CEO Office and Governance Assistant, London

Full time / Part time (4dpw) considered

About us

CF is a leading consultancy dedicated to making a lasting impact on health and healthcare. We work with leaders and frontline teams to improve health, transform healthcare, embed life science innovation and boost growth through investment.

We also create optimal policy conditions for healthcare advancements through evidence-based thought leadership, taking a proactive stance on key issues.

As an inclusive and values-driven organisation, we are committed to excellence and are honoured to have received multiple industry awards. With unmatched access to UK healthcare data and specialist data science expertise, our consultants are a driving force for delivering positive and meaningful change.

Role summary

The role has five core functions: responsibility for corporate calendar; orchestration of the company governance; company events management; and, ownership of the recognition and milestone celebration programme.

The CEO Office and Governance Assistant will manage the sequence of corporate commitments to ensure the flow and preparation of meetings and events is expertly delivered, professionally managed, attended by a quorate number of people and is a great experience for those involved.

Six corporate meetings require minute taking, ensuring this task is completed to a high standard and captured with rigorous knowledge management practices is essential.

The management of all company events falls within the remit of the role. Beyond scheduling them, this involves participating in the creative development process involved in planning rewarding and impactful events for staff. As well as the meticulous planning and contract management to ensure a seamless and fun experience for staff including this involves organising travel, sourcing venues (restaurants, hotels, event spaces), booking caterers and determining menus, sourcing team development activities and speakers.

The management of the events and staff entertainment budget management is part of the remit of the role and delivering optimal value for the company for the return on investment is crucial.

As is a desire to learn what colleagues value so that cards and gifts are tailored to them.

When working with colleagues in CF, clients, suppliers and people seeking to engage CF, kindness, diplomacy and professionalism are essential qualities.

Acting with the utmost discretion will be essential and treating every aspect of the role with strict confidentiality is a necessity.

These attributes form part of the four CF values and associated behaviours that apply to all staff and create a point of commonality. Upholding these values and behaviours is critical to our being the diverse and inclusive team that makes CF a great place to work. The four values and associated behaviours are set out below:

Be connected

We are known, we are trusted

• We meet our clients on their terms, in their environment
• We develop first-hand understanding
• We are reliable
• We socialise with colleagues and clients
• We recognise individual strengths and talents
• We get to know people inside out
• We cultivate a network

Uphold standards

Committed to our clients, professional in our approach

• We know what consulting excellence looks like
• We adopt and adhere to best-in-class approaches
• We seek diversity and understand its value
• We leverage the talent of the CF team and our clients
• We act with integrity and preserve confidentiality
• We manage client and company resources cost-effectively
• We hold each other to account for the standards we agree

Inspire change

Respected experts, sparking conviction

• We are knowledge seekers
• We hunt for innovation and translate it into practice
• We deal in solutions
• We collaborate and expect to contribute our point of view
• We understand conflict is essential and we face it
• We are passionate about our impact and the value we create
• We build a positive reputation for ourselves and for CF

Create the future

Embrace fear, aspire to be better

• We believe we all grow with effort, learning and persistence
• We celebrate success with pride
• We learn and adapt when we lose
• We spot and create opportunities
• We act fast and mobilise others
• We take responsibility for ourselves
• We develop each other through apprenticeship and mentoring

Requirements

The requirements, responsibilities, and duties of the role will include, but are not limited to:

• Plan the yearly corporate calendar, scheduling the Board meetings (in liaison with external members), executive committees and steering groups, leadership forums, staff briefings, awaydays, company drinks and all staff social events
• Provide support to Board and Committees across the organisation – including maintaining calendars, commissioning and distributing papers, taking minutes and following up on actions.
• Act as a point of contact for the Board.
• Ensure the meetings are scheduled in a systematic, well-spaced, way, on corporate days, ensuring the requirement to be in person or virtual is clear
• Ensure rooms are booked for meetings and refreshments are organised where needed
• Working with the Head of CEO Office and PA to CEO to ensure the pre-meets and preparation in line with the corporate meetings
• Work with the People Team to ensure leadership development days are incorporated sensibly in the corporate calendar

• Balance the assistant support across the team in the event of annual leave and unscheduled leave
• Negotiate corporate rates on hotels and travel options that are great staff and cost effective for the company, working with external providers to find new and innovative ways to make the team more efficient and to save costs

• Collaborate in the planning and event manage two company retreats a year (one in Q1, alternating each year between partners attending and one in Q4 without partners), arranging the venues, refreshments, activities and entertainment and executing these events on the day.
• Collaborate in the planning and event manage the all staff social event to welcome the new intake of Analysts in September (Q2) each year
• Collaborate in the planning and event manage the annual winter party (in Q3), including inviting staff members’ significant others, agreeing the format of the evening with external suppliers. Manage the logistics on the night to have a slick, well organised event
• Plan the logistics and invitees to the annual alumni event, working with the CEO and external contributors to run an informative and connecting event
• Organise team social activities and dinners for the leadership team
• Lead organisation and communications for monthly all staff social activities
• Manage the staff entertainment budget with a programme of reward and to enable connections to develop

• Have ownership for the organising and planning for celebrating personal and professional milestones, working closely with the People Team and CEO to determine a process and proactively plan for significant events coming up for staff, such as birthdays and anniversaries
• Network well in the company to identify events occurring in staffs’ personal lives and ensure cards and gifts are agreed and organised by the CEO in good time.
• Have regular check ins with the CEO to plan future events that the CEO should mark
• Source suitable cards and gifts, within budgets, to present to staff for significant events (anniversaries, birthdays and end of year celebrations)
• Source information to support and prepare draft emails celebrating major anniversaries (5 and 7 year)
• Schedule and plan for the announcement of staff events to the company, in the agreed format
• Work with the relevant corporate managers to set out a programme of recognition for thought leadership, commercial awareness and annual staff awards to recognise and reward all contributions
• Work closely with the People Team to ensure all events are marked and events do not get missed between the two teams
• Coordinate Christmas cards to all team members, associates, alumni and clients
• Support the CEO to organise a Christmas gift for all team members and for business-critical associates
• Ensure that budgets are spent wisely, in line with and in support of, the values

Flexible working

We have a hybrid-working policy, the CEO Office and Governance Assistant will need to work from the CF offices for a minimum of four days a week.

In addition, for up to four weeks a year each member of staff can work entirely virtually. This should be agreed with the Head of the CEO Office and the CPO.

Requirements

• Educated to degree level or with equivalent experience
• Previous experience in professional services environment within an executive assistant capacity
• Exceptional diary management and organisational skills
• Ability to work in a fast-paced and quickly changing environment
• Ability to prioritise workload and work quickly to tight deadlines and support the team to do the same
• Ability to carefully manage and organise a large volume of competing deadlines and thrive in a fast-paced environment
• Proactive, flexible, organised and able to problem solve
• Polite, direct and a positive ‘can-do’ attitude
• Empathy and understanding of workload pressures and able to distinguish between personal and professional
• Interest in healthcare and making a social impact
• Strong verbal and written communication skills
• Excellent working knowledge of Microsoft Suite including Outlook and PowerPoint
• Meticulous in attention to detail

Our commitment to Diversity & Inclusion

We are committed to building an inclusive and supportive culture where diversity thrives, and all our people can excel. We only recruit, promote and reward our people based on their skills and contribution, without regard to gender, race, disability, religion, nationality, ethnicity, sexual orientation, age, marital status, or other characteristics.

We are Disability Confident Accredited, and we want you to feel comfortable and able to perform at your best in the recruitment process, if you require any reasonable adjustments for any part of the recruitment process, please let us know.

• Holiday entitlement: 25 days/year for staff and 30 days/ year for leadership (Manager role included), increasing by 1 day for every year of service up to a maximum of 35 days of holiday per year
• We contribute 7% of your salary into your pension, while you contribute 3% (or more if you like)
• Access to a flexible benefits programme giving you the chance to increase pension contributions, gain access to a cash plan or benefit from a ClassPass subscription
• Annual leave purchase: employees with less than 35 days annual leave entitlement are able to purchase additional annual leave days
• Income protection: in the event of long-term incapacity and a qualifying claim, 75% of salary will be paid
• Enhanced sick pay benefit beyond Statutory Sick Pay for up to a total 12 weeks in any 12-month period
• Life insurance covering four times your basic salary in a tax-free lump sum payable to your beneficiaries in the event of your death whilst in service
• Enhanced family leave policies: additional pay for parents who have a baby or adopt
• Access to an interest free loan of up to £10,000
• Access to an interest-free season ticket loan, repayable by 12 monthly instalments
• Workplace nursery scheme: access to a scheme to help working parents save tax and NI on the cost of the nursery care
• Flexible working policy: including the ability to work fully remotely for up to 4 weeks a year
• An employee assistance and wellness Program: including access to telephone counselling, life coaching, interactive tools online and digital content downloadable from Lifeworks
• Seasonal flu jabs: provided by Boots annually
• Eye care tests: vouchers and discounts at Vision Express
• Ride to work scheme, saving up to 42% on bikes and cycling accessories at Evans Cycles
• Membership to the Health Service Journal (HSJ)