Best Practice & Real Estate Division Quality Assistant Basingstoke 2022

Penningtons Manches Cooper is a leading UK and international law firm which provides high quality legal advice tailored to both businesses and individuals. We address the specific objectives of each client through our flair and technical expertise and offer a personal service founded on a strong team ethic.

About us

Today, we have UK offices in the City of London, Basingstoke, Birmingham, Cambridge, Guildford, Oxford and Reading while our growing overseas network stretches from Asia to South America through our presence in Singapore, Piraeus, Paris, and Madrid. We have 140+ partners and over 850 people in total.

We have established a strong reputation in a variety of sectors, particularly technology, private wealth, shipping and real estate. Our lawyers are also recognised for their expertise in life sciences, education, retail, sports and entertainment and international trade.

Among our clients we count multi-national corporations, public companies, professional partnerships, banks and financial institutions as well as private individuals, owner managed businesses and start-ups. We are conscious that our culture and close working relationships are vital assets and we are determined to maintain these as we increase in size.

Our broad international focus is supported by well-established links with law firms throughout the world. Penningtons Manches Cooper is a member of Multilaw and the European Law Group, networks with representatives in over 100 countries, and many of our lawyers play leading roles in various international bodies.

We believe that our values (we care, stronger as one, curious and grounded, constructively challenging and proactively evolving) are core to our success.

The department

The Best Practice Group is a collaborative, vibrant team that forms a conduit between the fee-earning teams and central business to deliver a culture of quality, knowledge sharing and continuous improvement.

The Group includes specialists in risk/compliance, insurance/claims, quality management/business operations/projects, data governance, learning and development and knowledge management. Together they work collaboratively to keep the firm safe and to make things better. Better for our employees, better for our business, and better for our clients. They identify problems, and solve those problems by engaging with people, processes and technology. They help individuals, teams and the firm achieve strategic goals, maximise operational efficiency, drive innovation and facilitate change.

Best Practice Operations

The Best Practice Operations team is part of the Best Practice Group and is responsible for the firm's quality management systems, delivering operational business improvements and internal audit and regulatory record keeping.

Learning & Development

The Learning & Development team is part of the Best Practice Group and is responsible for ensuring that our employees have the right resources to grow, learn and adapt in a rapidly-changing world.

The Real Estate Division

Penningtons Manches Cooper’s award winning real estate division constitutes around 20% of the firm’s £90m turnover, is one of the largest teams in the firm and one of the largest teams amongst law firm competitors. The division’s experience covers all types of real estate transactions including investment property, property development, joint ventures, property lending, landlord and tenant issues, high value residential and social housing.

Summary of role

We are looking for a Best Practice & Real Estate Division Quality Assistant to support the Best Practice, Real Estate and Learning & Development teams.

This is a varied front-line role offering the opportunity to interact with all areas of the business from central teams to legal practice areas.

L& D duties include

• Various day to day administrative tasks including training administration and assisting the members of the L&D Team
• Supporting the L&D team with the Joiners and Leavers processes.
• Maintaining employee training records and dealing with employee queries relating to their training records.
• Managing the central L&D inbox and triaging/allocating email requests.
• Supporting the L&D Senior Assistant with the management and booking of external L&D courses.
• Supporting the L&D Senior Assistant with keeping the L&D intranet up to date.
• Various tasks (conducting business analysis or fact finding) for L&D projects.

CQS and Lenders Panel duties

• General administrative duties to support the Real Estate Knowledge Lawyers with the firm's CQS and Lenders' panel memberships.
• Co-ordinating and submitting CQS and Lenders' panel accreditation/re-accreditation applications.
• Processing new joiners and leavers to/from the firm's CQS membership and Lenders' panel membership.
• Responsibility for CQS course enrolment activities.
• Daily monitoring of the Lenders Panel inbox and Lenders Panel portals, triaging emails and new matters and allocating matters to the appropriate RE fee earner.
• Posting updates from lenders on the Real Estate News Board on the firm's intranet.

Responsibility for uploading practicing certificates to Lenders' panels following annual renewal.

The firm operates a hybrid agile working policy allowing employees to work from home (or another UK location) for at least 50% of their time.  Individuals can also apply for other flexible working options either at the time of recruitment or during the course of their employment.

Essential and desirable criteria

This role would be ideal for someone who is bright, energetic, has an eye for detail and a passion for business, talent development and delivering quality legal services.

This is a fantastic opportunity for an aspiring professional to work for a successful and growing UK law firm. The successful candidate will provide varied administrative support to the Learning and Development Function (2,5 days per week) and have day to day administrative responsibility for our Conveyancing Quality Scheme and Lenders' Panel memberships needed for the firm to undertake residential conveyancing (2.5 days per week). They will liaise with all areas of the business, learn transferable skills and work within a friendly and supportive team.

Ideally, we are looking for someone with previous administrative experience. Experience in a legal environment would be an advantage but is not essential.

Technical skills and experience

• Excellent verbal and written communication skills.
• Computer literate and proficient in using Microsoft office (Outlook, Excel, Word, PowerPoint).
• Ability to work independently, multitask, prioritise workload and problem solve.
• Ability to use initiative as well as take and precisely follow instructions.
• Strong organisation, planning and attention to detail skills.

Behavioural competencies

• Keen and resourceful; pro-active and motivated self-starter with excellent organisational skills; flexible, pragmatic and problem-solving approach.
• Comfortable working under pressure with the ability to plan and prioritise work and deliver to tight or changing deadlines whilst maintaining excellent attention to detail.
• Able to use sound judgment to balance confidence in own judgement and knowing when to refer decisions when necessary.
• Collaborative team member with a professional, user focussed approach and ability to quickly build trusted relationships with a wide range of people.
• Passion for the use of people, process and technology to enhance the delivery of legal services.
• Ability to look beyond a task and try to understand how it fits into the bigger picture.
• Friendly, reliable and confident to challenge themselves.

Pro-active in looking for opportunities to try new things, learn new skills and increase responsibilities.