While I was whizzing back to London from Newcastle, the CIPP and Trevor Mcdonald gave me this prize and I am so happy!
Coincidentally , I am even more happy as it looks like the work that I really want to do for tens of thousands of small employers is going to happen , thanks to a herbaceous software company in the North East!
McDoughnut, Graham and Hammond!
Not everything that happens with money – happens in London!
Are you getting a theme here? The CIPP are based in Solihull, I was in Newcastle and McDoughnut and co were in Wales. The word “London” refers only to where the action wasn’t! In case anyone reading this blog thinks that London’s where the heavy lifting goes on, think again! I got messages from Frome (thanks Jim Parsons)and Reading (thanks Hayley). Infact, almost everyone (quiet Liz) who I work with in payroll is out of town!
Because payroll isn’t very glamorous and doesn’t hang out in the Ned of an evening and doesn’t do awards in the Grosvenor House or the Dorchester.
But payroll makes pensions go round and if you don’t believe that, look at the compliance figures for auto-enrolment. When I was with the herbaceous software people I was studying a survey of thousands of their clients about pensions awareness. It was encouraging to discuss strategy based not on the likely impact on assets under management but on how we could better reach the millions of people paid by this firm.
The CIPP is the oil that keeps the payroll industry (including the software companies) grinding!
Grafters – not shafters!
Pension people can only aspire to the productivity of payroll. I know from five years of working with payroll people that they are grafters and not shafters.
Payroll – probably the most accountable profession in the world
There is something very simple about getting payroll right., it is- that if you don’t- you are sacked. There is no black or white in payroll. it’s right first time or out you go. That means that treating customers fairly is not an aspiration but a pre-requisite of the job.
Yes, payroll software companies are commercial and so are those who use the software, whether in-house or within a bureau. But the 36% margins achieved by the asset managers are not achieved in the competitive market of payroll. I doubt that most owners of the bureaux I work with, would tolerate any of their suppliers achieving such profitability, nor would they consider such margins for themselves as reasonable.
If the FCA wanted to set a benchmark against which to judge the asset management industry, they could do worse than look at payroll.
I am really happy to have been recognised for trying to help pensions and to help payroll.
The CIPP are great people and I value the CIPP’s recognition above that of any other trade body, as they are at the heart of what is good about payroll.
On Wednesday, I heard our Prime Minister croak that she would dedicate the rest of her term in office to making Britain a nation of house-owner again. That wasn’t much of a promise, the longevity of her term was undermined by the minute she stood on the podium!
McDoughnut my hero!
Last night, I missed out on collecting the award from Trevor (a teenage hero thanks to Lenny Henry) and I’m bloody glad I didn’t make any such foolish pledges myself.
I run the Pension PlayPen, we’re here to restore confidence in Pensions. I work for First Actuarial, the best pension consultancy in Britain. I am proud as punch that the CIPP think I’m doing a good job -I think they’re doing a great job too!
