PA to Head of Education & Service Support Assistant in Eastbourne

We are looking for an organised, proactive and confident Personal Assistant / Service Support Assistant to provide high-level administrative support to the Head of Education and Senior Leadership Team within Children's Services. This is a varied and fast-paced role where you will be responsible for keeping diaries, meetings, inboxes and priorities running smoothly. You will need to be comfortable supporting senior managers, taking minutes at meetings and handling sensitive and confidential information. The role also includes responsibility for maintaining and monitoring data, supporting projects and helping ensure important deadlines are met.

Key Responsibilities

• Manage busy diaries and calendars, arranging and prioritising appointments.
• Monitor and organise email inboxes, filing emails and ensuring important matters are brought to attention.
• Arrange and coordinate meetings, including Senior Leadership Team (SLT) meetings.
• Prepare and distribute meeting agendas, papers and supporting documents.
• Attend meetings and take accurate minutes and action notes.
• Track agreed actions and follow up with relevant colleagues.
• Maintain organised filing, OneNote and administrative systems.
• Produce accurate correspondence, reports and PowerPoint presentations.
• Deal with routine correspondence using your own initiative.
• Respond professionally to colleagues, senior managers, councillors, external organisations and customers.
• Help coordinate conferences, workshops and occasional SLT away days.
• Provide administrative and project support to the Head of Education and wider SLT.
• Input, maintain, analyse and cleanse information held on databases and spreadsheets.
• Help monitor responses relating to Freedom of Information, Data Protection and Local Government Ombudsman requests, ensuring deadlines are tracked.
• Provide cover and support across the wider SLT support team where required.

About You

We are particularly interested in candidates with previous experience as a Personal Assistant, Executive Assistant, Senior Administrator, Business Support Officer or similar. You will ideally have:

• Previous PA, secretarial or senior administrative experience.
• Strong diary and calendar management experience.
• Experience managing busy inboxes and competing priorities.
• Good minute-taking and meeting coordination skills.
• Excellent organisational skills with the ability to meet deadlines.
• Strong written and verbal communication skills.
• Confidence dealing with people at all levels of an organisation.
• Strong Microsoft Office skills, including Outlook, Word, Excel and PowerPoint.
• The ability to collate, interpret and maintain numerical data.
• A proactive approach and the ability to use your own initiative.
• Excellent attention to detail.
• The ability to handle sensitive information with discretion and confidentiality.
• A flexible approach and the ability to adapt when priorities change.

Previous experience supporting senior managers within a council, Children's Services, education or another large and complex organisation would be advantageous.

Contract Details

• £15.38 per hour PAYE
• 3-month contract
• Hybrid working
• Office attendance: Tuesday & Thursday

This would be an excellent opportunity for an experienced PA or Senior Administrator who enjoys being at the centre of a busy senior leadership team and is confident organising diaries, managing inboxes, coordinating meetings and keeping senior managers on track.