Secretary

Lewis Silkin works with leading businesses to protect and enhance their most important assets - their ideas, their people, their brand and their future. We call it: Ideas. People. Possibilities.

With offices in London, Oxford, Cardiff, Belfast, Dublin and Hong Kong, we are recognised by clients and industry alike as being distinct for our unique culture, market-leading practice areas, sector focused approach and for providing solutions to complex, multijurisdictional business challenges, with a pragmatic and human touch. We have two things at our core: people — both ours and our clients’— and a focus on creative, tech and innovative businesses.

Our culture is encapsulated by an ethos of bravery and kindness, guided by our values of Integrity, Clarity, Unity and Excellence (our ‘I-CUE’). We aim to provide a supportive environment for our people, clients and wider community and embrace diversity & inclusion, ensuring people are able to bring their full selves to work.

The Intellectual Property team is mostly based in London and is a fast-growing, dynamic team.

We are looking to recruit a PA into the London team, supporting a mix of partners and associates.  The work is a mix of contentious and non-contentious PA support.  The successful candidate must have previous experience of having worked in commercial litigation environment and must display a professional manner and first-class communication skills. They should be highly organised with excellent administration and mathematical skills, juggling the demands of a mix of fee earners, and be able to perform under pressure. They will be able to demonstrate a pro-active approach to their work and be able to work on their own initiative.

They must enjoy working in an involved team environment and be keen to guide and motivate others within the team. They will need to have a flexible nature and a co-operative and willing attitude.

• Excellent client communication skills, dealing with them efficiently and appropriately - liaising with them to deal with any queries or issues if able to.
• Dealing with confidential and private matters on behalf of allocated partners and associates.
• Ensuring sensitivity and confidentiality when dealing with clients and colleagues when appropriate.
• Co-ordinating billing/credit control and accounting matters relating to clients of allocated partners and associates, including reviewing WIP, raising draft pro formas, running small client billing projects and assisting credit control with chasing clients for payment of unpaid bills as required.
• Dealing with general admin duties as required, printing, copying, organising client meetings/lunches; booking seminars and assisting with travel arrangements etc.
• Answering the telephone in a helpful and professional manner, dealing with queries if able and ensuring messages are taken accurately and dealt with appropriately.
• Maintenance of allocated partner and associates' diaries, liaising with them on a regular basis to discuss forthcoming appointments and any required arrangements.
• Scheduling internal and external meetings, ensuring that all arrangements are in place and any required materials and documentation are prepared in good time.
• Drafting own correspondence as appropriate and producing fast and accurate audio/copy typing, producing documents, letters, emails and memos from time to time.
• Maintaining appropriate e-filing systems and ensuring e-filing is carried out.
• Managing fee earners’ inbox as required.
• Pro-active approach to ensuring that all administration work is completed on a timely basis, using own initiative to pre-empt matters.
• Taking an active part in developing own role and working to provide increasing support for allocated partners and associates - ensuring suitable training is undertaken.
• Assisting with marketing activities including liaising with Marketing team and assisting with the preparation for seminars and other events as required
• Pro-actively ensuring database of clients and contacts is maintained and reviewed.
• Assisting with workload of secretarial colleagues as required.

Abilities and desired qualities:

• Legal secretarial experience (preferably within a litigation environment)

• Ability to be proactive and to work on own initiative without guidance but seeking help if necessary - confidence to use own judgement in relation to current duties, client needs, etc.
• Excellent typing skills (at least 70 wpm audio/copy typing).
• Accurate numeracy skills.
• Good eye for detail - a high level of accuracy is essential.
• Excellent organisational and administration skills - must be highly organised and able to organise others.
• Ability to manage a heavy workload and support a number of people.
• Ability to work to tight deadlines in a pressurised environment.
• A confident and natural communicator - able to communicate at all levels.
• Enjoyment of client contact and involvement.
• Experience of using all office equipment.
• Team player and enthusiastic - flexible and willing to take on extra responsibilities.
• Highly professional in conduct at all times
• Punctual at all times.
• The ability to work overtime when required
• Good grammatical English - at least to GCSE standard or equivalent.

IT skills required:

• Proficient IT skills - Office 365, Word, Elite, Excel, Outlook, PowerPoint, Teams, DocsCorp PDF Docs, Word Compare (DocsCorp CompareDocs), Document Management System (Netdocs), Interaction, Chrome River - although full in-house training will be provided.

At Lewis Silkin our ethos is simple. We strive to do the best for our clients, our people and the communities in which we operate. We recognise that an inclusive workplace allows for all kinds of ideas and thoughts, a variety of points of view that can trigger discussions or deliver innovative results, and a wide range of versatile skills and expertise. We are proud of the diversity within Lewis Silkin and of our culture that allows people to be themselves at work, ensuring we provide the best possible service to our clients. We are committed to finding the right person for this role and are open to discussing flexible working patterns and office location.