Personal Assistant to Director

M&S Food is changing, and fast! We are undergoing one of the biggest transformations in retailing today to build a bigger, better, fresher food business. From Percy Pig to the freshest M&S Select Farms produce, we grow, source, and develop our own products to give our customers family-ready food that's unbeatable on flavour and innovation. We need motivated people who are ready to bring their whole self to work and give it their all in a fast-paced team committed to being the best. After all, this is not just food… This is M&S Food. We have a flexible / hybrid approach - talk to us about part time or job share opportunities in this role, if it’s meaningful to you, it’s important to us.

Are you an ultra-organised, proactive professional who thrives in a fast-paced environment? Our Director is on the lookout for a right-hand star to provide high-level support, manage schedules, coordinate meetings, and keep everything running smoothly behind the scenes. If you're a natural multitasker with impeccable attention to detail and the discretion to match, we’d love to hear from you.

To stay close to customers, our support teams are in the office five days a week as we believe that skills are developed through collaboration, and that spending time together makes us more creative and connected.

What’s in it for you

Being a part of M&S is exactly that – becoming a part and playing your part. We’re an inclusive, dynamic, exciting, and always evolving business built on core values.

Here are some of the benefits we offer that make working for M&S just that little bit more special…

• 20% Colleague discount on most things from furniture, fashion and food.
• A first-class welcome to M&S with a tailored induction and a wide range of training schemes to help with your learning and development. Having options to progress is something we’re proud of at M&S.
• Attractive annual bonus, based on company performance and personal objectives.
• Competitive holiday entitlement with the potential to buy extra holiday days!
• Amazing perks and discounts via our M&S Choices website. Including GymSave – that offers up to 25% off Gym Memberships and the option to become an M&S Shareholder using our ShareSave & ShareBuy Schemes.
• Charity Volunteer Day – A paid day away from work to support your chosen charity.
• A very generous Defined Contribution Pension Scheme and Life Assurance.
• Every colleague at M&S has access to a fantastic range of wellbeing support – this includes access to our 24/7 Virtual GP, PAM Assist to support you & your family as well as many other schemes.

What you’ll do

Your key accountabilities will include

• Provide support to the Directors and OR Head’s of in your appointed business area , representing the team and the overall function to the BU leader or Head’s goals.
• Manage complex diaries with professionalism for both internal and external stakeholder and manager all meetings/appointments/events etc. – ensuring suitable facilities are available and briefing documents are distributed appropriately.
• Act as a first point of contact for your appointed Director or Head of, to internal and external personnel, representing them as appropriate and managing issues as appropriate and escalate if needed. Maintain a clear understanding of your Director or Heads of deadlines, priorities and goals and keep up to date with Business priorities and adapt to any changes.
• Provide effective administration support including management of holidays, rotas, My HR administration and ensure issues are flagged and resolved as necessary. Ensuring you utilise all available channels to encourage networking and simplify coordination and completion of activity.
• Effectively manage your time and priorities at pace to ensure you can efficiently deliver tasks on time, accurately; demonstrating a clear understanding of the priorities and needs of your director and or Heads of their wider departments.

Who you are

Your skills and experience will include

• IT Skills: Highly skilled in using software such as Microsoft Office (Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Teams), MyHR, internal finance systems or other office productivity tools. This includes creating and editing documents, spreadsheets, and presentations.
• Communication skills & stakeholder management: Strong written and verbal communication skills for interacting with colleagues, managers, and customers. Ability to influence and engage stakeholders at all levels proactively.
• Email and Calendar Management: Effective management of emails and calendars ,organizing schedules, setting up appointments, responding to emails and ensuring that important dates and deadlines are not missed with minimal errors made.
• Multitasking and Time Management: Ability to act at pace and can work efficiently to ensure own deadlines are fully achieved to a high standard with minimal errors made.
• Problem Solving –. Ability to handle competing priorities, time-sensitive projects and potential conflicts; making decisions and demonstrating sound judgement whist maintaining excellent attention to detail, professionalism and confidentiality.

Everyone’s welcome

M&S is ready to push boundaries to lead the retail industry into a greener, speedier, more inspiring digital era. That’s why we’re revolutionising how we work and offering our most exciting opportunities yet. There’s never been a better time to be part of our team. Marks & Spencer aims to be an inclusive organisation, trusted and admired by our colleagues, customers and suppliers. Join us and make an immediate impact.

We’re an in-person business and have core collaboration days in our Support Centre each week. For most teams, this is 3 working days where we come together to collaborate, innovate, and serve our customers brilliantly.

We are committed to an active Inclusion, Diversity and Equal Opportunities Policy, which starts with our recruitment and selection process, and we are happy to talk flexible working.

If you consider yourself to require reasonable adjustments to any part of our recruitment process, we invite you to share those requirements with us when completing your application. We will make every effort to ensure your needs are met to provide a fair and transparent process of assessment.