Legal PA in Manchester

Reporting To: Secretarial Services Manager

Hours: 09.00 – 17.30 Monday - Friday

Location: Manchester or Harrogate

About Hempsons: With over 250 staff and lawyers working across our five offices nationwide, Hempsons is a leading law firm for the health and social care, life sciences, charity and social enterprise sectors. We help clients overcome a constantly evolving list of challenges. Our aim is to provide outstanding legal services that deliver the best possible client outcomes whilst nurturing a culture that makes us a “great place to work”.

The Role: The Personal Assistant provides high‑level administrative, organisational, and client‑facing support to partners and fee earners. The role requires advanced coordination skills, exceptional attention to detail, strong understanding of legal processes, and consistent delivery of professional, client‑centric service.

Key Responsibilities

• Administrative: Manage complex diaries, schedules, meetings, travel arrangements, and expenses. Coordinate multiple priorities and maintain structured, proactive organisation. Prepare ahead to ensure seamless delivery of administrative tasks. Support legal teams with court e‑filing, document service requirements, and managing legal workflows. Understand legal timelines and procedural rules, ensuring documents and tasks meet required standards. Maintain high accuracy to avoid errors or omissions. Act as a professional, responsive point of contact for clients. Handle sensitive information with confidentiality and discretion. Adapt communication style to suit different client needs and legal contexts. Conduct legal research, assist with project work, support tender submissions, and help deliver business development initiatives. Use CRM systems, document management platforms, and relevant legal technology tools effectively. Apply technology to increase efficiency, consistency and productivity. Continuously upskill in new or developing legal tech solutions.
• Financial: Where required, prepare draft bills, monitor client accounts, manage WIP, disbursements and other financial admin duties. Apply meticulous attention to detail to prevent inconsistencies and errors. Engage in continuous learning to strengthen financial administration skills.
• Communication: Key point of contact for fee earners and Clients to maintain relationships and ensure a high level of support is always provided by the team. Collate, organise, and prepare enclosures for client and expert communications. Prioritise client care, ensuring communications are timely, accurate, and professionally handled. Provide support to their immediate colleagues across the PSA team, and where practical, other secretarial functions as requested by the Secretarial Services Manager. Assisting others where there is spare capacity or it is evident that a colleague needs assistance with their workload.
• Customer service: Arranging and attending team meetings. Liaising with fee earners, PA Coordinators and the Secretarial Services Manager to take instruction and liaise on work requirements. Consistently and appropriately update service users on progress where appropriate. Regularly offer assistance wherever possible.

Core Expectations

• Proactive Organisation: Anticipates needs and prepares in advance.
• Confidentiality & Discretion: Consistently upholds strict confidentiality standards.
• Detail‑Oriented Execution: Ensures accuracy across legal, administrative and financial tasks.
• Proactive Compliance Monitoring: Keeps up to date with legal process changes.
• Adaptive Communication: Adjusts tone and style to suit clients and stakeholders.
• Client‑Centric Approach: Prioritises client needs and maintains professionalism in all interactions.
• Continuous Learning: Seeks opportunities to improve administrative, financial, and technical skills.
• Team Collaboration: Works cross‑departmentally to deliver consistent service quality.

Skills & Experience

• Microsoft packages experience (Outlook, Word, Excel, Teams).
• Proven experience in a PA or administrative role within legal or professional services.
• Strong organisational and time management skills.
• High accuracy and attention to detail.
• Ability to manage confidential information.

Desirable

• Experience with legal e‑filing and court service processes.
• Familiarity with billing, WIP and financial admin systems.
• Experience supporting tenders or business development tasks.

Attributes

• Professional, calm and proactive.
• Eager to learn and open to feedback.
• Reliable and consistent in delivering high quality work.

What can we offer you?

Our benefits package is designed to enable all colleagues to thrive in an inclusive and supportive environment. These benefits range from private health insurance, holiday purchase scheme, life assurance, income protection to season ticket loans and cycle‑to‑work scheme.

Hempsons is an equal opportunities employer. Hempsons is committed to providing equal opportunities for all and to encouraging diversity through recruitment. Applications are welcome from all sections of the community and decisions to progress will be made with reference to entirely objective criteria only.