About this role
Job summary
An exciting opportunity has arisen to join Legal Services as our Office Manager/Personal Assistant to General Counsel.
This is a key role at the heart of a busy in-house Legal Services team, providing high quality office management, administrative co-ordination and personal assistant support. The post holder will help ensure that the service operates effectively and efficiently, with well organised systems, clear processes and administrative support that enables our legal professionals to focus on the delivery of legal advice and casework.
This is not a role for someone who wants to be given direction on every task. We are looking for someone dynamic, creative and can bring their own ideas about how a high performing administrative service should work to best support the lawyers within the team and our external stakeholders. The role needs high attention to detail, commitment to quality, and will best suit a proactive and adaptable individual who can manage competing priorities, coordinate workflows and provide a consistently high standard of support. The successful candidate will have excellent communication and organisational skills, sound judgement and the confidence to work with colleagues and stakeholders across a busy professional service.
The role is an excellent opportunity for an experienced administrator, PA or office manager who would like to develop their career within a specialist NHS legal environment.
Main duties of the job
The Legal Office Manager/Personal Assistant is responsible for the effective day-to-day management and provision of administrative and office processes within Legal Services and for providing high-quality personal assistant support to the General Counsel and senior members of the Legal Services leadership team. The post holder will ensure that Legal Services operates efficiently, with robust administrative systems, effective coordination and well-managed workflows, enabling legal professionals to focus on the delivery of legal advice and casework.
The role requires provision and oversight of high quality administrative support, line management and supervision of junior administrative staff, coordination of workloads, independent prioritisation and close liaison with internal and external stakeholders. The role does not provide legal advice or undertake legal case management but has responsibility for administrative service provision, organisation and coordination.
About us
NHS University Hospitals of Liverpool Group (UHL Group) was formed on 1 November 2024, born from a shared aim to improve the care we provide our communities.
We are one of the largest employers in region, with over 18,900 colleagues who are dedicated to caring for our communities - from birth and beyond.
For the 630,000 people across Merseyside, we are their local NHS. We provide general and emergency hospital care, alongside highly specialised regional services that extend to more than two million people in the North West.
We operate from five hospital sites: Aintree University Hospitalis the single receiving site for adult major trauma patients in Cheshire and Merseyside, and hosts a number of regional services including an award-winning stroke facility. Broadgreen Hospitalis home to several elective surgical, diagnostic and treatment services, together with specialist patient rehabilitation. Liverpool Heart and Chest Hospitalprovide specialist services incardiothoracic surgery,cardiology and respiratory medicine, both in the hospital and out in the community.
Liverpool Women's Hospitalspecialises in the health of women and babies, delivering over 7,200 babies in the UK's largest single site maternity hospital each year. TheRoyal Liverpool University Hospital is the largest hospital in the country to provide inpatients with 100% single en-suite bedrooms and mainly focuses on complex planned care and specialist services.
Job description
Job responsibilities
Please see attached the Job Description and Personal Specification which sets out further details of the main responsibilities of the role.
Manage the day-to-day administrative operations of the Legal Services team, ensuring systems, processes, and workflows are efficient and effective.
Act as the key point of coordination for legal administrative activity, undertaking administrative duties effectively and allocating work to administrative staff as appropriate and monitoring progress.
Maintain and oversee filing, document control, and records management systems in line with Trust policy, Department Standards and legal requirements.
Identify opportunities to improve administrative processes, and implement changes with agreement of the Legal Services leadership team.
Retrieve, open, log and distribute incoming post and emails in accordance with established procedures. Assist with monitoring of central mailbox to ensure queries and emails are reviewed, triaged and assigned in a timely fashion.
Maintain electronic and paper filing systems to ensure accurate, complete and up-to-date legal records.
Assist with routine administrative tasks relating to claims, inquests, court directions, and legal correspondence including filing, scanning, e-file management, and post where applicable.
Report new claims to NHS Resolution in accordance with claims reporting procedures
Provide comprehensive PA support to the General Counsel and senior legal staff, including diary management, meeting coordination, email management and document preparation.
Organise and manage meetings, including preparation of agendas, collation of papers, minute-taking, and follow-up of agreed actions.
Exercise judgement in prioritising requests and managing competing demands on senior staff time
Support induction and administrative on-boarding of new Legal Services staff.
When submitting your application please confirm whether you have used a generative AI tool (for example, Microsoft Copilot or ChatGPT) in preparing your application and, if so, briefly describe how you used it.
Person Specification
Qualifications
Essential
- Educated to GCSE level (or equivalent) including English and Maths
- NVQ Level 4 in Business Administration or equivalent experience
- Personal Assistant or Office Management qualification or equivalent experience
Experience
Essential
- Significant experience of management of a professional administration service or within a Personal Assistant role
- Line management of junior administrative staff
- Experience of implementing administrative systems and/or developing administrative solutions to workflows/processes
Desirable
- Working within an NHS legal team or solicitor's firm
Knowledge
Essential
- Strong understanding of administrative and office management systems
- Understanding of confidentiality and data protection
Desirable
- Understanding of the Civil Procedure Rules and NHS Resolution claims reporting requirements
- Knowledge of risk management systems such as Datix and InPhase
Skills
Essential
- Proficient in use of MS 365 applications
- Excellent communication skills (both written and verbal) and interpersonal skills, with a wide range of staff, able to adjust communication style appropriately depending on audience
- Able to plan and manage workload
- Able to multitask in a demanding environment
- Ability to pro-actively manage workload and priorities, including that of others in the team and able to direct workflow and team members accordingly according to service demand
- Able to effectively communicate and work with multiple legal team members from differing backgrounds and with different levels of expertise
- Able to identify administrative system issues or gaps, think creatively and analyse potential solutions and implement changes to improve service and respond to the evolving needs of the team
- Excellent command of English language, including spelling and grammar
- Able to adjust and adapt depending on the evolving requirements of the role, willingness to learn and develop
Disclosure and Barring Service Check
This post is subject to the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act (Exceptions Order) 1975 and as such it will be necessary for a submission for Disclosure to be made to the Disclosure and Barring Service (formerly known as CRB) to check for any previous criminal convictions.
Certificate of Sponsorship
Applications from job seekers who require current Skilled worker sponsorship to work in the UK are welcome and will be considered alongside all other applications. For further information visit the UK Visas and Immigration website (Opens in a new tab).
From 6 April 2017, skilled worker applicants, applying for entry clearance into the UK, have had to present a criminal record certificate from each country they have resided continuously or cumulatively for 12 months or more in the past 10 years. Adult dependants (over 18 years old) are also subject to this requirement. Guidance can be found here Criminal records checks for overseas applicants (Opens in a new tab).
Employer details
Employer name
Liverpool University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust
Address
Aintree
Liverpool
L9 7AL
United Kingdom
Employer's website
https://www.liverpoolft.nhs.uk/ (Opens in a new tab)