Product Manager Sr

About the opportunity We are looking for a Senior Product Manager with deep German payroll domain expertise to support the development, maintenance, enhancement, and compliance of Germany payroll capabilities within our product platform. This role requires a strong understanding of German payroll operations, statutory payroll calculations, tax and social insurance processes, ITSG requirements, local payroll reporting, and the practical needs of employers running payroll in Germany. The successful candidate will act as a bridge between payroll domain requirements, product requirements, engineering delivery, compliance expectations, customer needs, and operational readiness. This is a hands-on senior individual contributor role. The person must be comfortable working across product analysis, requirements definition, payroll rule interpretation, customer issue investigation, release validation, statutory change support, documentation, enablement, and any adjacent work reasonably required to support Germany payroll product outcomes. What you’ll get to do The Senior Product Manager, German Payroll is responsible for ensuring that Germany payroll product capabilities are accurate, compliant, usable, scalable, and aligned with local employer requirements. The role exists to translate German payroll legislation, ITSG expectations, statutory processes, payroll practitioner needs, and customer feedback into clear product requirements and deliverable outcomes for engineering and operational teams. ITSG is directly relevant because it develops and operates digital communication applications for the German health and social services environment, and its system examination reviews payroll programs used for remuneration and payment accounting. Employers in Germany also use official digital processes for wage tax, social security, and contribution related reporting, including channels such as ELSTER and social insurance reporting processes. What you'll get to do Own and maintain product requirements for German payroll capabilities, including payroll calculations, statutory deductions, employer contributions, employee contributions, gross to net processing, corrections, retroactivity, year-end activities, and payroll outputs. Provide German payroll domain expertise to Product, Engineering, QA, Implementation, Customer Success, Support, Compliance, and Operations teams. Interpret German payroll requirements and translate them into clear functional specifications, acceptance criteria, user stories, test scenarios, and release guidance. Support ITSG related product requirements, certification readiness, statutory communication processes, social insurance reporting, data exchange expectations, and issue resolution where applicable. Work with engineering and QA teams to validate payroll calculations, statutory reports, interfaces, edge cases, error handling, and customer scenarios. Support analysis and delivery of statutory changes affecting Germany payroll, including changes related to income tax, social insurance, health insurance, pension insurance, unemployment insurance, long term care insurance, mini jobs, employment status, and related payroll obligations. Partner with compliance, legal, payroll operations, and external subject matter experts to confirm interpretation of German payroll rules and practical application in the product. Investigate customer reported payroll issues, determine root cause, separate configuration issues from product defects, and support prioritisation of fixes or enhancements. Contribute to release readiness by preparing release notes, customer impact summaries, internal enablement material, validation evidence, and operational guidance. Support customer discovery and practitioner feedback sessions focused on Germany payroll workflows, usability, accuracy, reporting, and compliance needs. Participate in backlog prioritisation for Germany payroll work, balancing statutory urgency, customer impact, operational risk, technical effort, and platform quality. Act as a practical escalation point for complex German payroll domain questions during implementation, support, testing, audits, and product delivery. Work beyond a narrow product ownership lane when required, including product analysis, payroll research, defect triage, documentation, test review, operational support, implementation support, customer issue analysis, and other reasonable duties aligned to Germany payroll product success. Mentor Product Managers, Product Owners, Business Analysts, QA analysts, or implementation colleagues on German payroll concepts, local payroll terminology, statutory logic, and product behaviour. Skills and experience we value Significant hands-on experience with German payroll, ideally as a payroll subject matter expert, payroll product manager, payroll consultant, payroll implementation lead, payroll analyst, or senior payroll practitioner. Strong understanding of German payroll calculations, gross to net logic, tax deductions, social insurance contributions, employer obligations, employee obligations, payroll corrections, retroactive processing, and payroll period activities. Experience with ITSG related payroll requirements, statutory social insurance processes, system tested payroll software expectations, or German payroll certification support. Strong knowledge of German payroll domain areas such as ELStAM, DEÜV, Beitragsnachweise, Sozialversicherungsmeldungen, Krankenkassen processes, Berufsgenossenschaft reporting, mini jobs, pension insurance, health insurance, unemployment insurance, and long-term care insurance. Experience translating payroll rules and practitioner requirements into product requirements, functional specifications, user stories, acceptance criteria, and test scenarios. Ability to work closely with engineering and QA teams to explain payroll logic, validate calculations, review defects, and support release readiness. Strong analytical skills, with the ability to investigate payroll discrepancies, identify root causes, and communicate findings clearly. Professional fluency in German, written and spoken is preferred Professional fluency in English, written and spoken is essential Strong stakeholder management skills, with the ability to work across product, technical, compliance, customer facing, and operational teams. Ability to work flexibly across product ownership, payroll analysis, issue triage, documentation, testing support, implementation support, and other Germany payroll related activities as business needs require. What would make you really standout Experience working with HCM, payroll, workforce management, time, HR, or compliance software. Experience with Dayforce or another enterprise payroll or HCM platform. Experience supporting ITSG certification, ITSG system examination, German statutory payroll releases, or social insurance data exchange processes. Experience with German payroll implementation, parallel payroll testing, customer migration, payroll reconciliation, or production support. Experience working in a SaaS product organisation with distributed product, engineering, QA, and customer teams. Experience creating payroll documentation, statutory change summaries, test packs, customer guidance, internal enablement, or compliance evidence. Experience supporting payroll product escalations for enterprise customers.