Paula Tadayesky brings 15+ years of Time and Absence Management as well as Human Capital Management systems experience to the HRchitect team. Paula’s knowledge includes the full project life-cycle, including policy review and analysis, conducting workshops, implementation, user acceptance testing, corporate training, and change management. She prides herself on her ability to facilitate process enhancements for clients, and her strong executive presence and interpersonal relationship-building skills. Paula joined the HRchitect team as a Senior Implementation Consultant and has recently been promoted to an Implementation Manager role where she oversees a group of specialized consultants. Learn more about Paula, her favorite restaurant, and her favorite technology tools in this month’s consultant spotlight.
Hometown: Easton, Pennsylvania
Alma mater: I received my Associates from the Allentown Business School in Center Valley, Pennsylvania
All-time favorite restaurant: blue grillhouse in Pennsylvania
Last book you read: The Rhythm of Life: Living Every Day with Passion & Purpose by Matthew Kelly
What do you do when you’re not working? I am a sports, project car, and dog mom. I am currently the Treasurer of the Wilson Warrior Football Mom’s Club responsible for fundraising, event planning, and keeping the players fed. High school boys can eat! In the summer I go to car meets with my daughter and our Volkswagens. I have a 1997 Volkswagen Cabrio and she has a modified 2015 Volkswagen Tiguan. My baby is still a work in progress. I am enjoying our new 6-month-old English Bulldog puppy, Winnie, in addition to our 4-year-old Australian Shepard mix, Kiah, and Bailey, a 3-year-old Shar-Pei Pitbull mix.
How did you find out about HRchitect, and what made you join the company? I interviewed with Matt Lafata and Erica Niesse several years ago and although I joined another company at that time, we kept in touch. When that organization went through a merger we reconnected, but I had already accepted an offer with another company. That company’s size and culture were not a good fit for me. I reached out to Matt on Linkedin and within a week I joined HRchitect. The culture of putting employees first, and the size and growth of HRchitect were paramount in making my decision. I truly found a home joining the HRchitect team.
How has your background impacted your experience as a consultant? Originally, in my career, I started on the sales side of the house consulting and providing Time and Labor solutions. I progressed to consulting on end-to-end solutions from hire to retire which benefited me in becoming a strong consultant. While in Sales, I was aligned with Global and National accounts which enhanced my understanding and communication with various client audiences. This gave me the ability to understand critical business issues and needs at different levels of an organization. During the sales cycle, scoping was crucial which gave me insight into the processes before Implementation. My background in social work, technology, and being a single mom have provided me with the tools necessary to excel in my position and support my team and my clients. Time management, being an active listener, and being able to manage difficult conversations is paramount.
In your own words, what do you do at HRchitect? I have recently been promoted to a new role, Implementation Manager. In this role, I focus a lot of time on mentoring my team. I train, implement, network, communicate, and understand all the pieces of what we do. Every day is different, and I love what I do. I enjoy that my job is always evolving. As a leader, though I am using my expertise to mentor my team, I am constantly learning so much from my team and peers. I thoroughly enjoy seeing them develop and I am learning new things as well.
What’s a typical workday like for you? It actually starts at the end of my prior day. At the end of each day, I recap my day and make a list of items that are outstanding or need follow-up. After I check my morning emails, I utilize this as my priority list. This helps me complete my high priority items first thing in the morning. I then start my timesheet so I can manage my week, check in with my team to see if they have any needs, coordinate meetings, and start tasks for my client projects.
Tell me about a project you’ve worked on that you’re particularly proud of. I am proud ofmy first UKG Dimensions project at a former company. It was a healthcare client , with 12,000 employees with multiple unions and there was a lot of complexity. It was supposed to be a simple “migration,” but I learned a lot about Business Structure. Their team was very tech-savvy but that also caused them to over-configure their time system. This was a challenging project but the project was extremely rewarding. I learned a lot from it.
What’s been one of your favorite destinations to travel to for a client site visit? Believe it or not, Buffalo, New York . Our full implementation team of 5-6 members would travel frequently to the client over a two-year time period. We got to explore Niagara Falls, and the Canadian countryside which included phenomenal wineries and restaurants. We were all foodies and we discovered so many amazing restaurants in Buffalo. The relationships that we built were incredible and I keep in touch with most of them. Teambuilding at its finest.
As part of a team that works 100% virtually, what technology or collaboration tools do you use to make your work life easier? I use multiple screens, and a wireless headset so I can move around and get steps in. Slack has been incredible for instant communication with my team on projects. It is a great tool to give us ‘microbreaks’ throughout the day with trivia, fun memes, vacation photos, jokes, pet photos, and more. This has been so beneficial and fun considering we are a 100% remote team.
What motivates you to wake up and go to work every day? Our team and how we support each other are my big motivators. Every day is different, and technology is constantly changing. Our company and team are like a melting pot. We all come from so many different backgrounds and levels of experience, whether it be sales, or HR practitioner experience. Our different backgrounds contribute to what makes us so knowledgeable and great at what we do. We do a lot of collaboration and product experience sharing. It’s the culture that we all share. Even as we grow, we never forget how important this is to our team and organization.
Which employee perks that HRchitect offers do you enjoy the most? Why? The Annual Charitable Campaign really hit home personally as I was able to donate to a cause that was very important to my son and me. The organization even issued a press release about this donation. I also love the Health Initiative program and the Home Office Allowance.
Learn more about Paula on LinkedIn.