Senior PA (Real Estate)

Role profile

We are seeking a Senior PA to join our Real Estate service line. This is a permanent position based in our London office supporting a group of Partners and Fee Earners at varying levels of seniority. This role offers hybrid working arrangements.

This is an exciting opportunity for an experienced Senior PA who will provide high-level, professional and proactive PA support. This is a busy and varied role which requires an organised and proactive individual who enjoys working with different people in a fast-paced environment.

The Real Estate service line sits within our Projects, Real Estate and Finance Practice Group. The service line is led by a Service Line Leader (SLL) who is responsible for the strategic direction, business development and day-to-day management of the team.

Key Responsibilities

• Provide professional, effective and proactive PA support to a number of Partners and fee earners within the team.
• Have regular one-to-one meetings with fee earners to understand their proactive work needs for the week, record and follow up on actions including diary management, travel, meeting booking, expenses, WIP and billing.
• Take ownership for diary and inbox management (complex in the case of Partners) including anticipating and avoiding potential diary clashes, organising meetings and travel using initiative in advance of the planning and scheduling stage, and acting as gatekeeper for meeting invites and requests from across the business.
• Proactively take responsibility for travel arrangements (including international travel), conference and meeting bookings, and ensure any travel itineraries are prepared in advance together with any agendas required for meetings.
• Assist with the file opening and client due diligence process where necessary; set up new matters and draft engagement letters.
• Play an active role in managing the billing process by working closely with the finance team including accessing relevant reports, transferring time, ensuring correct rates, initial mark-up on billing guides and drafting emails for invoices to be sent to clients.
• Play a key role in managing financial administration for fee earners including monthly cost updates, updating client documents and requesting purchase order numbers.
• Collate and process expenses including proactive management in a timely manner.
• Document comparisons and electronic filing.
• Draft short correspondence and communications; demonstrate excellent IT skills with the ability to amend and format documents.
• Develop and maintain positive relationships with the rest of the Real Estate PA team and other client and internal contacts.
• A thorough understanding of the deeds process.
• Working closely with your Fee Earner to support all aspects of their Business Development.
• A thorough understanding of Searches.
• Manage HighQ sites.

Key Skills

We are looking for an experienced PA with a proactive work ethic. The position requires someone with drive and ambition who is able to use their own initiative, has first-class organisational skills and is an integral team player. Flexibility and proactivity are essential personal attributes.

You will also be able to demonstrate:

• Highly organised, with excellent attention to detail and the ability to manage multiple fee earners, deadlines and priorities calmly and effectively.
• A team player with excellent relationship-building skills; Able to build strong relationships with fee earners and influence their working practices to ensure PA support is utilised effectively and efficiently.
• Commercially aware, understanding the importance of maximising fee earner time on chargeable work and protecting client service standards.
• The ability to prioritise work effectively, working under pressure and to tight deadlines while maintaining excellent attention to detail.
• Strong communication skills, both written and verbal, with the confidence to liaise with clients and senior stakeholders.
• Capable of taking initiative and developing solutions.
• The ability to work with confidentiality, discretion and diplomacy.
• Excellent IT skills using Microsoft Word, Excel, PowerPoint and Outlook.
• Experience of deeds processes and Searches.
• Willingness to work flexibly to meet client needs.

Salary and benefits

We offer competitive salaries and generous benefits. We value the health and wellbeing of our people and our wide range of initiatives and benefits support this.

Our recruitment process

Please note that although we include closing dates for our roles as a guide, we review and progress applications on a rolling basis. At [Employer hidden — view at passion-project.co.uk] we do not make any recruitment decisions using automated decision-making.

We are committed to providing an environment where you can perform to the best of your abilities at every stage of your recruitment experience and beyond. If you require any adjustments to be made during the application stage, interview process, or when working with us, please let us know in confidence.