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Pennylane is a fast-growing fintech serving French SMEs and accounting firms with a financial operating system for accounting and finance automation. The company has raised €400M (including from Sequoia), grown to 1,000 employees across 25+ nationalities, and is expanding internationally.
You will lead the post-launch evolution of Workday HCM as a strategic manager within the HR function. You will manage a team of 2 Workday HRIS Experts and 1 HR Data Analyst, owning the Workday roadmap, HR data governance, system integrations, and AI/automation innovation.
Key responsibilities include:
**Team Leadership**: Manage and mentor your team of three, organize work using agile methodologies, prioritize backlog by business impact, foster documentation and knowledge sharing, and ensure continuous upskilling on Workday releases.
**Workday Post-Launch Excellence**: Own the post-go-live roadmap for continuous improvement and optimization. Challenge existing configurations to identify gaps and inefficiencies. Act as the internal functional project lead, translating HR business needs into requirements, leading solution design, UAT, and deployment. Stay current with Workday product updates and bi-annual releases. Maintain Workday security, role-based access control, data privacy, and audit compliance.
**Stakeholder Collaboration**: Work closely with IT, Finance, HR Leadership, Talent Acquisition, and Business teams. Facilitate prioritization workshops and steering committees. Serve as the main point of contact between HR Operations and the broader tech organization. Challenge requests and provide expert recommendations grounded in Workday best practices.
**Integrations & HR Tech Ecosystem**: Oversee integrations between Workday and third-party tools (Ashby for recruiting, Silae for payroll, and others). Identify opportunities to connect new tools as the company scales. Partner with IT to ensure robust, secure, and maintainable integration architecture. Maintain an up-to-date map of the HR tech stack.
**AI & Automation Innovation**: Explore and assess Workday's emerging AI and extensibility capabilities (Workday Extend, Sana Learn). Evaluate AI-enabled learning solutions. Map automation and AI tools already in use and identify secure, scalable opportunities to connect them with Workday. Lead experimentation, business-case assessment, governance, and deployment of selected use cases. Build team capabilities through training and knowledge sharing.
**HR Data & Analytics**: Work with the HR Data Analyst to ensure data quality, consistency, and governance. Drive development of HR dashboards, KPIs, and reporting (headcount, attrition, workforce planning). Champion a data-driven HR culture. Ensure GDPR and data protection compliance.
**International Expansion Support**: Support HRIS configuration and deployment for international growth, including new countries, legal entities, payroll connectors, and local compliance. Ensure Workday configurations scale with organizational growth.
The role is based in France with hybrid flexibility. Pennylane offers 25 paid vacation days, competitive compensation, company shares, home office budget, coworking allowance, Gymlib fitness access, latest Apple equipment, and regular company events. French-based employees receive additional benefits including 6-12 RTT days, 5 weeks PTO, lunch credits (Swile), and Alan Blue healthcare.
**Requirements**
Must-Haves:
- 8+ years of experience with Workday HCM, including post-go-live ownership and functional configuration (HCM Core, Time tracking, Absence, Learning, Talent, Compensation, Peakon)
- Strong understanding of Workday security model (role-based access, domain/business process security)
- Experience acting as AMOA or functional project lead on HRIS projects: requirements gathering, solution design, change management, UAT
- Proven experience managing a team or leading a project team, with collaborative and empowering leadership style
- Strong project management skills: ability to run sprints, manage backlog, and deliver in agile environment
- Excellent communication and stakeholder management skills – comfortable influencing without authority across IT, Finance, and HR Leadership
- Experience managing or overseeing HR system integrations (APIs, middleware, integration studio, etc.)
- Experience with AI and automation applied to Workday, HR, or Data, with ability to assess use cases, risks, and business value
- Fluent in both French and English
Nice-to-Haves:
- Familiarity with Ashby (ATS), Silae (payroll), Deel (payroll), Google package
- Experience in a scale-up or high-growth environment
- Exposure to international HRIS rollouts (multi-country configurations, payroll connectors)
- Knowledge of HR data governance frameworks and GDPR compliance
