Come and join Legal Services and help make a difference to the people of West Sussex.

Working Pattern: Full time, 37 hours per week

Contract type: 12 months, fixed term or secondment opportunity

Location: County Hall, Chichester and hybrid working

Interview date: w/c 17 February 2025

West Sussex County Council are looking for a legal assistant to join our experienced and motivated team.  This is a fantastic opportunity to start a career in the legal profession whilst working in a legal environment. If you would like to work in a team providing legal advice in the Property Team then this could be the job for you. You will need a flexible approach and excellent organisational skills. 

As a Legal Assistant, your primary focus will be to provide a range of legal advice and support duties to the Property Team who aim to meet the requirements of clients by delivering a timely, efficient and professional legal service.

There is some direct responsibility for handling and processing legal information where care, accuracy and confidentiality are important, and you will be required to prepare legal documents for distribution. You will provide advice and an efficient service under guidance and direction from senior colleagues.

The successful candidate must be a team player able to work under pressure, with an eye for detail, an awareness of confidentiality and excellent interpersonal skills and able to communicate with people at all levels.

What are we looking for?

• You will be able to work flexibly to meet the demands of this fast-paced team, organising your own workload and prioritising work as required.
• You will be a strong team player, demonstrating confidentiality and integrity in order to provide the best possible customer service.
• You will have good drafting and research skills.
• You will have confident presentational and negotiation skills.
• You will have excellent IT skills in a range of Microsoft Office applications.
• You will be able to achieve and maintain good working relationships with clients, colleagues, other Local Authority staff, and external stakeholders.

Working for us

As well as adding real value to our service users and our communities, as an employer we recognise our employees are central in being able to achieve this. To recognise this we want to help support your development and provide an great place to work ensuring you can fulfil your full potential, have access to a range of benefits including:

• an excellent local government pension scheme
• generous holiday entitlement of 25 days (plus opportunity to buy additional leave)
• a range of flexible working options, depending on your job role
• maternity, paternity, dependency and adoption leave
• volunteering opportunities
• training and development opportunities, including coaching and mentoring
• a range of discounts giving our staff access to hundreds of offers; groceries, travel, cinema tickets, days out, leisure activities, high street retailers and the opportunity to save over £1,000 a year through our West Sussex Choices benefits platform
• health and wellbeing benefits including access to our Employee Assistance Programme, Mental Health First Aiders and Voluntary Health Cash Plans

Further information

The reference number for this role is CRS00899.

For an informal conversation or for further information regarding the role, please contact Jonathan Brown (Principal Solicitor) at jonathan.brown@westsussex.gov.uk. For issues or queries regarding your application please contact hrrecruitment@westsussex.gov.uk.

To apply, please follow the links below to upload your CV and complete the application form. In your application form please outline your motivations for applying and explaining the skills and experience you can bring to the role (please refer to the key skills) ensuring that any gaps in employment are covered in your CV. Please ensure you have saved the job description attached to the main advert on our website as, once the job has closed, you may not have the opportunity to download again.

We are committed to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children, young people and vulnerable adults. This post is subject to 3 years referencing and a health check.

Equity, inclusion and accessibility is very important to West Sussex County Council. We welcome and encourage applications from everyone, as this helps us build a diverse and talented workforce, that reflects the communities we serve. We ensure our approach to recruitment is flexible and supportive to enable all applicants to be at their best and to ensure they have the best possible chance of success.

We operate a guaranteed interview scheme for applicants that have a disability, are a veteran or are a care leaver. More information can be found on our application help page.

Closing date: 2 February 2025

For further information or to apply, please click on the 'Enquire/Apply' button below.