Personal Assistant

Williams Lea; Royal Leamington Spa; Hybrid; GBP 25,000 - 35,000; Full time

Job summary

Williams Lea is seeking a Personal Assistant in Royal Leamington Spa to provide proactive support to fee earners. The role involves managing diaries, preparing documentation, and maintaining a high standard of professionalism. With a hybrid work model and a comprehensive benefits package, this position offers an excellent opportunity for career development.

Benefits

25 days holiday, plus bank holidays

Private Medical Insurance

Discounted gym memberships

On-site restaurant and café

Qualifications

• Exceptional standard of written and verbal communication.
• Able to remain calm under pressure and work to tight deadlines.
• Conscientious, approachable, and enthusiastic.

Responsibilities

• Providing direct support to fee earners.
• Managing complex diaries and key dates.
• Preparing high-quality documentation as required.

Skills

Communication

Initiative

Confidentiality

Attention to Detail

Flexibility

Tools

Microsoft Office

Job description

This website is operated, hosted and managed by Williams Lea Limited, 3 Savannah Way, Leeds LS10 1AB, United Kingdom.

Shifts: 29 hours per week, Monday – Friday, 11am-5:30pm with a 40 minute unpaid break

Work model: Hybrid – office-based Tuesday to Thursday with the option to work from home Monday and Friday, depending on business requirements (flexibility required)

Williams Lea seeks a Personal Assistant to join our team!

Williams Lea is the leading global provider of skilled, technology-enabled, business-critical support services, with long-term trusted relationships with blue-chip clients across investment banks, law firms and professional services firms. Williams Lea employees, nearly 7000 people worldwide, who provide efficient business services at client sites in often complex and highly regulated environments, from centralised Williams Lea onshore facilities, and through best cost company offshore locations.

Purpose of role

The Personal Assistant’s principal role is to provide enhanced, proactive support to a team of fee earners enabling them to operate efficiently, reducing their time spent on administrative tasks as much as possible. The Personal Assistant and their support will enable fee earners to provide seamless legal services to their clients, helping them to maximise the amount of time they are able to spend on fee earning tasks.

The support provided needs to be seamless and of a high standard. The individual is expected to use a high degree of self-management, initiative, proactiveness and can maintain a high level of confidentiality and professionalism.

The Personal Assistant will act as workflow manager for other support services. This includes delegating and supervising the completion of document production, file management and copying/scanning tasks which are primarily undertaken by other relevant business support services, e.g. Office Services / Legal Admin.

Key responsibilities

• Providing direct to support to a number of fee earners
• Proactively liaising with fee earners to discuss their workloads, deadlines and any upcoming projects
• Proactively managing complex diaries and key dates, including co-ordinating fee earner movements and making travel arrangements
• Effectively and proactively monitoring fee earner mailboxes
• Preparing high quality documentation such as covering letters, spreadsheets and reports as required
• Organising internal and external meetings – arranging meeting rooms and requesting catering
• Monitoring and responding to emails in a professional and timely manner
• Managing external telephone calls on behalf of the team
• Liaising with clients via email, telephone and in person where required and acting as a point of contact alongside the fee earners, adhering to firm’s standards for client care
• Promptly and accurately opening new files within the firm’s Practice Management System
• Delivering an exceptional electronic and hard copy file management service,
• Undertaking necessary file closure activities
• Proactively taking action ahead of critical diary dates
• Co-ordinating the completion of high-quality document production output
• Efficiently delegating tasks to the relevant support teams with adequate instructions and clear deadlines, such as photocopying, scanning, couriers, letters/faxes etc.
• Taking full ownership and accountability of any delegated tasks with relevant support teams or third-party providers and seeing tasks through to completion
• Completing financial tasks such as billing, invoicing, payments, requesting cheques
• Supporting with the collection of outstanding payments from clients and/or third parties
• Regularly reviewing and moving forward the team case report to ensure financials and AML / compliance requirements are in order – liaising with clients where required
• Processing fee earner expenses
• Managing the production of official documents including bundles, court papers, originals and any other relevant documents
• Using third party systems, portals or websites to undertake department specific tasks – e.g. Land Registry, InfoTrack, C-E filing, Companies House, OPG – and any other relevant systems, where required
• Liaising with internal departments including finance and compliance
• Prioritising the workload effectively by deadline, importance and time sensitivity
• Actively participating in all relevant training
• Demonstrating flexibility with working practices and processes in line with the business needs, especially in times of pressure or high workload
• Proactively seeking support from peers or team leaders where any gaps in training or knowledge arise, instilling confidence in fee earners and the service provided
• Supporting the wider business where required and necessary, including other members of the wider support and legal teams, both proactively and at the request of the team leaders
• Ensure that personal and team working areas are always kept tidy and professional
• Attend both team and firm wide meetings and trainings where scheduled
• Any other duties within the scope and spirit of the post as required

Personal attributes

• Exceptional standard of written and verbal communication
• Competent with the Microsoft Office suite and all forms of technology
• Flexible and dependable, able to take initiative
• Able to remain calm under pressure and work to tight deadlines and defined SOPs
• Conscientious, approachable and enthusiastic
• Able to quickly build confidence, respect and trust with others
• Have a positive approach to daily tasks and have a solution and service delivery focused working method
• Adaptable to change
• Team player
• Excellent interpersonal skills
• Solutions focused
• Have a high level of confidentiality and integrity
• Exceptional attention to detail

Rewards and Benefits

We believe in supporting our employees in both their professional and personal lives. As part of our commitment to your well-being, we offer a comprehensive benefits package, including but not limited to:

• 25 days holiday, plus bank holidays (pro-rata for part time roles)
• Salary sacrifice schemes, retail vouchers – including our TechScheme which can be used on a range of gadgets such as Smart TV’s, laptops and computers or household appliances.
• Life Assurance
• Private Medical Insurance
• Health Assessments
• Discounted gym memberships
• Referral Scheme
• On-site restaurant and café

You will also have the opportunity to work for a global employer who is dedicated to offering each and every employee an enjoyable, challenging and rewarding career with future career development prospects!

Equality and Diversity

The Company values the differences that a diverse workforce brings to the organisation and will not discriminate because of age, disability, gender reassignment, marriage and civil partnership, pregnancy and maternity, race (which includes colour, nationality and ethnic or national origins), religion or belief, sex or sexual orientation (each of these being a “protected characteristic” in discrimination law). It will not discriminate because of any other irrelevant factor and will build a culture that values openness, fairness and transparency.

If you have a disability and would prefer to apply in a different format or would like to make a reasonable adjustment to enable you to make an interview please contact us at [e-mail] (we do not accept applications to this email address).

In a rapidly changing world, the ability to innovate and break new ground drives progress. Williams Lea has harnessed this ability for more than 200 years.

Our 5,200+ talented employees worldwide are experts in delivering efficient business processes in complex and highly regulated environments.

We’re always progressing. Connecting technology with expertise and strong processes to transform support services. As we enter our third century, we continue helping businesses thrive in a future driven by digitization and virtualization.