Executive Assistant

**Job Description* – **Executive Assistant to the Director**

The Position

The Director’s Executive Assistant plays an essential part in ensuring the smooth running of the

Director’s Office, providing efficient and accurate administration support to the Director, the

Director of Strategic Operations and the Development Office.

*Responsibilities*

The Executive Assistant will be required to interact with people who are strategically important to

the Institute and is therefore responsible for portraying a favourable and highly professional

impression to external contacts. The Executive Assistant will also need to be able to manage the

Director’s competing demands with a high degree of confidence and professionalism. The

Executive Assistant will also need to make a significant contribution to the effective performance of

Director by supporting his administrative and information needs. Responsibilities will include diary

management, complex travel arrangements and expenses, managing correspondence, as well as

discretely handling confidential and sensitive information, information gathering and web

searching. The role necessitates a high degree of autonomy and initiative and the need to make

decisions on a daily basis within the agreed standards and framework, in a context of changing

demands.

The duties are drawn from the following broad categories of activity:

Administration

♦ Proactively managing the Director’s complex and flexible diary, assisting him to maximise his

time productivity, such as advising him on upcoming commitments, prioritisation, managing

regular changes and dealing professionally with competing meeting requests.

♦ Making complex travel arrangements (including international), hotel bookings, visa

requirements etc. with minimal supervision, within known preferences

♦ Liaising with the Director and actively updating his work plan, projects and responsibilities,

including monitoring of commitments and deadlines, maintaining confidentiality.

♦ Making arrangements for Strategic Management Group, Board and Board sub-committee

meetings, including booking rooms, arranging catering, travel arrangements for external

participants and collation and circulation of relevant papers and agendas.

♦ Managing the Directorate filing systems, mailing list and contacts database, taking telephone

messages and dealing appropriately with incoming and outgoing post.

♦ Providing general administrative duties including word processing, collating and preparing

documents.

♦ Participating in team meetings, retreats and other institute events.

♦ Supplying comprehensive information in response to internal and external requests to include

in website/intranet services.

♦ Basic library and internet searches and presentation of information in appropriate formats.

♦ General secretarial support for the Director of Strategy Operations and Development Officer as

required

♦ Other clerical duties and special projects as arise.

Finance and legal

♦ Responsible for processing all expense claims for Directorate members’ activities.

♦ Responsible for recording and monitoring Director’s expenditure within agreed guidelines.

**Liaison**

♦ Working with Director and Directorate Coordinator to respond to general information requests

and to disseminate information through e-mail, mail, publications and web pages.

♦ Providing assistance to visitors and staff as appropriate to their position, seniority and urgency.

♦ Acting as key contact to provide general information in response to institute related enquiries.