Jobs

Do you want to help improve research communications in all corners of the globe? Come and join the world of nonprofit open infrastructure and be part of improving the creation and sharing of knowledge as our new HR Specialist.

• Location: Remote and global, with at least two hours overlap with EST/EDT time zone.
• Type: part-time 25 hours a week Mon-Thu or 32 hours a week Mon-Thu
• Remuneration: 22/hr USD or local equivalent. Note this is a general guide (as there is no universal currency) and local currency analysis will take place before the final offer.
• Benefits: Check out our Employee Handbook for more details on paid time off, unlimited sick time, paid parental and medical leaves, and more.
• Reports to: Head of Human Resources, Michelle Cancel
• Timeline: Advertise in October-November and offer in December.

About the role

Reporting to our Head of HR, the HR Specialist is a new role that will support our growing team.

We’re looking for an HR Specialist with a focus on Payroll and Benefits to provide excellent administrative support. You’ll be the main administrator of our HR systems and run smooth payroll and benefits processes. Supporting a global team can be complex at times as it requires familiarity with different sets of local employment laws and benefits. This is an excellent opportunity for someone with curiosity who wants to expand their knowledge on global payroll and benefits practices. The strongest candidates may possess an inclination for detailed, independent, and organizational work.

Currently, we are a team of 50, growing to nearly 60 next year. We have staff in over 14 countries, and so this role will play an important part in administering the employment experience of our team. This role sits on the Operations teams, works closely with our Finance team, and will interact with everyone in the organization.

We are a diverse distributed team and are seeking candidates who want to foster a strong team. We work a flexible schedule and asynchronously. We ask that candidates have at least 2 hours of availability with EST/EDT timezone for 1:1s, team stand ups, and all staff meetings.

Key responsibilities

Payroll

• Administer bi-weekly payroll for US with ADP WFN
• Administer monthly payroll for UK with Paycircle
• Administer monthly payroll for all other countries with EOR provider
• Process monthly payments for independent contractors
• Enter monthly expense reimbursements, EOR provider
• Review and approval of time tracking submissions
• Record-keeping of all payroll cycles in Google Suite
• Maintain accurate personnel data in payroll systems

Benefits

• Coordinate renewals and maintain up to date information for global benefits
• Coordinate annual Open Enrollment for the US health and wellness benefits and manage documentation. Maintain accurate US benefits information.
• Administer COBRA processes for the US
• Administer retirement and pension contributions and ensure accuracy
• Gather monthly invoices for review and approval
• Administer our global EAP and share monthly newsletters
• Administer leave system

General

• Understanding of statutory benefits and taxes
• Maintenance of SOPs, HR systems, and HR folders
• Update Holidays, birthday, and anniversary calendars
• Annual maintenance of US Labor Law posters
• Support with onboarding and offboarding tasks as needed
• Support with recruitment tasks and ATS administration as needed
• Update organizational chart
• Support annual financial and security audits
• Answer questions from our team members on payroll and benefits
• Create and follow-up on tickets from our payroll providers
• Escalate sensitive and complex issues to Head of HR
• Participates in cross-collaboration groups
• Other projects and tasks as assigned

About you

You’ll need:

• Outstanding detail orientation and accuracy
• Excellent organizational skills and can independently manage tasks and priorities
• Proper handling of confidential and sensitive information
• Good written and spoken English
• Quick learner and can rapidly adapt to new systems and processes
• Proactive in asking questions and making suggestions for improvements
• Work efficiently but also kindly and with empathy with our very diverse, global team.

Nice-to-have:

• Experience in HR, finance, operations or customer service
• Experience with HR systems and benefits
• Experience with global payroll and benefits
• Strong problem solving skills

About Crossref & the team

We’re a nonprofit membership organisation that exists to make scholarly communications better. We rally the community; tag and share metadata; run an open infrastructure; play with technology; and make tools and services—all to help put research in context.

We envision a rich and reusable open network of relationships connecting research organisations, people, things, and actions; a scholarly record that the global community can build on forever, for the benefit of society. We are working towards this vision of a ‘Research Nexus’ by demonstrating the value of richer and connected open metadata, incentivising people to meet best practices, while making it easier to do so. “We” means 2 members from 160+ countries, 170+ million records, and nearly 2 billion monthly metadata queries from thousands of tools across the research ecosystem. We want to be a sustainable source of complete, open, and global scholarly metadata and relationships.

Take a look at our strategic agenda to see the planned work that aims to achieve the vision. The sustainability area aims to make transparent all the processes and procedures we follow to run the operation long-term, including our financials and our ongoing commitment to the Principles of Open Scholarly Infrastructure (POSI). The governance area describes our board and its role in community oversight.

It also takes a strong team – because reliable infrastructure needs committed people who contribute to and realise the vision, and thrive doing it. We are a distributed group of 49 dedicated people who like to play quizzes, talk about celery (sometimes cucumber), measure coffee intake, and create 100s of custom slack emojis. We enthusiastically support the Oxford comma but waver between use of American or British English. Occasionally we do some work to improve knowledge sharing worldwide— which we take a bit more seriously than ourselves. We do this through fair policies and working practices, a balanced approach to resourcing, and accountability to each other.

We can offer the successful candidate a challenging and fun environment to work in. Together we are dedicated to our global mission and we are constantly adapting to ensure we get there. Take a look at our organisation chart, the latest Annual Meeting recordings, and our financial information here.

Thinking of applying?

We especially encourage applications from people with backgrounds historically under-represented in research and scholarly communications. You can be based anywhere in the world where we can employ staff, either directly or through an employer of record.

We will invite selected candidates to an initial call to discuss the role. Following that, shortlisted candidates will be invited to an interview. You will receive all information in advance, and the interview will include some questions and/or exercises you’ll have a chance to prepare for. All interviews will be held remotely on Zoom.

Click here to apply!

Applications close on November 14th, 2025.

Anticipated salary for this role is approximately 22/hr USD-equivalent, paid in local currency. Crossref offers competitive compensation, benefits, flexible work arrangements, professional development opportunities, and a supportive work environment. Check out our Employee Handbook for more details on paid time off, unlimited sick time, paid parental and medical leaves, and more.

Equal opportunities commitment

Crossref is committed to a policy of non-discrimination and equal opportunity for all employees and qualified applicants for employment without regard to race, colour, religion, sex, pregnancy or a condition related to pregnancy, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, national origin, ancestry, age, physical or mental disability, genetic information, veteran status, uniform service member status, or any other protected class under applicable law. Crossref will make reasonable accommodations for qualified individuals with known disabilities in accordance with applicable law.

Thanks for your interest in joining Crossref. We are excited to hear from you!