Executive Assistant

Office for Students; London; Hybrid; GBP 36,000 - 39,000

Job description

Executive Assistant

Permanent

Location: Bristol or London - Regular travel will be required to London if Bristol based

Salary: £36,430 - £38,294

Plus generous Civil Service defined benefit pension and London weighting £3,566 where appropriate

Who We Are

The Office for Students (OfS) is the independent regulator of higher education in England. We regulate higher education on behalf of all students, ensuring that every student, regardless of their background, has a fulfilling experience that enriches their lives and careers.

Role Overview

We are seeking a highly motivated and dynamic Executive Assistant to join the office of the Director of Regulation within our Regulation Directorate. This is an exciting opportunity to join the OfS as we embark on our ambitious new strategy focused on quality, standards, and equality of opportunity.

Role Responsibilities

As Executive Assistant to the Director of Regulation, you will act as the central point of contact in the Director’s office, co-ordinating and supporting the work of the Director as required. Your responsibilities will include:

1. Developing a strong awareness of the Director's work and the work of the wider directorate: to understand the subject matter in correspondence, effectively triage queries, identify risks, and inform judgement around priorities.
2. Co-ordinating communications and correspondence: with internal and external stakeholders across the Director’s complex regulatory and operational portfolio.
3. Stakeholder management: building strong internal and external peer relationships and networks to enable the Director to effectively manage and deliver meetings and engagement with stakeholders.
4. Delivering a portfolio of administrative tasks to a high standard: including calendar management, email management, travel coordination, preparing briefing materials, drafting correspondence, and minute taking.
5. Managing and enhancing administrative systems: such as those relating to daily briefing packs and email accounts to meet the Director’s needs.
6. Team collaboration: working proactively with the Director’s Strategic Advisor, the Regulation Directorate Strategy and Support Team, and the Office for Student central functions (e.g., CE office; HR; comms team), in order to triage queries, problem solve, and deliver key pieces of operational and regulatory work.
7. Providing peer leadership: to other administrative colleagues in the directorate, with the aim of enhancing business support functions across the directorate.

What We Are Looking For – Person Specification

We are seeking a dedicated and proactive individual who embodies the following qualities:

1. Professional experience: You have previous experience of working as an executive assistant to a director (or similar role) and have undertaken enhanced PA responsibilities to a high standard.
2. Excellent judgement: You proactively build understanding of your Director’s (or similar role) work, and are able to triage, prioritise and action correspondence and queries as appropriate. You have experience of handling sensitive issues discretely.
3. Effective networker: You build strong and constructive peer relationships and networks, including with the offices of internal and external stakeholders, to support meetings and engagements.
4. Communication skills: Your communication skills, both written and verbal, are clear, concise, and you are able to draft and tailor communication to a variety of internal and external audiences.
5. Problem-solving ability: You are able to proactively identify issues with, and then enhance, the administrative systems that support a Director (or similar role) in their work.
6. Organisational and time management skills: You have high attention to detail, and can co-ordinate, organise and signpost in context of a consistently fast moving and complex portfolio of activity.
7. Office administration: You have a solid background in the use of a variety of standard software and business processes, particularly within the MS Office suite (Word, Outlook, Teams, Excel, OneNote).

Benefits

Our Total Reward Framework offers a range of benefits to suit your way of life:

1. 25 days’ annual leave plus bank holidays.
2. Comprehensive learning and development opportunities.
3. Generous Civil Service pension scheme.
4. Health benefits.

Diversity and Inclusion

We value diversity and the wealth of perspectives, experience, and ideas it brings to our work. We strive to embed equality of opportunity in everything we do and welcome applications from candidates regardless of age, disability, race and ethnicity, gender reassignment, marriage and civil partnership, pregnancy and maternity, religion or belief, sex, sexual orientation, and socio-economic background.

Working Arrangements

We embrace flexible and hybrid working arrangements, typically requiring office presence for two or three days per week.

Next Steps

If you are shortlisted for the role, we will ask you to complete some pre-interview tasks. At interview, we will discuss these tasks and ask some questions based on the person specification in the Executive Assistant job description.

The final shortlist will have an informal discussion with the Director of Regulation before decisions are taken.

Closing date for applications: 23:59 13 April

Interview date: w/c 5 May