Executive Assistant

Job summary

Executive Assistants sit at the heart of senior leadership. You work closely with one or more senior leaders, helping them stay focused, organised and effective in a fast moving, high profile environment.

You take full ownership of complex diaries, making sure time is used well and meetings are purposeful. You anticipate issues before they arise, spot clashes early, and make clear recommendations so decisions are made quickly. You handle travel, correspondence and briefings with care and attention to detail, always thinking a few steps ahead.

You act as a first point of contact, building strong relationships with colleagues and external partners. You communicate clearly and confidently, adapting your style to different audiences. You handle sensitive information with discretion and sound judgement, understanding the importance of trust in this role.

You are comfortable working independently, but you also enjoy being part of a wider team. You share good practice and help create a positive, professional working culture. You look for ways to improve how things are done and are not afraid to suggest smarter, simpler approaches.

This role suits you if you enjoy responsibility, variety and pace. You like solving problems, bringing order to complexity and making a real difference behind the scenes. Every day is different, and your work directly supports senior leaders to do their best work. If you are organised, proactive and resilient, you will thrive in this role.

The Crown Prosecution Service is based in England and Wales. If you’re applying for this role and live in Scotland or Northern Ireland, you must let us know when accepting this offer as you need permission to work from your home address if hybrid working is part of your role. There’s no guarantee that we will grant this approval.

You must be aged 16 or over at the point of starting in this role. The expected start date is approximately 8–12 weeks after the application closing date. You are expected to commence employment as soon as possible following the expiry of your notice period. Requests for significantly later start dates may not be accommodated.

Job description

Your roles and responsibilities

• To monitor the senior leaders/manager’s correspondence, ensuring that appropriate, and timely action is taken to resolve issues, respond to enquiries and requests, and in general maintain business continuity.

• To ensure that in the absence of the senior manager, all briefings, submissions and draft replies produced for or on their behalf meet an equally high standard and are approved and submitted to the appropriate organisation/department in a timely manner.

• To monitor and co-ordinate Parliamentary Questions, Parliamentary Enquiries and Parliamentary Correspondence, adhering to strict deadlines

• To maintain confidentiality in all areas of work.

• To monitor and coordinate complaints handling for senior leaders.

A copy of the full job description is attached.

Person specification

To be eligible to apply, you need to demonstrate:

• Strong verbal and written communications.
• Highly proficient in MS Teams, Outlook, Excel, PowerPoint presentations, and drafting letters correspondence, emails, and coordinating briefings, and excel in high-quality correspondence handling in a fast-paced working environment.
• Diary management.
• Strong drafting skills, setting agendas, and minute taking.
• Experience of organising meetings for senior leaders with technical and digital support online and in-person.

It is desirable that you have the below experience but this is not required to apply:

• Understanding on wider government and the civil service.
• Understanding of the Criminal Justice System (CJS).

Behaviours

We'll assess you against these behaviours during the selection process:

• Delivering at Pace
• Communicating and Influencing
• Making Effective Decisions
• Working Together

Benefits

Alongside your salary of £31,840, Crown Prosecution Service contributes £9,224 towards you being a member of the Civil Service Defined Benefit Pension scheme. Find out what benefits a Civil Service Pension provides (opens in a new window).

Join the Crown Prosecution Service and find your purpose.

Why we work for the Crown Prosecution Service

The Crown Prosecution Service is passionate about ensuring that we're a top performing organisation and a great place to work. We're a committed equal opportunities employer, creating a culture where you can bring your whole self to work, and individuality is truly appreciated.

This culture of inclusion is underpinned by our staff networks covering disability, faith and belief, LGBTQI+, race, social mobility alongside our mental health first aiders programme and wellbeing sessions.

The Crown Prosecution Service commits to offer its employees the following experience.

• You can do impactful, purposeful work that’s making a difference to your local communities.
• You are able to learn and grow, with access to the right opportunities and resources.
• We care about your wellbeing.
• We want you to feel valued, trusted and included.

We also offer the following range of benefits:

• Civil Service contributory pension of up to 28.9%
• 25 days’ leave, increasing to 30 days after 5 years
• £350 each year to spend on personal development
• lawyer training programme for all new prosecutors
• an extra privilege day to mark the King's birthday
• competitive maternity, paternity and parental leave
• flexible working including flexitime, and a family friendly approach to work
• Cycle2Work scheme, employee savings.

Diversity at the Crown Prosecution Service is about inclusion, embracing differences and ensuring our workforce truly reflects the communities we serve. We want you to feel that you belong and can thrive, whatever your background, identity or culture. As a Disability Confident employer, we're happy to support requests for reasonable adjustments and improve your recruitment experience. If you'd like any reasonable adjustments made to our recruitment process, let us know within your application or contact [email removed].

The Crown Prosecution Service has fixed rates for its Executive Officer grade – a developing rate (the starting salary) and a spot rate (the maximum salary). Applicants typically join us on the developing rate and, after completing a 15-month development period, move to the spot rate if your line manager confirms you’re performing the role to a satisfactory standard.

If you’re joining the Crown Prosecution Service on a lateral transfer from another government department, you should contact us about the impact on your salary and the implications of any time you’ve already spent at that grade before applying or accepting an employment offer. Your salary may be adjusted if your location changes when you join us. This adjustment also takes into account any existing allowances that may have previously been consolidated into your basic pay – there’s no guarantee that you can retain these when you transfer.

We want to ensure our employees can thrive at work and home and offer a range of support to achieve a balance. This includes flexibility of working hours, flexibility to support caring responsibilities and a flexible approach to deployment. We o