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adjustments for candidates | Travers Smith
Travers Smith
An award-winning city law firm. We build lasting relationships with
public and private sector clients. It is Travers Smith's purpose to
provide the very highest quality of service to our clients whilst
enabling our people to achieve professional fulfilment in a
supportive, inclusive, and enjoyable working environment.
Department
The Central Pool supports all practice groups across the firm,
including Corporate, Tax, Employment, and others. The nature of work
is varied and during certain periods you will support particular
practices more than others. The work and tasks are distributed via a
centralized inbox.
The Role
You will be expected to provide high quality, comprehensive
administrative support to lawyers and PAs across multiple departments,
as required. You will proactively contribute to the department, and
ultimately, the firm's success by actively seeking to improve working
processes, anticipating the needs of those requiring assistance, and
facilitating flexible and efficient administrative support.
As a Team Administrator, the expectation is that you will demonstrate
the key characteristics described below. While these characteristics
are not exhaustive, they provide an overview of the fundamental
expectations that the firm places on its Team Administrators.
Proactivity
Team Administrators are expected to understand the varying needs of
the individuals to whom they provide support. This will be realized
through action and results oriented behaviour, where requirements and
challenges are pre-empted and resolved, and where opportunities to add
value are exploited.
Teamwork
Team Administrators are expected to contribute to assist the PA team
as well as fee earners as required, operating as one seamless 'unit'.
This will involve maximizing individual strengths and drawing on the
capacity of everyone in the team to collectively ensure that deadlines
are met and excellent work product is delivered. This is likely to
include sharing knowledge, providing support to others at times when
absence or capacity issues arise and collaborating with the wider team
to suggest and implement improvements to processes.
Communication
Good communication needs to be channelled in multiple directions to
develop constructive working relationships. This will require managing
expectations of key stakeholders by acknowledging and updating on the
progress of tasks, including non-urgent tasks and those that are
on-going. Strong communication skills will be evidenced by recognizing
and assisting when colleagues require support. Ultimately, good
communication is vital for enabling effective team working and for
developing trust.
Inspiring confidence
The value added by Team Administrators has a direct impact on the
level of service provided to clients. It is therefore imperative, as
someone providing support for the department, that support is
delivered with a genuine appreciation of the pace and extent of
demands expected by the firm's clients. This will involve delivering
work with a high degree of accuracy and professional presentation,
turned around promptly to meet deadlines, with the parallel aim of
going above and beyond wherever possible.
Key Responsibilities
Work to ensure unique and individual support needs for all members
of the department and more broadly the firm's clients are understood
and met.
Use effective systems to ensure that urgent and non-urgent tasks
are completed within the required timescales, including
collaborating with other Team Administrators.
Use initiative to take responsibility of essential administration
that will assist the wider department, for example, coordinating
expense payments, archiving, emptying confidential shredding,
arranging photocopying and developing administrative systems with
the support of the Pas, as required.
Be capable of operating all functions of the photocopiers and
scanners including clearing jams, replenishing paper and replacing
the toner;
Assist other members of the department (including PAs, paralegals,
Business Development ('BD') team as required; and
Develop a general awareness of business issues and challenges
within which the lawyers operate to gain their trust and confidence
in the support provided by the Administration team.
Key Duties
Deal with incoming and outgoing mail.
Establish and maintain effective and accurate filing systems (hard
copy and electronic), as required.
Liaise with the Archives/General Office ('GO') department to send
off and recall archived filing.
Continually replenish the stationery cupboards and ensure that all
stationery requirements are met.
Arrange for the shredding and disposal of confidential documents;
Liaise with GO to arrange couriers as and when they are required;
Liaise with the GO, Facilities and Maintenance departments to
progress issues that may arise within the office.
Provide assistance with photocopying and scanning tasks as
required; and
Perform general ad-hoc administration duties including conflict
checks and file opening as required and assisting to support
departmental BD activities, including maintenance of the BD diary,
updating Interaction contacts, assisting in the publication of
content and departmental newsletter.
Documents
Where document work and collation is delivered, ensure that the
work product is accurate (spell check, page numbers etc.); and
Assist the PAs, paralegals, and other fee earners with ad hoc
document work, as and when levels of busyness and overflow work dictates.
Communication
Demonstrate rapport and professionalism when communicating and use
these skills to build and maintain collaborative working
relationships with all colleagues, clients and stakeholders.
Use internal and external networks to help you solve problems and
devise effective solutions;
Liaise with Business Services departments as required; and
Communicate and work as part of the PA team to help cover busy
periods and absences.
Skills and Experience
Strong attention to detail.
A good level of knowledge of MS Office applications (Word,
Outlook, Excel, PowerPoint);
Confidence and ability to learn other technology packages and
systems to provide support to the department.
Interpersonal skills that will allow effective interaction with
people at all levels across the firm;
Confidence to proactively problem solve and seek assistance should
issues arise;
Ability to work in a fast-paced team environment while maintaining
a high level of performance and focus on good client service;
Excellent ability to organise and prioritise effectively while
handling multiple deadlines; and
