What’s the most significant challenges facing payroll professionals today?

Two stand out.

First, regulatory complexity is accelerating faster than teams can absorb. Remote work has surfaced cross-border exposures (Permanent Establishment, the 183-day rule, social security coordination, etc.) that used to sit in tax’s lane.

Second, AI: the real challenge isn’t whether it replaces us, but how quickly we learn to use it well,  shifting from doing the work to managing the AI agents that do it (we will need to be the manager of the AI agent)

What excites you most about participating this year?

The agenda hits the conversations that actually matter right now:  AI in practice, pay transparency ahead of the EU Directive, the global workforce, and payroll education. It’s one of the few rooms where peers compare real experiences openly rather than polished case studies.

Which session or theme are you most looking forward to?

The AI-focused sessions. There’s a lot of noise in the market and not enough honest conversation about what’s actually working in production, where the value is real, where it’s still hype, and how teams are managing the control implications.

What is a common misconception about "The New Rules of Global Payroll", and how is your session challenging it?

The biggest one is that "going global" is solved by picking the right provider. It isn’t. Provider choice is downstream of governance, risk appetite, and the maturity of your in-house function. My session reframes it: the new rules aren’t about outsourcing harder, they’re about owning the strategy and using providers as instruments, not crutches.

How does "The New Rules of Global Payroll" connect to broader organisational strategy or a business’ performance?

Directly. Where you can hire, how fast you can onboard, what your true cost of employment looks like in a given country, these are payroll-adjacent questions that shape commercial decisions. Remote work, regulatory pace, and provider choice now sit upstream of talent strategy, M&A, and geographic expansion. Treating payroll as a back-office cost centre means leaving real strategic value on the table.

What do you hope attendees take away from your session?

A practical lens, not theory on how to address the reality of remote working as it is today. Sharper questions to ask their providers, a clearer view of where their governance gaps are, and the confidence to push back when payroll is being asked to absorb risk that should sit elsewhere. If they leave with one reframed conversation to have with their leadership team, the session has done its job.

What are the biggest opportunities for innovation in payroll over the next 2–3 years?

AI, but the useful kind, spotting errors, handling exceptions, drafting employee comms, sorting queries. The real shift is in our role: payroll professionals will become managers of AI agents rather than processors. The teams that work out how to use AI without losing control will pull ahead. There’s also a challenge for global vendors: build real AI into your systems, not just a label on the box. Right now there’s huge pressure to be the first to say "AI-native," but the basics, integrations, governance, controls, audit trail, are still unsolved. As I’ve said a few times on LinkedIn, there’s a real gap between the people building payroll systems (product owners) and the people running payroll every day (payroll team and leaders).

Closing that gap would make these tools much closer to what customers actually need, rather than what looks good in a demo. Beyond AI, the market is also moving toward fewer, broader platforms that cover more countries in one place, and toward systems where compliance is built in from the start, not added on country by country. That shift will change what "global payroll" really means: today, it’s often one contract sitting on top of a messy reality. The platforms that genuinely deliver one system across many countries will redefine the category.

What is one thing you’re hoping to learn from the other speakers?

Concrete AI stories. Not the vision, the reality. What models peers have actually deployed, where they hit walls, and how they got through. Shared evidence, not slideware.

Coffee or tea before your big session?

Espresso. Always a good single espresso and “ristretto".

Find out more about Mirko’s session and everything else on offer at The Reward and Payroll Summit 2026 - Click here to find out more