King's College London

About us:

King’s College London is an internationally renowned university delivering exceptional education and world-leading research. The university is dedicated to driving positive and sustainable change in society and realising our vision of making the world a better place. The Strategic Vision 2029 looks forward to King’s College London’s 200th anniversary in 2029 and sets out ambitious plans in five key areas:

- Educating the next generation of change-makers

- Challenging ideas and driving change through research

- Giving back to society through meaningful service

- Working with our local communities in London

- Fostering global citizens with an international perspective

The Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology & Neuroscience (IoPPN) is a Faculty of King's College London and the largest academic community in Europe devoted to the study and prevention of mental illness and brain disease.

The School of Neuroscience is UK’s 2nd largest Neuroscience school with over 500 researchers and 200 PhD students. It is one of three schools at the Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology & Neuroscience. We are ranked 4th in the world for the total number of publications in neuroscience, 4th for the number of publication outputs in top 5% citations in neuroscience, and 4th for top 5% citations in neurology.

Our academic and research staff are integral to our school. Their work is supported by a group of Professional Services staff members within the departments as well as at the school level. We support staff members requiring flexible working arrangements and reasonable adjustments. Upon consultation at the points of recruitment and onboarding, we will strive to provide the best adjustments for you.

We strongly encourage our staff to dedicate time to their professional development through training courses and participation in working groups and networks. We also encourage our staff to seek mentoring outside their direct line management. Mentoring, both via formal and informal arrangements, allows individuals to fully explore their career situation and development. Our weekly school circular regularly captures and promotes opportunities open to all staff.

About the role:

The School of Neuroscience is looking for a highly organised and detail-oriented Business Operations Officer to provide professional support to the departments and Co-Heads/Heads of Department (HoDs) at the School.

The post holder will be expected to liaise closely with the HoDs offering dedicated administrative support as required, as well as providing local support to some selected Principal Investigators (PIs) and to the wider department. The post holder will be expected to undertake activities including diary management, dealing efficiently with communications and correspondence in a timely manner, acting as secretary for departmental meetings, coordinating arrangements for external visitors to the department, travel management, budget and financial tracking, and any other department-level duties as required by the HoDs. They will liaise with a range of people at all levels across King’s depending on the nature of the task and will build and maintain effective working relationships locally with their fellow department members and across the School’s Professional Services clusters.

The role is critical to maintaining smooth day-to-day operations in each of the two departments whilst also providing dedicated support to the HoDs. The ideal candidate would be someone who is attentive, can work independently, is proactive in delivering tasks, responds well to different styles of leadership, and who can effectively manage competing priorities. In addition, excellent written and spoken English is essential as well as a proven ability to maintain confidentiality and handle situations sensitively

The post will be either supporting two departments based on the Guy’s Campus or two departments based on the Denmark Hill Campus. The exact campus will be confirmed at offer stage.

This is an on campus role, and the post holder is expected to work 2.5 days in each department (two separate buildings on the same campus.) We anticipate that this role will have a 50:50 split between the two departments, although this may change from week to week.

This is a full-time post (35 Hours per week) with a start date as early as possible. You will be offered an indefinite contract.

About you:

To be successful in this role, we are looking for candidates to have the following skills and experience:

Essential criteria

1.  Experience in providing high level administrative and/or personal support to a senior executive, ideally within a research or academic environment.
2.  Experience of complex and multiple diary management.
3. Strong organisational skills and the ability to multitask, manage competing priorities and meet multiple deadlines.
4. Excellent communication skills, including excellent spoken and written English, particularly in formal documents, letters, emails and other communications.
5. Proactive in the delivery and completion of tasks and the willingness to work flexibly and adapt to different leadership styles.
6. Proficiency in Microsoft Office Suite (Word, Excel, Outlook, PowerPoint) and experience of other office management software or tools.
7.  Experience of event coordination and handling logistics for professional meetings, external visits, and workshops.
8.  Experience of financial tracking and a good understanding of expense and reimbursement monitoring and reporting.

Desirable criteria

1. Experience of working in the higher education sector and familiarity with HE administration.
2. Working knowledge and experience of King’s systems such as Business World and HR Digital Services.
3. Proven commitment to ongoing skills development.

Downloading a copy of our Job Description

Full details of the role and the skills, knowledge and experience required can be found in the Job Description document, provided at the bottom of the next page after you click “Apply Now”. This document will provide information of what criteria will be assessed at each stage of the recruitment process.

Further information

We pride ourselves on being inclusive and welcoming. We embrace diversity and want everyone to feel that they belong and are connected to others in our community. We are committed to working with our staff and unions, to continue to support our people and to develop a diverse and inclusive culture at King's. As part of this commitment to equality, diversity and inclusion and through this appointment process, it is our aim to develop candidate pools that include applicants from all backgrounds and communities.

We ask all candidates to submit a copy of their CV, and a supporting statement, detailing how they meet the essential criteria listed in the advert. If we receive a strong field of candidates, we may use the desirable criteria to choose our final shortlist, so please include your evidence against these where possible.

To find out how our managers will review your application, please take a look at our ‘How we Recruit’ pages.