Personal Assistant

A&O Shearman is a new global industry-leading law firm, with 48 offices in 28 countries worldwide. Our fluency in English law, US law, and the laws of the world’s most dynamic markets, enables us to provide unmatched insight and seamless delivery to clients. We work on challenging and important deals and disputes that have the potential to shape the future.

We offer exceptional opportunities for our people; opportunities to work for the world’s leading businesses; to transform the status quo, and to deliver your best work, helping you and your career to thrive, while delivering unparalleled outcomes for our clients.

Whether you're helping clients solve complex challenges, transforming the ways we manage our business, or ensuring the smooth-running of our operations, this is an environment where you can belong and excel. We provide first-rate training and development, we are committed to an inclusive environment, and we provide support and ways of working that help you optimise your wellbeing.

What truly defines a career with us? We recruit the best and ask for the best of you.
And together, we will redefine success.

**Role purpose**
The Legal Personal Assistant will be working for several lawyers within the Litigation and Investigations practice group. In this role you provide fee earners with effective high-quality PA support that appropriately meets their requirements, by identifying where value can be added, enabling them to focus on providing legals services and client development. In particular, deal/matter support; effective diary management; travel arrangements; communication control; and preparation of correspondence.
The Litigation & Investigations department specialises in domestic and cross-border litigation, commercial litigation, and national and international arbitration with a deep expertise in areas such as bank liability, insolvency proceedings, M&A disputes, fraud and white-collar crime.

**Role and responsibilities**

You are the lawyers' first port of call for a wide variety of queries and requests, and as such, your role involves a multitude of tasks:

Administrative Support

- Supporting the full matter lifecycle: from opening matters, to drafting engagement letters over supporting billing preparations;
- Preparing, processing and virtual filing correspondence, legal documents and reports (Word, Excel);
- Creating high-impact presentations for meetings and seminars (PowerPoint);
- Keeping CRM systems updated and liaising with our marketing department for the organisation of client events and the preparation of mailings;
- Managing the lawyers’ calendars and mailboxes in a proactive manner. This includes scheduling appointments and conference calls, booking meeting rooms , restaurants, team events etc.;
- Travel management from A-Z;
- Handling mails and phone calls efficiently and professionally;
- Preparing and submitting the lawyers' expense notes, follow-up on billing, outstanding bills, engagement letters;
- Encoding of the timesheets and communicating with the accounting department;
- Filing (court) documents (submissions, letters, exhibits) with the clerk's office of the court (using e-Deposit or DPA);
- Managing the file of exhibits for use in court proceedings.

Business Assistance

- Acting as primary point of contact with high level of professionalism in all forms of communication;
- Engaging with Partners, Associates, and Business professionals at both national and international levels as required;
- Cultivating and maintaining strong relationships with clients and internal stakeholders.

**Key requirements**

- A Degree in Office management, Literature, Business Administration or in another relevant area;
- An excellent knowledge (written and spoken) of English as well as French and Dutch;
- Tech-savvy: including MS Office Suite, Communication tools, AI tools etc;
- An experience in a similar role and in a fast-paced environment (law firms, consultancy, multinational).

The successful candidate will

- Demonstrate a positive and flexible attitude and approach to all tasks and situations;
- Adopt a proactive and solution-focused approach;
- Maintain tact and diplomacy, trust and confidentiality;
- Exhibit professional communication skills, both oral and written;
- Demonstrate a high level of organisation and prioritisation skills;
- Apply a high level of attention to detail for all tasks understanding the importance of accuracy;
- Be capable to work independently while promoting teamwork;
- Take responsibility in team-building and contribute to a supportive and collaborative environment;
- Have a professional and flexible approach to ensure effective hybrid working;
- Lead in building successful relationships and identify individual requirements and preferences;
- Have an enthusiastic and open approach to change, adapt to and embrace evolving requirements;
- Demonstrate both a forward-thinking approach to technology and a high level of technical skills;
- Ensure familiarity and compliance with A&O Shearman standard operating procedures;
- Show curiosity to learn new skills and knowledge;

**Application process**
Please upload your application to www.aoshearman.com/careers. Thank you for adding your CV to support your application.

As part of our recruitment process, and in order to comply with our legal obligations and internal policies, we require successful candidates to undergo a background screening, which includes the candidate providing information on its criminal record. We will only process information that is necessary and relevant to the position you are applying for. Access to the criminal record information you will provide will be strictly limited to the local recruitment officer responsible for your application. This data will not be stored in our systems and, if provided in writing, it will be deleted immediately, no later than 24 hours after receipt. Please see our data privacy notice for further information. If you have any questions, please contact HRBelgium@aoshearman.com.