Multi-Site Office Administrator / People Leader - Legal Services

We Place People Executive Search Firm

Parsippany, NJ 07054, USA

Published: 6/14/2022

Real Estate

Full Time

Job Description

Parsippany & Hackensack, New Jersey
Full-Time | On-Site

Important Location Requirement

This is a multi-site, on-site leadership position requiring regular presence at both New Jersey offices. The anticipated schedule is approximately 3 days per week in Parsippany and 2 days per week in Hackensack.

Candidates must be able and willing to work from both locations on a regular basis. This is not a remote position.

The Opportunity

We are recruiting an experienced operations leader to take ownership of the day-to-day business operations of two established New Jersey legal offices.

This is a broad, hands-on leadership role for someone who knows how to manage people, strengthen processes, improve client service, use data to drive performance, and keep multiple teams and locations moving in the same direction.

You'll work closely with senior leadership while managing the business and administrative side of the offices. You'll have significant responsibility for staff performance, client intake and service, operational consistency, business metrics, technology coordination, and the overall effectiveness of both locations.

This position does not direct or supervise the practice of law or professional legal judgment.

Your Impact

In this role, you'll be expected to:

Lead and develop employees across both offices, including the team responsible for prospective-client inquiries and consultation coordination. You'll set expectations, coach performance, conduct one-on-ones, support employee development, and address performance issues when necessary.
Build strong partnerships with attorneys and office leadership, helping manage the non-legal aspects of staffing, onboarding, performance, scheduling, responsiveness, time-entry expectations, workload support, and day-to-day office operations.
Create consistency between two busy locations by identifying gaps, improving workflows, implementing procedures, and ensuring new systems and organizational initiatives are successfully adopted.
Take an active role in hiring and workforce planning, including recruiting and onboarding non-attorney employees, assessing staffing needs, coordinating schedules and PTO, and making sure both locations have appropriate coverage.
Own the quality of the prospective-client experience, ensuring inquiries and consultation requests receive prompt, professional, and empathetic attention. You'll oversee the operational process surrounding consultations and continually look for opportunities to improve responsiveness and conversion.
Use data to manage performance rather than waiting for problems to surface. You'll monitor operational and business metrics such as productivity, billings, collections, expenses, client-service results, consultation activity, conversion trends, and lead sources and communicate meaningful findings to leadership.
Maintain strong CRM discipline and ensure records, pipelines, activity, and reporting are accurate and useful. Salesforce experience is particularly valuable for this position.
Support the financial health of both offices through budget monitoring, billing and collection support, expense oversight, performance reporting, and early identification of areas that need attention.
Serve as a hands-on operational problem solver. Whether the issue involves staffing, scheduling, technology, a client concern, an inefficient process, or an office need, you'll be expected to identify the problem, bring the right people together, and drive it toward resolution.
Help employees get the most from technology. You'll coordinate with IT resources, assist with user and equipment setup, troubleshoot routine issues, and help ensure technology problems are addressed quickly.
Make AI part of smarter operations. You'll use AI tools in everyday work for activities such as analysis, reporting, drafting, and preparation, while also identifying opportunities where AI and automation can improve productivity and client service.
Keep both workplaces running professionally and safely, coordinating vendors, facilities needs, purchasing, equipment, security procedures, and business-continuity planning.

Throughout all of these responsibilities, you'll be expected to handle confidential employee, client, operational, and financial information with sound judgment and discretion.

What You'll Bring

We're looking for someone who combines strong people leadership with operational discipline. You should be comfortable moving between high-level business issues and hands-on day-to-day problem solving.

The ideal background includes:

5+ years of experience in office administration, operations management, business management, or a comparable leadership role.
At least 3 years of direct people-management experience, including coaching and performance management.
Experience overseeing multiple locations, teams, or departments, or a demonstrated ability to successfully manage responsibilities across more than one site.
Strong organizational skills and the ability to prioritize competing needs in a fast-moving professional environment.
Experience using business metrics, KPIs, reports, and financial information to identify trends and improve performance.
Strong Microsoft Office skills, particularly Excel.
Meaningful day-to-day experience with a CRM, including records, pipelines, and reporting. Salesforce experience is strongly preferred.
Strong practical experience using AI tools, including effective prompting, as part of everyday professional work.
Experience with AI automation, workflow tools, or platforms such as n8n is a significant plus.
Comfort with technology, including basic computer/equipment setup and working with internal or external IT support.
Strong written and verbal communication skills and the ability to build credibility with both professional and administrative employees.
Sound judgment, discretion, and the ability to remain composed while addressing sensitive or challenging situations.
Flexibility to occasionally work outside normal business hours when operational needs require it.

A bachelor's degree in business administration or a related discipline is preferred. Previous legal-industry experience and/or a Certified Legal Manager (CLM) designation are advantageous but are not required.

Benefits

The organization offers health benefits, paid time off, paid holidays, eligibility We are looking for an accomplished people leader to take responsibility for the employees, culture, client-service standards, and day-to-day effectiveness of two professional offices.

While strong organizational and business-management skills are important, this is not primarily a project management or process-focused operations role. The heart of this position is leading people.

The person we are seeking has spent several years directly managing employees and knows how to build a positive, accountable workplace. You should be comfortable coaching strong performers, developing employees who need additional support, resolving conflict, having difficult conversations, setting expectations, holding people accountable, and earning the trust and buy-in of different personalities.

You'll work closely with senior leadership and attorneys while directly leading non-attorney employees and the client service/consultation function. You'll also partner with office leadership on the non-legal aspects of attorney management.

The successful candidate will be someone who can walk into an office, understand what's happening with the people and the business, identify what needs attention, and confidently take action.

What Success Looks Like

You'll create an environment where employees understand what's expected of them, receive meaningful feedback, and feel supported while still being held accountable for results.

You'll be highly visible and engaged with employees in both locations—conducting regular one-on-ones, coaching and developing team members, addressing interpersonal issues, recognizing strong performance, and stepping into difficult situations when necessary.

You'll participate actively in hiring, onboarding, training, performance reviews, corrective action, workforce planning, scheduling, and coverage. You'll also work closely with HR and senior leadership when more complex employee matters arise.

A major part of your responsibility will be creating consistency across two offices. Employees shouldn't have dramatically different experiences or expectations simply because they work in different locations. You'll help establish clear standards, communicate changes, gain employee buy-in, and ensure new processes actually become part of how people work.

You'll also lead the team responsible for prospective-client inquiries and consultation coordination. This requires someone who understands that excellent client service starts with the people delivering it. You'll use coaching, call reviews, performance data, and individual feedback to continually improve responsiveness, professionalism, empathy, follow-through, and results.

You'll partner effectively with attorneys and senior leaders without needing positional authority to accomplish things. That means building credibility, communicating directly and positively, resolving disagreements professionally, and knowing when to listen, when to coach, and when to make a decision. Along with the people side of the position, you'll maintain responsibility for the overall effectiveness of both offices. That includes monitoring staffing and workloads, addressing workflow problems, reviewing business and client-service metrics, supporting budgets and financial performance, coordinating technology and facilities needs, and making sure problems don't linger.

Technology—and particularly artificial intelligence—is an important part of how this organization works. We're looking for someone who already uses AI confidently in everyday professional work and understands how to write effective prompts to produce useful results. You'll use AI for analysis, drafting, reporting, preparation, and problem solving and look for additional ways AI and automation can make employees and processes more effective.

The Background We're Seeking We are particularly interested in candidates who bring: 5+ years of direct people-management experience with meaningful responsibility for employee performance and development. Demonstrated experience hiring, onboarding, coaching, motivating, evaluating, and managing employees, including addressing poor performance and difficult workplace situations.

A track record of creating a positive, collaborative, accountable workplace culture.

Strong examples of successfully resolving employee conflict and navigating challenging interpersonal situations.

The ability to influence, motivate, and gain buy-in from employees and professionals with different personalities and priorities.

Experience managing competing priorities independently while knowing when senior leadership or HR needs to become involved.

Experience leading teams across multiple departments, functions, or locations.

Strong written and verbal communication skills with a positive, professional leadership presence.

Comfort working with performance metrics, reports, budgets, and business information and turning that information into action.

Strong Microsoft Office skills, particularly Excel.

Meaningful experience using a CRM for records, pipelines, and reporting; Salesforce experience is strongly preferred.

Advanced, hands-on use of AI tools, including strong prompting skills and the ability to apply AI to real business situations.

Experience creating AI-driven workflows, automations, or agents is a significant plus.

Comfort with technology and the willingness to handle basic equipment setup and work with IT resources when needed.

Sound judgment and discretion when handling sensitive employee, client, and financial information.

A bachelor's degree in business administration or a related discipline is preferred.

Previous law-firm experience is not required. We are more interested in finding an exceptional people leader who can successfully lead professionals and employees in a demanding, service-oriented environment.

Benefits The organization offers health benefits, paid time off, paid holidays, eligibility for a performance-based bonus program, and employee referral incentives.

Equal Opportunity Our client is an equal opportunity employer and considers qualified applicants without regard to characteristics protected by applicable federal, state, or local law.

\nCompany Description

We Place People is a premiere Executive Search Firm working with leading companies nationwide. We have a direct relationship with our clients and a 95% hire rate! We differentiate ourselves from other firms & work closely with our candidates throughout the interview process. WE PLACE PEOPLE is what we do best!