, somebody came up with this.

[00:13:13] Somebody's out there being creative with payroll like this. So please one, one tell us of course your origin story. We love our payroll origin stories. Um, so tell us how you got into payroll. So I actually have been in the staffing HR payroll realm for 10 years, a decade.

[00:13:35] Oh, okay. My company is pretty big in staffing. And I like to say that I've toured the whole company. I've been in all the lines of business. I've done a lot, a lot of different roles. And so right now the space I'm in is payroll overpayment recovery,

[00:13:53] which is very interesting and it hand in hand with the game I created. And it fit hand in hand with forensic accounting, which I enjoy. So my origin story isn't that of a villain type. I just started off as a temp in the industry doing garnishment.

[00:14:14] And I stayed with the company they hired me on and here I am today. Oh, wow. All right. So, so you kind of, so you kind of what appealed to you about payroll. So it sounds like you worked in different realms, like you said, but what about payroll?

[00:14:31] The word problem of it all. Payroll is a big word problem to me. When people come with their issues, it's a wild time. They'll be like, oh, I filled out my W-4 wrong and I put eight

[00:14:43] dependents on there and then I wanted to file exempt and then I wanted to file exempt on the state. And it's just the story of people and trying to figure out what are they trying to accomplish with their paychecks?

[00:14:56] The story behind garnishment too, how people get tax levies and other creditor garnishments. And of course we hear about child support, but it's other things that's involved in garnishment. So I love the mystery trying to figure out life in here. Yes.

[00:15:13] That's one of my favorite things too is to do then the investigation of it all, dig behind. Cause you're right. It's such an amazing way to put it, the word problem of it all. Cause I love that, Hey, my check is off, right?

[00:15:28] And then it's why, you know, and then I get to go dig in and figure out why or something like that. So I love that. That's awesome. That's awesome. Yeah, that's the first time I've ever heard anybody articulate it in that way. Yes.

[00:15:40] I find it because usually when it comes to payroll, you automatically go to math, math, the numbers, science. That's right. That's very interesting. I like that. People often tell me, Oh, you're in payroll. You must be good at numbers. And I'm like only in Excel.

[00:15:57] You know what I mean? Cause Walt is better with it in his head than I am. Cause you tell them numbers, he's busting out percentages and this is three thirds of one third or fourth. They're like, what? No, I need to, I need Excel.

[00:16:09] But yeah, I love that. I love that. Okay. So then perfect segue. How did you come up with this game? Tell us this, the game, you have a game, you've named it. What was, what's the name of it? How'd you come up with it?

[00:16:21] It's awesome by the way, folks. I'm sorry to jump in here, but it's awesome. And it's going to be changing. Cause I've worked on it more since I've sent it to Walt, but it's called payroll murder mystery.

[00:16:33] And how this game started is maybe about three weeks before my maternity leave, my director pulled me to the side and said, Hey, I have this opportunity and payroll overpayment. Would you like to take it? And I'm like, wow. Okay. Sure. I took it on the spot.

[00:16:49] And so she gave me all this material and she was like, I know you're going on maternity leave, but I want you to come back and really hit the ground running. So I read the manual. I looked at the SWPs. I'm on payroll. What's that?

[00:17:05] Standard of work process. Ooh. Okay. So I'm on payroll or trying to see like, what are people saying about overpayments and stuff? And so I was talking to my good work friend and I said, girl, this is like a murder mystery. This is wild.

[00:17:21] All the back and forth and passing the baton and then it comes back. And that's how it started. And because I was on maternity leave and I wanted to stay close to my work, I created the game. I'm a creative by nature.

[00:17:37] I just created the game and it gave me fulfillment and it kept me close to the work. So when I came back from maternity leave, I already had a passion for the department. Wow. Can you give, is there a brief way to say how the game works?

[00:17:55] How do you play it? Walk us through something. I guess the way I set it up is similar to Clue with a little bit of Masked Singer involved. Okay. I don't know how many people watch that show.

[00:18:09] So on Masked Singer, they give you little hints and clues about who they could possibly be. Right. And so with that, I have suspect cards and I tell you what you will say as a suspect, what's your alibi? What's your background story?

[00:18:28] And you read those cards and those responses in the different rounds. And then the other players of the game, they are detectives or investigators and they get to ask the questions, certain questions in certain rounds you can ask.

[00:18:42] And you're trying to figure out who did it, what department were they in and the motive behind it. I love it. Yeah, that's amazing. And the deck that she sent us is very detailed, very laid out, very

[00:18:58] descriptive, so I'm excited to see what changes you made to it to enhance it more. Oh my gosh. It is. He partnered me up with some of his gamer friends. So they introduced me to Tabletop Simulator and they told me that

[00:19:14] it's similar to what I'm doing is like Dungeons and Dragons. And so I've been looking into that and it's really taken off. So once I put it on Desktop Simulator, I can actually submit this game to Hasbro because they go off of Desktop Simulator. So that's major.

[00:19:33] The energy and the time I put into this can pay off. Yes, absolutely. Oh my goodness. Congrats on that. Guys, what was my question? Oh, and this is a sidebar. I may edit some of this out or whatever, but like, would you be interested

[00:19:50] in trying to play it online if that's even possible? Like do a stream or something like that. Oh, Simulator because that does give you... What is that? Well, I'm sorry. What's Desktop Simulator? Desktop Simulator is on Steam and it's a virtual game.

[00:20:04] It's almost similar to if you had the IVR headset. Okay. So you get to go into Steam, sit down at a table with other players. But the gag is you have to have a Steam account.

[00:20:19] And so I want to use Desktop Simulator, but I also want to keep it on the deck like how I said, Walt, because I want to offer it for other payroll teams to host, for me to come to their team and host and help them play the game

[00:20:35] and really just lighten the mood of payroll. Yes. I love it. Yeah. I would love to see if we could do it and make a show out of it and record and just edit it down. That would be so fun. Let's do it. Let's do it.

[00:20:49] Cause we know enough people in payroll to invite some people and try to get them in. I'm with that. Let's do that. That's amazing. I love it. I love it.

[00:20:59] I just had a game pop in my head that I want to try for you guys at the end of this. Okay. We got a game for you too. I love it. All right. So what's the next one? So let's see.

[00:21:10] What would you like to see more in payroll being you're so creative, you have so much thoughts about it. What are some of the things that you would like to see in payroll? The, the payroll pain point for me is I guess the miseducation of the employee.

[00:21:27] People just don't know about their check. It's right behind. They just don't know it. I really like what you guys are doing with the paycheck podcast. People need that. So before we transition to going global, people have to understand their check

[00:21:44] right now beyond completing a W four, beyond putting their deposit information in and so that part, they just look at their paycheck as income, income verification, that's it. Look how many, mind you, right? We've talked to a lot of professionals, right?

[00:22:07] We've been really blessed with talking to great professionals across other domains, HR industries, whatever we had an HR professional senior level. He's a CHRO right now and he's exaggerated. I'm sure, but he's, I don't look at my pay stub. I just make sure my direct deposit hits.

[00:22:25] You know what I mean? And you make sure your amount is directionally right. And if you're a salaried employee, it's the same amount every time. And you're like, oh, I'm good. But there's so much more to it for the employee to understand, right?

[00:22:38] He takes it for granted and we take it for granted because we know. But I'll do one better for you because I know I told it on a couple of episodes but I've known payroll pros earlier in my career that didn't even understand their pay stub. Yep.

[00:22:54] They were processing payroll. I know that sounds bad, but they didn't understand. But it's true cause they're an employee, right? And you bring up two things, one it's true. Like it's agnostic to any job, but two that's the transition in payroll

[00:23:11] and the payroll career where you need to change. If you don't understand your own check as a payroll professional, that is the moment where you have to say to yourself, I need to elevate my job. Right?

[00:23:22] I need to elevate myself in my profession because I should know what this is. And I've been developing this concept of the payroll glance. A payroll professional should be able to glance at a paycheck and tell you what

[00:23:38] the possible pain points could be, what the possible errors could be. Not that they should see the error cause it's not always that obvious, but a good payroll professional should be able to look at a pay stub and say, and break it down.

[00:23:54] Hey, this is your gross here. Your earnings section, this is where some errors can be your, the your deduction section. This is where some errors can be your tax section. This is where some errors can be. Shoot. Go for it.

[00:24:08] And in doctrine to say, I'm not a tax professional. I can't tell you about your check. I can't tell you how to fill that out. And so with that being said, all your OGs and payroll will pop

[00:24:24] hands of new people who try to come in and actually educate people about their check. And they'll say, no, don't do that. It's happened to me where they say, we don't tell people how to fill out

[00:24:34] their check. We don't tell them how to make the numbers work for what they're trying to accomplish in their life. We don't do that. Now you're actually seeing where people are like raising their hand and saying, help me. I want to know what my check means. Help me.

[00:24:47] I want to talk to my payroll department and not be angry every time. Yes. No, you're no, go ahead. I'm sorry. No, I'm finished. What were you going to say? No, that that resonates with me and thank you for saying that because I

[00:25:02] totally agree with what you just said, Brittany, because I feel that it's an old antiquated, the old school mindset. Like you said, okay, we're here to do a job not to give them support in that way. But I think people, especially in today's economy, we have to be

[00:25:18] mindful that we're servicing people, that they're people first, right? They're not their paycheck. They're not their job. They're people first. And I think if more people had that outlook, payroll is people first. Then I think that would maybe change some of the ways that things are done.

[00:25:35] But I totally agree with you as we fade out the old leadership, the baby boomers of it all. We really get some people that understand the impact of payroll because I remember being told early in my career when I said that I did payroll to somebody.

[00:25:52] He responded and said, that's a glorified data entry person. And I was just taking a back wall, but payroll started that way. Payrolls as the women with their bouffant hair, typing in the numbers. Looking at that push card, typing in the numbers. And that's how payroll started.

[00:26:10] And so they still think that is the realm today of how it is. And it's so much more than that. Absolutely. One of the things you said, you're absolutely right. We're classically trained not to give advice and there's some legalities in there, sure.

[00:26:27] But Gerard Hall is actually the one who came on the show and got us, put us, put that battery in our back to start the it's about your paycheck podcast, not so much, Hey, you guys should start a podcast, but he challenged us.

[00:26:41] He was like, we need more customer service. And we were like, what does that mean? And we were like, employers do not help their employees understand their paycheck enough. That one statement is what helped us start the other podcast because

[00:26:57] we were like, how do we service the employees of it all? And I've even my whole con I was Brittany when we first started the show, I was like that. No, we don't do, we don't tell you about your paycheck. We don't talk about your paycheck. But right.

[00:27:13] But now I draw, I was like, why not? Why can't you help them? You can help them. You can help me onboarding. Yes. You come to a company, they sit you down and tell you about benefits for 30 minutes to an hour. Yep. Yeah.

[00:27:25] They're not going to tell you about your paycheck and how your pay stub is going to look. Maybe they'll mention when your direct deposit might hit. I'm from a time of where you had to put the hole and you weren't getting paid for it for a little bit.

[00:27:42] Oh wow. They're just not talking about, they're not talking about it. Gerard is right. We need customer service. Nobody has the time and it's not because we're being snooty. There's so many other intricate details that we are doing in

[00:27:56] payroll and our job is a perfection when it's right. We're doing our job and when it's wrong, we've ruined everything. We don't have time to do, we don't have time to do outbound calls or answer and get yelled at because we're affecting people's livelihood.

[00:28:15] Like I said, so it's personal. They're talking to you like trash. You're getting verbally abused and stuff. So it's a tight space, but I did want to ask you guys with a payroll university app. What if you transform that into like a simulation where people

[00:28:36] could see how the changes on their W-4 affected their paycheck? ADP has something to do with maybe breaking down to the lowest compound and making more just tangible for regular employees. That's interesting because we, that's something that we, I think

[00:28:53] we spoke to because we have a roadmap of different apps that we have built out and that we had something similar to that. So I find that very interesting that you just connected with that wavelength. And we do, but I think you're absolutely right, Brittany.

[00:29:08] I think that's something that we should invest more in the education piece of the employee. We should invest more in teaching them and helping people understand, Hey, how does my pay work for me? I know I work to get paid, but how does it work for me? Right.

[00:29:25] So I absolutely agree with you. I hope I hope I articulated that in a way that connected it. Yeah, most definitely. Brittany is doing her research here as you can see. So not many people know that the entity behind all this is called payroll universe Inc.

[00:29:43] That's the company behind our podcast and our venture. It's not in your view right now, but we have, he has a sign up called PayQuest app. That's an app that we've been developing for awhile. It is on the shelf right now.

[00:29:56] We have run into a development hitch where just we haven't found the right partners to help us continue development. We had two good teams along the way that really helped us get here, but it's a labor of love and it's out there.

[00:30:12] And Brittany would like to show that's where we first started. That's where we went on bubble to, and we were just weren't smart enough to get it going. And we just had to bring in developer development help.

[00:30:24] And they do, they market bubble as like a low coding, low code, low code, no code, a lot of manipulation. You could probably do a little bit of like a draft in Google app. If you draft in Google apps, when you take it to bubble, you don't have

[00:30:42] that team spending as much time hashing out a lot of details because they're charging you by the hour. So you want to have all those sheets ready. Yeah. Shout out to them before, and I'm pretty detailed because I saw in the

[00:30:56] payroll org community that a lot of people wanted a standalone overpayment process while I was researching the game and just reading the chats and stuff. And so I thought that was interesting because a lot of the payroll software that we use is old robust and we have workarounds

[00:31:14] within our own teams just to continue to use it. And so people were on the forum saying we wish we had a standalone place that we could do overpayment collection and processing because each state has its own rules and regulations.

[00:31:31] And then it goes over my head that some people aren't even able to take these payments or recover the payments outside of payroll deduction. So they can't take, you know, a draft out of your bank.

[00:31:46] And with this is me being a nerd now, guys, with overpayments when we recovered the funds, we can't take you under minimum wage. So if we overpaid you a thousand dollars and you say, well, take it back all of it back, we can't.

[00:32:01] We all have it back because it sends you up under minimum wage. Now we're not following the code of honor, the payroll code of honor. Yep. But now if they say that they have enough wiggle room in their finances

[00:32:13] to do that, if there was an online payment option, they could go on themselves and pay them thousand dollars back and we wouldn't be dragging out a recovery for three months. So that's a little a spark for you guys. Yeah. I got a lot of things going on.

[00:32:31] I got some ideas, but I am totally willing to hand it over to you. Well, to anybody listening really? Cause hey, anybody listening, I love to see an idea bloom. I think that's why I enjoy the space.

[00:32:45] Even if I don't get all the credit for the idea, I know that I planted the seed in some, that's right. That's right. I can look at it and get. Forbilled. That's right. I'm playing some water. That's right. No doubt. Yes. Love it.

[00:33:04] And we all know, look, we do this so much to talk about, but move through our agenda here. A good question for you is how has the industry been for you as a woman of not this too, really as a woman and as a woman of color.

[00:33:19] Stick on that. This is a tough one and it gets real sticky because I've been in the industry for 10 years. So I would say that I have figured out corporate politics for women of color and for women of color. And it's not one dimensional.

[00:33:38] It's not one thing I can tell you to do. And that's going to keep you in the graces of the people because it's going to be somebody that doesn't like you or agree with you. But for the episode that you guys had with Tabitha, when she said,

[00:33:52] when you're honest, that keeps the people around you honest. And that's so true when you put your boundaries up and when you're honest, the people who are negative or are trying to be used car salesmen, they don't want to be around you.

[00:34:08] And that's how you're going to know to read people. I have a setback in which turned out to be a little bit of an advantage. I have a parent with mental illness, so I've got a lot of resources early on

[00:34:22] about how to interact with people who weren't stable and, and how to just engage and not so stay under the radar, but keep things neutral. So that has helped me in this realm, staying positive. I love finding the silver lining.

[00:34:41] And if I had to give anybody some advice, who's a woman of color, my main thing would be is to never be inconvenienced. Never let somebody know that you're inconvenienced. That is your superpower. Just don't let it out. Even if you are inconvenienced, don't let people know that

[00:35:01] you're inconvenienced and that's going to keep you strong in corporate politics. That's a good one. I need to apply that one. Thank you for being vulnerable and sharing that with us, Brittany. I appreciate that because it lets us not only realize that we can already

[00:35:18] tell from our interactions that people are important to you, but it lets us know that you're just not the payroll pro, you're still this human that actually cares about others. So thank you for putting that out there. Thank you for sharing that.

[00:35:33] And I really think it is vital for people to learn from your example and hearing that from you. So thank you again. Yeah, I'm like, cause I have a lot of off the record stuff that we, I want to talk about with you. Let's go ahead.

[00:35:54] You want to move to this or that? Yeah, let's move to this or that. And then I know Brittany said that she had a game that she wanted to play with us. As well, which is cool.

[00:36:02] So we're going to play our game and then we're going to play her game. All right. You want to start off with the first three? Yeah. Finish it off. Yeah, absolutely. This or that it's both either, neither doesn't matter.

[00:36:12] These are little things that help folks get to know us beyond payroll. So first one is beach resort or cruise. Oh, beach resort. Okay. Okay. I'm not a huge fan of beach resort. I grew up on. Oh, really? And so I like the beach. Okay.

[00:36:31] Country life or city life? I am a country girl, but I like to do my shopping in the city. So one of my hobbies, I like to fish and I like country, so in crochet, so I'm a country girl. I want some chickens and a goat possibly.

[00:36:52] So I'm going to pick country. No doubt. A great book or a great movie. I like a great book that has been turned into a movie. It's good because I like to see a movie and see how they've actually

[00:37:12] portrayed the book or dramatize the book and the book, because you really get to get in the head space of the care. Yes. Yes. And I like to know what they're thinking.

[00:37:21] I don't know if this is, I need to go look it up, but the series, your honor. Okay. I'm watching that right now and I'm like, is this a book? Cause I need to know about all this. That series, anybody is listening. They haven't started watching it.

[00:37:35] Watch it because it lets you know that once you tell a lie, you got to tell five, six, seven, eight, more lies and other people got to be in alignment with your lie. It is a wild time.

[00:37:49] Oh, my mom has always told me don't lie because when you tell one lie, you got to keep lying. And so I try to be as honest as I can and truthful in that moment. I done told you something wrong. I done told you a story.

[00:38:04] I done told you a story. Oh my gosh. All right. Thank you for that. So I'm going to finish this with the last three. Excel or Google, Google Sheets. Google Sheets. I love Google Sheets because Google Sheets tells your business. All right.

[00:38:20] And when you're on a shared drive, a lot of people like to say, I didn't delete that column and I didn't delete this row. The data, I didn't do this. Oh really? Ooh, I didn't know that. Ooh. And you also can go back to old data. Yeah.

[00:38:37] It's such a paper trail. And I love that about Google Sheets. And it lets you interact in real time. You can comment on there. I'm a Google girl through and through. Now we're in Excel. Yes, because Google really doesn't like CSV files for whatever reason. And thank you.

[00:38:55] And macros, but I'll use Excel for those two things. And then I'll come back to Google. Interesting. Interesting. Okay. All right. Number five, social studies or science? A little bit of both. Okay. All right. And the last one is Disney or Universal Studios. Universal Studios. Nice. Universal Studios.

[00:39:24] I like the whole space of it all. I'm not really, Disney is kind of glitz and glamour for me. If you're going to compare theme parts and I feel like Universal Studios is for the nerd or the alternative person. Okay. Okay. Nice. I like that. All right.

[00:39:41] So what we're excited to see the games you have for us. I thought about it needs to be one person. So who wants to take the hot seat? I'll take it. Let's go. This game is going to be called. Hello. I have a payroll emergency. Okay.

[00:39:58] And you have 15 seconds to tell me how you would get this employee off the phone. Oh dang. I'm thankful. Thank God you took it. Right. Put the clock up. Add it. Add it again. He has a little timer. We got a little timer. A little timer.

[00:40:13] How would you get this employee off the phone? Okay. And this is the, this is a scenario. Employee goes in changes their W four on for an additional tax withholding for federal of a thousand dollars. Their paycheck on a weekly basis is normally 800 bucks.

[00:40:35] And now their entire check has gone to the IRS. Start now. Ray. So the first thing I would do is say, especially if I didn't know the details of it, I would want to do the research behind it and say, Hey, I'll call you back.

[00:40:52] Let me give some research and I'll call you back with the solution that we have for you. I don't know if that's going to get a disgruntled person off the phone wall. I don't know if that's going to work. That one's tough. Oh man.

[00:41:07] Because somebody's whole check is gone. We can't just go back to the IRS and say, we done made a mistake. Can we get that money back? That's not how it works. Once you've submitted your 940 forms, that money is gone. Okay. We're not getting it back.

[00:41:22] So that's a tough one. We actually had something like that happen in our department. So I thought it was fun and you guys made me think about it. But if anybody else that's watching has had a crazy payroll interaction where somebody called in, send it to the guys.

[00:41:38] I want to know about it and we'll do it on another show. How would they handle this on the spot? I don't know if that would have got him off the phone. He probably would have called you back about three more times, but

[00:41:51] yeah, no, you caught me off guard. I thought it was going to be a layup. You caught me. You hit me. 15 seconds. That's a fun one. Huh? How would you get me off the phone in 15 seconds? Cause you really don't have time. Yeah. You don't.

[00:42:10] And then, but no, but what answer does, yeah, that's it. That's the right answer. Cause you definitely can't, you got to do research. Hey, I promise to call you back by some, maybe adding the timeline. Like I'll call you back tomorrow at 12.

[00:42:21] Even when you research, there's nothing you can't get them any money. There's no money value that you can really add because it's gone to the IRS. It was a tough space. What was the question again? Cause I wasn't on the hot seat.

[00:42:37] Basically all their funds, they made a mistake on their W four. They put an additional thousand dollars and it took their entire net pay. Basically went to federal taxes. You know the option where you can add extra withhold. Usually people do 50 or a hundred dollars.

[00:42:55] And so he had fat fingered instead of putting a hundred, put a thousand. And his regular check gross is 800 or net 800. Net 800. So after it all got done, he didn't have it. I mean crumbs. Oh, okay. So net 800.

[00:43:12] So he did satisfy his other deductions already and is usually a net 800. So that additional wipe this whole net out. Ooh, I don't know how they resolved it because he ended up escalating it. But I was just curious to see if you guys had a,

[00:43:31] yeah, I've had experience. I've had experience with that because if you were to do an adjustment, you would have to, it would impact so many different levels of it. If depending on where the time period is at. You void and reissue in a timely manner.

[00:43:45] You could void and reissue. But if it's at the quarter already passed, if it has quarter, you have to do a prior quarter adjustment. You have to do so many different things. You have to do an amended filing through your tax service and stuff like that.

[00:43:59] No, I don't. I've had so many experiences with those. And people's mind, they just think, oh, just make it right. And they don't understand the levels and layers that the payroll department has to get help from other teams.

[00:44:14] It's not as simple as just all void and reissue or stuff like that. There's so many different levels that you have to go through. Yeah. But in a timely manner, right? If it's right after check date or on check date, you could just void and reissue.

[00:44:28] Yeah, you could do a DD reversal and just bring it back and try to do it again. But like Walt said, if you too long now wait next week, it's a whole different story. Yeah. Yeah. You spent the money. Oh, it is a whole different story now. Yeah.

[00:44:43] Give you a gas card and hope that you make it. For real. Yes. I mean, because then my thought is then it becomes how nice is your employer? Because, you know, honestly, I've had I've had some employees,

[00:44:56] employers that would just be like, Brian, just go ahead and go ahead and pay them again. We'll we'll figure it out. Just make sure they got money. You know what I mean? And that could be done in a few different ways.

[00:45:06] But ultimately, my point is it ultimately cost the company money, not so much to employer E. You know what I mean? But yeah, that's a good one. Goodness gracious. That's a good one. She got 15 seconds on the hot spot. We call it hot spot or something like that.

[00:45:21] That'd be a great emergency. Yeah. I like that one a lot. Yeah. That game. Because if we put I'm going to put the guest on it, though, we're going to have to ask the guest. The guest on the hot spot. Yeah.

[00:45:34] I'm going to be putting us on the hot spot. Brittany's been excused this show. Making my own rules here. You just making up your own coming on the show, creating segments. Come on now. I think that's a perfect segue though. I do love it. Yes, it is.

[00:45:49] Now I look at the safe talk. This this next piece before we let you go. OK, we have a segment of the show is called Safe Talk. And so today's Safe Talk question is, do you think more payroll pros should strive to be more creative in the industry?

[00:46:10] How do you feel about that? Absolutely. Creativity is going to allow you to express yourself and have some form of outlet. Payroll is stressful. It's a tough space. People are calloused over, so you need that creativity.

[00:46:30] Even with creating my game, I hope that while teams are playing the game, they could really show their authentic and organic self. And by that, the competitive people can be competitive. The cheerleaders can be cheerleaders.

[00:46:47] The spectators can watch and just enjoy people laughing and playing in the game. And so in that moment, you can be yourself and nobody's offended by it. Nobody's taking it as a jab or cut.

[00:47:01] So you need the creativity and you need the fun in payroll because it makes you harsh. Yeah, yeah, I totally agree with you. Brian, you want to go before I go? No, I agree with Brittany. She said it great. Yeah, I think it definitely can. It's almost wellness.

[00:47:27] It brings out some wellness part of it because you because it's right. It makes you so black and white. Right. Payroll makes it there's not room for a lot of gray in payroll. Everything is black and white. Right.

[00:47:39] And like we had the conversation the other day about how our careers have made us very compliant, we're very compliance minded. Every move we make is, is this allowed? Is it compliant? Is it legal? Is it ethical?

[00:47:54] We're always thinking about the rules of things and there's not a lot of room for fun. And as we started off talking on before we started recording with Brittany, is this kind of one of the things that we wanted to bring to the podcast

[00:48:07] was just being ourselves. Right. We weren't going to dress for work and do the show, dressed for work and be all proper and black and white. This is a space where we can talk about payroll comfortably and just from our own mindset.

[00:48:22] And it's like Bart said, everybody has a different angle when it's when they're talking about payroll. Like there's plenty of room. Right. There's plenty of room for things. And Brittany, this is something you might want to think about as an author,

[00:48:34] as a creator, is bringing a book to the space because there's only two payroll authors out there in the world that have written payroll books that aren't textbooks. Bart Van Der Storm and Anita LeTink and Bart reminded me they're both from

[00:48:51] the Netherlands, so we need an American to write a payroll book. That is an interesting thing. Just to go off what you were saying about being yourself. I recently got another mentor and he's a guy and he's the one who really told me to get on LinkedIn.

[00:49:08] He was like, oh, heck yeah. He said, Brittany, you weren't. So he said it's so dry. He talks to me in the realest space and just keeps it so funky and lets me know what it needs to be awesome.

[00:49:20] And he was like, get on LinkedIn because the passion that you have when I talk to you about stuff like other people need that and would enjoy that. And he was saying, I know sometimes everybody doesn't want to receive what you're saying in the workspace,

[00:49:37] in your regular team. But it's some other teams out here who would love to hear what you're saying. And so that was just eye opening because, like you had said, Brian, it's being compliant, it's falling in. I've been a ghostwriter for so long

[00:49:55] where people have taken my ideas, people have plagiarized me. Oh, really? With my hands folded and just wow. OK, I like that you plagiarize me because you still have to come back to me. I'm the originator of the thought and the idea. And I still win.

[00:50:12] But he really told me, like, put your information out there. That's right. Let them know that you came up with it. And so that's what I was doing. I did it for my birthday was in May. I came to LinkedIn.

[00:50:25] I know a lot of people was like, where the heck did this lady come from? Just popped out a note out of thin air and was schooling them. And so I've been here a while. I've just been ghostwriting. So you've heard some content. Wow.

[00:50:39] But you might not know that it can't be. Wow. I love that. I love that. That's bigger you. That's bigger you to do that because what's meant for you is going to be for you anyway, nobody can stop that.

[00:50:52] So I give you big ups for being a big person and just letting that go through. And I can tell that you're going to do big things and everything. And I would love to. I think I see that little whiteboard back there says Georgia.

[00:51:08] Are you a part of the Georgia Atlanta payroll chapter? No, I'm not in the local chapter. I'm actually out in the country. So, oh, OK, I can't get to the local chapter as much. But I do say that on my own chapter, I am the chapter.

[00:51:24] Hey, you may need to start one out there wherever you're at. And even if I don't know what they're doing, that's right, I will go up to Atlanta. I got some stuff that I want to do and bring it to fruition with LinkedIn.

[00:51:38] I'll be up there in the area pretty soon. Hey, Walter is a new Georgia native resident now. You know, guys can meet up. Are you north or south of Atlanta? I'm kind of like southeast of Atlanta, like in some place called Mableton. Yeah, I know. Southwest, southwest Mableton.

[00:51:58] Yeah. It's close to Smyrna. Smyrna? I know where it is. Don't get mad at me, Georgia. I just moved here. I'm born and raised in Georgia. So I'm from a small town called Kingsland. Kings Bay neighborhood is located down there. But it's really small.

[00:52:20] It's by Brunswick and Savannah is usually how people understand it. But I could walk across this bridge and actually go to Florida. So it's right on the state. Oh, my gosh. Yeah. Wow. You could hop into Florida and, you know, wow, yeah, no doubt. All right.

[00:52:41] Yeah, that's cool. That's interesting because I think Brian's daughter is a May baby. Yeah, May baby. Yep. When's your birthday? May what? What day? May 15th. OK, yeah. Yeah. Are you a Gemini? I'm a Taurus. OK, the Gemini is later. OK, got you.

[00:53:02] I'm a Taurus and a Virgo. OK, OK, nice. Nice. OK, good. Good, good, good. Talking about Gemini's and my Gemini baby popped up. Thanks for having me. The Payday shirt. So this will be for National Payroll Week 2024.

[00:53:20] If you guys want to know anything about it, you can message us here. I'll be doing pre-orders starting in July. OK, that's why you didn't give me the order information. I'm like, yo, I want to buy my shirt.

[00:53:33] I'm going to do it in July and then I'll stop the orders and I want everybody to get their shirts two weeks in advance. That way I can find out anything with shipping or just if something got lost.

[00:53:45] I want to be able to be spot on with it. And I have an Etsy shop, so I understand the logistics of it all. OK, cool. I wanted to make sure people had enough time to get their shirts, maybe even take some pictures and content and share.

[00:54:00] Share them online. So message the guys here if you do want to get on that list for the pre-orders. Awesome. Heck yeah. I love it. I love it. Thanks again for joining us, Brittany. What an amazing guest. You've been so much creativity. I love it.

[00:54:17] Did you answer the question, what about creativity also? Because I get lost and she's making me go off on all these tangents. Yes, I'm inspiring you. Yes, you are. Yes. Yes. I don't know if I did, but I agree. There you go. Great show.

[00:54:34] Great show. We love you. Thank you all. Till the next time. We love you. Peace. Peace. Before we sign off, here are a couple of quick things. Don't forget to follow. It's about payroll on LinkedIn and it's about your paycheck on Facebook and TikTok.

[00:54:55] Thank you for being part of our payroll community, and thank you for being a part of this journey with us. Until the next time, keep learning, keep growing, and most importantly, keep going.