Description:
Reporting to the Associate General Counsel (AGC), Litigation, Student Appeals and Policy, the Legal Assistant is the primary administrative legal support to all the activities undertaken by the Litigation, Student Appeals, and Policy Legal team and is also accountable for administrative services, including office management and coordination. Work demands in the office consist of high volumes of work, rapidly changing priorities, and dealing with competing pressures and deadlines. This position generally works with minimal supervision supporting a high volume of work. The role requires the ability to work under pressure in this fast-paced environment. Considerable discretion is also necessary as the position is privy to and works with sensitive, highly confidential information.
Summary of Key Responsibilities (job functions include but are not limited to):
- Utilizing Legal Assistance expertise and training to support the Legislative Compliance Program.
- Complete detailed projects requiring considerable knowledge and research.
- Responsible for developing and maintaining a litigation hold process for Legal Services.
- Build relationships with key stakeholders internally and externally
Research, create and recommend a records retention and management framework and program for Legal Services.
- Maintain the University's policy library and provides support in policy development
- Editing of the University's policy website via Drupal
- Provide, research and facilitate environmental scans and other fact finding to support Policy and Legal Services.
- Gathers information and prepares initial drafts of reports from the Litigation, Student Appeals, and Policy team to the Board of Governors, the Audit Committee of the Board and the Enterprise Risk Management Committee.
- Where appropriate, gathers information and prepares correspondence, certificates and affidavits with attention to accuracy of information, grammar and formatting, for subsequent review by appropriate lawyer.
Qualifications / Requirements:
- 3-5 years legal administrative experience required; previous experience at the University of Calgary is an asset.
- University degree (or equivalent) or completion of a post-secondary certificate in a Legal Assistant program from a recognized institution.
- Experience in project work and maintaining legal files.
- Must be comfortable working and communicating with all levels of staff, including senior leaders.
- Strong interpersonal skills and communicates effectively in a professional and respectful manner with colleagues from various disciplines and external collaborators.
- Strong organizational skills that facilitate multi-tasking, including a meticulous attention to detail.
- Excellent analytical reasoning and organizational skills demonstrated ability to work independently with minimal supervision and manage own time, ability to set priorities and meet commitments and timelines. Must be able to work with shifting priorities.
- Must be able to act decisively and exercise a high degree of initiative, flexibility, and sound judgment.
- The ability to anticipate and adapt quickly to changing priorities in an effective manner
- Excellent communication (oral, written) and interpersonal skills.
- Ability to create, launch and maintain websites in Drupal and other media technologies.
- Proficiency with Microsoft Office applications (Microsoft Office Suite, Outlook, Word, Excel, Power Point and OneDrive), SharePoint, PeopleSoft, document management systems, or similar software is an asset.