Legal Secretary

Birketts is a full service, top 100 UK law firm, operating in Cambridge, Chelmsford, Ipswich, Norwich and the surrounding areas.

With a rich heritage spanning over 150 years we’ve built an enviable track record advising businesses, institutions and individuals in the UK and internationally.
Throughout our history our ethos has remained simple: we provide clear legal advice and value and insight to our clients.

We set out to truly understand our clients’ needs and help realise their ambitions.

We believe that through this approach and a combination of technical excellence and high quality service we can develop long-lasting partnerships and become our clients' solicitor of choice.

We have one of the best regarded and largest dedicated property teams within the country, numbering over 100 specialists.  Our property lawyers are particularly experienced in dealing with development and investment, planning, secured lending and landlord and tenant matters.

The team deals with a wide range of high quality commercial real estate work, much of which is complex, high value and high profile. Led by four Partners and supported by a diverse group of lawyers the team deals with six predominant practice areas, namely, real estate finance, strategic land, residential development, commercial development, investment disposals and acquisitions and corporate support. Birketts offers a strong IT infrastructure, to allow our lawyers the very best in agile working.

The team represents a number of high profile clients in sectors such as:

• Housebuilding.
• Retail.
• Roadside retail and leisure.
• Public sector, including Local Authority, health and education.
• Service office sector.
• Charities
• Ports
• Logistics, storage and distribution.

To support the existing secretarial team with a variety of administration tasks;

Technical ability:

• To produce and amend documents with speed and accuracy;
• To format, paginate, number and present documents;
• To proof read all work, checking for spelling and grammar;
• To be a user of key software packages and take responsibility for any training needs to improve relevant skills needed to meet the needs of the business;
• To proactively work with the fee earners to ensure relevant documentation is produced to meet clients’ expectations and deadlines.

General Administration:

• To accurately maintain and update client and other relevant contact details on the database;
• To process all forms including new client form, new matter form, money laundering form, training course booking forms etc.
• To ensure that all electronic filing and paper based filing is up to date and maintained at regular intervals;
• To prepare narratives and bills and keep billing files up to date;
• To carry out photocopying and scanning as required.

Professional Skills:

• To immediately clarify instructions from fee earners should they be unclear or if deadlines are not made explicit;
• To respond to internal and external telephone enquiries politely and professionally and take accurate telephone messages(name/number/company), passing them on to the relevant fee earners etc.;
• To proactively support other members of the secretarial team and to provide cover as and when necessary to ensure that work is completed to a high standard and meets the required deadlines;
• To provide full support to fee earners in the full range of activities that are performed and to carry out any other duties as reasonably requested.

General Approach

• To show a positive approach and interest in the work that your fee earners are undertaking;
• Show initiative when responding to queries and actively try to seek solutions to problems;
• To support your fee earners when clients are demanding the work product to be delivered;
• To support and build working relationships with your own fee earners as well as other members of the team and to actively work for the interests of the whole team     
• To support and build working relationships with your colleagues in the secretarial team and to actively get involved in working activities within the team. 

• Previous experience supporting a legal property team would be advantageous - or someone keen to transfer departments
• Educated to GCSE or O level standard or equivalent.

• Typing speed of at least 50 wpm;
• Excellent spelling and punctuation;
• Strong written and oral communication skills.
• Ability to communicate with colleagues at all levels of seniority and liaise effectively with other internal departments and external contacts;
• Ability to use discretion;
• Positive and enthusiastic approach to team work;
• Good telephone manner;
• A flexible, highly motivated, proactive and ‘can do’ working style;
• Self-motivated, ability to use initiative and provide pro-active support to fee-earners;
• Ability to pay attention to detail and check own work;
• Good organisational skills, able to prioritise, make decisions and work effectively within a sometimes pressurised environment;
• Commitment to ongoing learning and development.

We are committed to recruiting individuals on merits of suitability for each role, on the basis of qualifications and experience. All applications are treated fairly and equally regardless of sexual orientation, race, disability, religious beliefs and any other protected characteristic, ensuring that there are equal opportunities at all stages of the recruitment process.