18 Mar 2025
edit edit edit When Woolworths found itself facing a $300 million underpayment scandal, it wasn't just the PR team scrambling. The board was asking hard questions: How did we miss this? What metrics should we have been watching?¹
They're not alone. Across boardrooms in Sydney, Melbourne and beyond, Australian executives are waking up to a new reality: payroll isn't just an administrative function—it's a strategic priority with governance implications that demand C-suite attention.
"Most executives can recite their company's EBITDA down to the decimal point but couldn't tell you their payroll accuracy rate," says Tracy Angwin, CEO of the Australian Payroll Association. "That knowledge gap represents significant risk in today's regulatory environment."²
With the Fair Work Ombudsman ramping up enforcement and wage compliance becoming a board-level concern, we've pulled together the definitive list of payroll metrics that should be on every Australian executive's dashboard. These aren't just numbers for your payroll manager—they're strategic indicators that deserve your attention