Executive Assistant - Leadership Team

Ellison Institute of Technology Oxford; Oxford; On-site; GBP 25,000 - 35,000; Full time

Job summary

The Ellison Institute of Technology seeks an administrative support specialist to assist its Senior Leadership Team in Oxford. This role is pivotal in ensuring leaders focus on high-priority tasks and translates key decisions into actionable plans, fostering effective coordination and operational excellence.

Qualifications

• Experience in administrative support in fast-paced environments.
• Strong organisational skills with managing competing priorities.
• High emotional intelligence for building relationships across levels.

Responsibilities

• Provide administrative support to Senior Leadership Team.
• Coordinate calendars and ensure meetings run smoothly.
• Track decisions and ensure timely execution of follow-ups.

Skills

Task Prioritisation

Time Management

Communication

Relationship Management

Project Coordination

Job description

About

EIT Oxford The Ellison Institute of Technology (EIT) works to develop and deploy advanced technology in pursuit of solving some of humanity's most challenging and enduring problems. Guided by world-leading scientists and entrepreneurs, EIT seeks to accelerate innovation by driving scientific and technological advancements across four humane endeavors: health and medical science, food security and sustainable agriculture, climate change and clean energy, and government innovation and the era of artificial intelligence.

Please visit eit.org for more details

Our Culture

At the Ellison Institute, we believe that an inclusive, collaborative team atmosphere is just as important to our mission as our scientific aims and methods.

We strive to build a supportive environment where everyone feels confident taking creative risks toward innovation. We value emotional intelligence and communicating with empathy and respect for others. We foster a team that is curious, has a deep sense of commitment, responsibility, and resilience needed to achieve excellence.

About AI Capability

We are a team of AI researchers, Applied AI scientists, data and software engineers within EIT. We work across all humane endeavors, supported by world-class data platforms and large-scale compute.AI is at the heart of how EIT tackles humanity's most pressing and enduring challenges. Our mission is to harness state-of-the-art statistical machine learning to 10x the impact of EIT's programmes and discover novel AI approaches that lead to 100x impact in the future.

Job Summary:

You will play a pivotal role in providing administrative and logistical support to three members of our Senior Leadership Team, ensuring our leaders stay focused on high-value priorities, and translating key decisions into action within the AI team and across the wider organisation. You will work closely with your assigned leaders and the broader leadership team to support the development of effective operational processes around their priorities — including strategic triage, cross-team coordination, decision tracking, and time management.

You'll be a consistent source of clarity, structure, and momentum behind the scenes, bringing a proactive, solutions-driven mindset to everything you do. Effectively support leaders by working under guidance and executing assigned responsibilities with precision, contributing to operational excellence and enabling strategic focus.

Requirements

Job Summary:

You will play a pivotal role in providing administrative and logistical support to three members of our Senior Leadership Team, ensuring our leaders stay focused on high-value priorities, and translating key decisions into action within the AI team and across the wider organisation. You will work closely with your assigned leaders and the broader leadership team to support the development of effective operational processes around their priorities — including strategic triage, cross-team coordination, decision tracking, and time management.

You'll be a consistent source of clarity, structure, and momentum behind the scenes, bringing a proactive, solutions-driven mindset to everything you do. Effectively support leaders by working under guidance and executing assigned responsibilities with precision, contributing to operational excellence and enabling strategic focus.

Key Responsibilities:

Strategic Enablement

• Assist in managing leader priorities by coordinating calendars and ensuring meetings run smoothly
• Track decisions and support follow-through across teams
• Track follow-ups and action items, ensuring timely execution and clear documentation
• Prepare materials, briefing documents, and agendas to increase meeting effectiveness
• Act as a reliable point of continuity by staying aligned with leadership priorities
• Support internal communication and coordination
• Act as liaison and support clear communication between Leadership and internal/external stakeholders to maintain alignment
  
  

Operational Excellence

• Coordinate logistics and support workflows to help ensure smooth execution of leadership priorities
• Coordinate complex calendars and high-stakes meetings with precision
• Support a culture of clear communication, thorough documentation and operational simplicity
• Ensure leadership decisions consistently turn into actionable, trackable outcomes
  
  

Trusted Partnership

• Act as a strategic gatekeeper to protect your leaders' time and energy
• Build trusted relationships across all levels, serving as an extension of leadership
• Model calm, focus, and resilience in high-pressure environments
• Carry and reinforce organisational culture, especially around professionalism, trust, and collaboration
• Serve as a consistent source of momentum, clarity, and reliability behind the scenes
  
  

Essential Knowledge, Skills and Experience:

Administrative Support: Experience providing reliable administrative support in fast-paced environments. Able to manage tasks, schedules, and communication with professionalism and efficiency.

Task Prioritisation and Time Management: Strong organisational skills with the ability to manage competing priorities, support leader time management, and follow through on tasks in a timely manner.

Project Coordination: Skilled at driving multiple initiatives in parallel, bringing clarity, timelines, and accountability across teams.

Communication and Relationship Management: High EQ with the ability to build trusted relationships across all levels of an organisation.

Operational Excellence: Obsessed with detail, execution, and creating calm out of chaos; able to simplify complexity through smart workflows and documentation.

Terms of Appointment

• You must be eligible to work in the UK with a willingness to travel as necessary
• You must be based in, or within easy commuting distance of, Oxford
• During peak periods, some longer hours may be required and some working across multiple time zones due to the global nature of the role.