Senior Operations Support Administrator

External Relations
Location: University of Birmingham, Edgbaston, Birmingham UK

Full time starting salary is normally in the range £28,397 to £30,210, with potential progression once in post to £33,938

Grade: 5
Full Time, Permanent
Closing date: 4th September 2024

Our offer to you

People are at the heart of what we are and do.

The University of Birmingham is proud to have been a part of the City of Birmingham and the wider region for over 100 years, and we are equally proud to be recognised as a leading global university. We want to attract talented people from across the city and beyond, support them to succeed, and celebrate their success.

We are committed to helping the people who work here to develop through our sector- leading Birmingham Professional programme which provides all professional services staff with development opportunities and the encouragement to reach their full potential. With almost 5,000 professional services jobs in a wide-range of functions in Edgbaston and in our campus in Dubai, there are plenty of opportunities for you to be able to develop your career at the University.

We believe there is no such thing as a typical member of staff and that diversity is a source of strength that underpins the exchange of ideas, innovation, and debate. We warmly welcome people from all backgrounds and are committed to fostering an inclusive environment where diversity is at the heart of who and what we are, and how we work.

Supporting our people to achieve a healthy work/life balance is important both to our employees and to the success of the University and, depending on the role, we offer
a variety of flexible working arrangements. We therefore welcome discussions on all forms of flexible working. In addition, you will receive a generous package of benefits including 40 days paid holiday a year, one paid day a year for volunteering, occupational sick pay, and a pension scheme. We also have three high quality subsidised day nurseries.

The University is situated in leafy Edgbaston and there are excellent transport links to our beautiful campus, including main bus routes and a train station on site. On campus we have a state-of-the-art sports centre with pool, shops, places to eat and drink, our own art gallery, museum and botanical gardens.

Find out more about the benefits of working for the University of Birmingham

Background

The University of Birmingham is one of the UK’s largest providers of distance learning and, as part of our Birmingham 2030 strategy, we are making a significant investment in the development of our online programme portfolio.

UoB Online is an ambitious team within the University, comprised of both academic and professional services staff. The team supports the development and delivery of a portfolio of online programmes that make our world-leading teaching and research accessible to lifelong learners across the globe. We are looking to recruit an ambitious, collaborative andinnovative individual who can significantly contribute to realising the University’s strategic goals.

Role Summary

This is an exciting opportunity for an experienced administrator to take on a key role within the UoB Online Education Operations team. As a Senior Operations Support Administrator within UoB Online, you will provide support for a broad range of administrative and operational duties, some of which may be complex. You will also be responsible for supporting colleagues and sharing knowledge. You will be able to use your wide range of skills, both technical and administrative, and may have the opportunity to lead on specific tasks within a team. Roles within UoB Online work in an agile way, and to flexibly use resource you may be given the opportunity to work in different areas of the team or wider University. This role supports the provision of a high-quality student experience for all students studying a UoB Online programme.

You will work closely with a diverse group of colleagues, including managers, Professional Services staff, academic staff, staff from Partner organisations, and other key internal and external stakeholders.

This role will report into the Education Operations Manager, who is responsible for the UoB Online administration, governance, and student experience related processes. You will also work closely with the Education Operations Officer.

Main Duties

You will be able to deal with complex systems and procedures and will be expected to offer advice on these, including deciding on the response to more complex queries. You will be expected to exercise your judgment on the answer to queries or on the direction of work within parameters set by your manager, ensuring all queries are dealt with accurately and efficiently. On a day-to-day basis you will be expected to resolve more complex queries without necessarily referring to your manager.

Act as a role model and help coach members of the team. If you have a supervisory role, you will line manage your staff taking responsibility for co-ordinating and prioritising the work of others.

You will act as a primary contact for and maintain high profile working relationships with key stakeholders on your own initiative, fielding complex enquiries independently and ensuring that appropriate information is disseminated to stakeholders as appropriate. This will include identifying when to delegate or escalate queries, ensuring all follow-up action is taken.

You will support with meeting planning duties as required, including making informed decisions about the team’s work schedule based on an understanding of priorities and deadlines.
You will manage small scale projects on your own initiative and will carry out desk research and source data from internal and external sources to contribute to wider projects.

You will be expected to use a variety of complex University systems and processes to research, analyse and interpret complex data, producing bespoke reports as
required. This may include identifying and resolving issues with the data.
Support the oversight and operational development, implementation and documentation of local processes and systems, enabling successful delivery of programmes.

Process more complex data, monitoring accuracy, chasing up missing information, and resolving any issues as appropriate.

Support periodic quality assurance related audits, report on compliance, propose solutions and develop and deliver remedial action plans.

You are likely to be responsible for one or more of the following:

• Monitoring and processing partner invoicing,
• Producing regular student data reports;
• Regular review and updating of key documentation;
• Support the creation of Standard Operating Procedures;
• Support governance-related activity;
• Updating and writing contents for the department’s communications;
• Support the development and documentation of systems and procedures to assist in the day-to-day running of the unit’s administration;
• Monitoring internal procedures/compliance and ensuring these are followed and disseminated as appropriate.
• Work in an agile and flexible manner, supporting with resourcing needs across the unit as required. This will include providing cover for other roles across the team as required.
• Supports equality and values diversity, moderating own behaviour to avoid unfair discriminatory impact or bias on others.
• Any other duties commensurate with the grade.

Required Knowledge, Skills, Qualifications, Experience

• Educated to A Level standard, or equivalent level 3 qualification such as a Level 3 NVQ, or level 3 national diploma or relevant work experience evidencing the skills and ability to undertake the role.
• Minimum of grade C/4 in Mathematics and English at GCSE or equivalent.
• Experience working in Higher Education is desirable but not required.
• Highly proficient IT skills, in particular the ability to handle complex spreadsheets, electronic diaries and emails, and the wider MS Office suite of programmes including Excel and PowerPoint. The ability to use an enterprise resource planning package to manage day-to-day processes (training will be provided). The post holder should also be confident and able to quickly learn other new IT skills and software packages as required.
• Proven ability to plan ahead and anticipate requirements, proactively planning own (and sometimes others’ workloads) to manage time effectively, progress tasks concurrently and work to deadlines.
• Excellent communication skills, including the ability to write for different audiences, and to required deadlines.
• Exemplary attention to detail and the ability to work confidentially, use judgement and make appropriate decisions within the constraints of the role.
• Excellent interpersonal skills. The post holder must inspire confidence and command authority with a range of colleagues and provide excellent customer service at all times. Values driven, aligning behaviour with the core University of Birmingham values; ambitious, innovative, open, collaborative, and responsible.
• A high degree of professionalism, tact, and diplomacy, and the ability to exercise discretion regarding the handling and management of sensitive information/issues.
• A high degree of initiative, personal judgement, resourcefulness, flexibility, and a self- motivating approach, being comfortable working on your own initiative to complete tasks and projects without close supervision and working in an agile manner.
• Ability to work effectively in a large, complex organisation, and to develop a good understanding of how the University and higher education institutions work.
• Ability to understand policy, procedures and processes and how to apply these. Understands the importance of equality and diversity in the workplace.
• Ability to identify and respond to equality and diversity issues in line with relevant policies and procedures.

Dimensions

This role will require the exercise of personal initiative within and beyond the department.

Planning and Organising

The role is required to work independently on daily, weekly and monthly tasks but also on projects with medium longer-term horizons without daily supervision. You will be required to manage and prioritise a varied and complex workload to delivery within required timelines, and make a substantial contribution to the management, development and implementation of operational processes.

Problem Solving and decision making

You will work with direction from management but with a significant degree of autonomy to deliver the outputs required. You will deal with more complex queries and be expected to resolve any problems in your area of responsibility. You may also manage the workload of others or coach others to achieve results.

Internal and External relationships

This role will be liaising with internal colleagues and stakeholders, likely to be University- wide and with external stakeholders, with an expectation of maintaining good working relationships with all.

Informal enquiries can be made to uobonline.ops@bham.contacts.ac.uk, we kindly ask that the role title is included in the subject of any emails.

View our staff values and behaviours here

We believe there is no such thing as a 'typical' member of University of Birmingham staff and that diversity in its many forms is a strength that underpins the exchange of ideas, innovation and debate at the heart of University life. We are committed to proactively addressing the barriers experienced by some groups in our community and are proud to hold Athena SWAN, Race Equality Charter and Disability Confident accreditations. We have an Equality Diversity and Inclusion Centre that focuses on continuously improving the University as a fair and inclusive place to work where everyone has the opportunity to succeed. We are also committed to sustainability, which is a key part of our strategy. You can find out more about our work to create a fairer university for everyone on our website