Personal Assistant

Job Title / Personal Assistant
Faculty/ School/Department
Responsible to:
Responsible for:
Job Purpose
Working as part of an administration team, PAs will provide a professional, high quality, proactive and responsive secretarial and organisational support service to one or more senior staff. There is a requirement to use discretion and sound judgement to ensure correct prioritisation of work demands, identify urgent and sensitive matters and ensure deadlines are met.
Main activities and responsibilities
  1. Provide a high quality secretarial and organisational support service
  2. Effective management of electronic diaries, assessing priority of appointments and reallocation as necessary.
  3. Provide support for an extensive range of meetings. This will include scheduling, preparing agendas, pre meeting briefings and meeting papers, noting action points and following them up.
  4. Minute taking.
  5. Drafting correspondence, memos and reports and preparing presentations.
  6. Word processing documents from written copy or audio files.
  7. Receiving and dealing with telephone calls professionally, re-directing or taking messages and using initiative to deal with queries
  8. Sorting, distributing and responding or drafting responses to incoming mail in a timely and efficient manner.
  9. Organising and maintaining effective filing systems
  10. Acting as a key liaison point between the senior managers and other key parties, setting up meetings as appropriate and maintaining good communications.
  11. Making travel arrangements, booking accommodation and processing claims for expenses.
  12. Providing high quality and professional office hospitality.
  13. Organising arrangements for events.
  14. Providing cover for other personal assistants or administrative staff as required.
  15. May be required to supervise administrative / clerical / reception staff.

Additional Key Requirements:
Communication
Frequent need to communicate effectively with a wide range of people, many at a senior level and to coordinate communications on behalf of a senior manager. There is a requirement for good interpersonal skills, empathy and the ability to flex communication style in order to communicate sensitive information or overcome barriers to understanding.
Teamwork
It is expected that Personal Assistants will have a keen customer focus and work collaboratively with colleagues to ensure that a responsive and effective administration service is provided within the University. This may include a degree of flexibility to work across different areas, provide assistance for a variety of senior staff and support colleagues at times of peak demand or to help cover holidays and other absence.
Initiative, problem solving and decision making
Solve varied problems within own area of work, including issues about prioritising competing demands and managing conflicting deadlines.
Work environment
Be aware of the risks in the work environment and their potential impact on their own work and that of others.
Person Specification
  • A good standard of education, preferably to degree level. Equivalence may be accepted in lieu of formal qualifications through demonstrating comparable skills and ability to:
  • Make decisions and solve problems in a complex environment.
  • Assemble, evaluate and analyse information to inform sound judgements.
  • Communicate effectively.
  • Adopt a proactive work style.
  • Excellent IT skills including advanced knowledge of word processing, spreadsheet and presentation software packages, preferably Microsoft Word, Excel and PowerPoint.
  • Experience as a personal assistant
  • Experience of electronic diary management
  • Experience of working in a higher education environment is desirable.
  • Excellent team working skills with the ability to work collaboratively and co-operatively with colleagues
  • Ability to organise and plan own work.
  • Exceptional interpersonal and communication skills including the ability to ensure effective communication with a wide range of contacts both internal and external to the University.
  • Ability to assimilate large quantities of written and verbal communication quickly and produce accurate, timely minutes.
  • Excellent attention to detail, including proof reading skills, with the ability to maintain a high level of accuracy.
  • Ability to work under pressure and to tight deadlines
  • A flexible, pro-active approach to work including the ability to prioritise and re-prioritise to achieve successful outcomes
  • Ability to work on own initiative.
  • Ability to deal with sensitive information and to maintain confidentiality at all time.
  • A good understanding of information governance.

Special requirements
Able to undertake duties at different premises including any University campus as required.
May be required to work outside normal office hours to effectively support University operations and events.
Expectations of all staff
Professional standards
All staff employed by Birmingham City University are expected to exhibit high professional standards which promote and demonstrate the University’s core values of Excellence, People Focused, Partnership Working, Fairness and Integrity.
Equal Opportunities
All staff are expected to understand and enact the University’s commitment to ensuring equality and diversity in all activities. This commitment is enshrined in the Equality Statement and core values.
Dignity at work
Every member of staff has a responsibility to ensure colleagues are treated with dignity and respect.
The University is committed to creating a work environment for all staff that is free from harassment, intimidation and any other forms of bullying at work, where everyone is treated with dignity, respect and professional courtesy.
Health and safety
The arrangements for meeting the University’s health and safety objectives are contained in the Birmingham City University Health and Safety Policy. This includes the responsibilities of key staff and procedures covering the main activities of the University.
All staff are expected to take reasonable care of themselves and those that may be affected by their actions.
Dress code
The University does not operate a formal dress code for its employees, other than for those who are provided with uniform and/or protective clothing. However, employees must ensure that their dress is professional, reasonably smart and appropriate for the situation in which they are working. All staff should ensure that they present a professional image and one that reflects sensitivity to customer perceptions. This may reflect their ethnicity and lifestyle, but should not be provocative or cause offence to those with whom they have contact.
Citizenship
All staff are expected to adhere to good citizenship, being generous with help and support to others, collaborating with colleagues and working for the benefit of the University as a whole. In particular working to provide a positive studentexperience and achieving excellence in all the University’s activities.
This job description indicates the expectations of staff at this level. Job descriptions are not exhaustive and you may be required to undertake other duties of a similar level and responsibility.