This position exists to provide high-level, comprehensive, and strictly confidential executive administrative support directly to the Dean of Seaver College and to facilitate the strategic governance operations of the Seaver College Dean's Office. The Executive Assistant acts as a key ambassador and primary point of contact representing the Dean's Office to internal and external stakeholders, including senior administrators, faculty, cabinet members, students, parents, and external partners.
The role ensures the seamless execution of executive governance, complex communications, high-profile institutional events, specialized retreats, and strategic institutional initiatives, aligning administrative operations directly with the University's Christian mission and strategic plan.

Duties

• Executive Operations & Strategic Initiatives: Strategic Alignment: Partner with the Dean to coordinate and advance strategic initiatives by monitoring institutional priorities, maintaining executive dashboards, and tracking progress toward divisional goals. Cabinet Governance: Serve as the operational coordinator for the Seaver Cabinet. Formulate and distribute comprehensive meeting agendas, coordinate meeting spaces and technology configurations, record highly accurate and detailed minutes, distribute official executive announcements, and maintain an action-item tracking system to ensure project timeline compliance across cabinet members. Confidential Project Management: Manage confidential executive projects involving faculty workload, compensation tracking, operational reporting, and other high-priority initiatives requiring discretion and independent judgment. Personnel Faculty Mailings: Independently organize, draft, process, and distribute highly confidential faculty mailings and official correspondence originating directly from the Dean's Office, including processing course release approvals, specialized bonus pay modifications, research grant awards, and structural step increase notifications while maintaining ironclad data security.
• Calendar Management: Manage the Dean's complex, fluid executive calendar, aligning meetings and commitments with institutional priorities while proactively resolving scheduling conflicts and anticipating emerging needs. Primary Liaison & Triage: Serve as the primary liaison for the Dean's Office by managing executive communications. Act as an authorized designate for the Dean, exercising sound judgment, absolute discretion, diplomacy, and emotional intelligence when handling complex or sensitive inquiries from stakeholders. Executive Support & Logistics: Coordinate executive travel, meetings, correspondence, and daily office operations while ensuring the Dean is thoroughly prepared for key engagements and decision-making. This includes maintaining sensitive executive folders and managing high-priority document signatures. Financial Reconciliation: Oversee the financial reconciliation process administered by the Administrative Assistant, ensuring the accurate reallocation, tracking, and substantiation of corporate credit card charges, detailed monthly reconciliations, and the creation of official financial requisitions.
• Operational Effectiveness & Process Improvement: Workflow Optimization: Identify opportunities to improve administrative processes by evaluating Dean's Office workflows, documenting standard operating procedures, and implementing operational efficiencies. Data & Project Tracking: Develop and maintain project tracking tools, reports, and documentation that support executive decision-making and divisional operations. Perform foundational data entry across primary university databases, including High-Impact Practice (HIP) data tracking. Best Practices Research: Research and recommend administrative best practices to strengthen organizational effectiveness and service delivery. Assist with technical workflows such as executing software regression testing during institutional platform updates.
• Institutional Projects & Event Management: Collaborative Event Leadership: Co-lead with the Manager of Administration the administrative planning, vendor coordination, venue logistics, and on-site execution of major College initiatives, academic ceremonies, and institutional retreats. Key Institutional Events: Execute key logistics for high-profile events, including the annual Seaver Faculty Retreat, the annual Cabinet Retreat, Commencement week operations, and Baccalaureate services. Project Oversight: Develop comprehensive project timelines, coordinate cross-functional stakeholders, oversee vendor logistics, and rigorously monitor deliverables to ensure flawless execution.
• Academic Operations & Executive Support: Student Academic Requests: Oversee administrative processes for student academic requests, including processing Directed Studies, Change of Final Exam petitions, and handling international program (IP) course registration entries. Dean's List & PR Coordination: Compute complex Dean's List eligibility data at the conclusion of each academic term, perform accurate record updates within PeopleSoft Student Records, coordinate external media notifications with the Office of Public Relations, and distribute official congratulatory mailings to students and families. Strategic Faculty Hiring Support: Deliver comprehensive administrative support to the faculty hiring pipeline by organizing and scheduling complex candidate interview sequences, coordinating national and internal job advertisements, drafting faculty offer letters, compiling baseline HR data, and routing background check requests. Provide baseline Interfolio training and troubleshooting assistance to divisional staff members. Document Proofreading & Editing: Review, proofread, and edit highly confidential documentation, formal academic proposals, donor communications, and complex institutional strategic plans drafted by the Dean to ensure absolute grammatical accuracy and complete alignment with University standards. Provide special project support as assigned to maintain alignment with the University's mission.
• Perform other duties as assigned.
• Uphold the University Mission through work performed.

The above information has been designed to indicate the general nature and level of work performed by employees within this classification. It is not designed to contain or be interpreted as a comprehensive inventory of all duties, responsibilities, and qualifications required of employees assigned to this job.

Skills and Qualifications

Required:

• A Bachelor of Arts (B.A.) or Bachelor of Science (B.S.) degree from an accredited institution.
• Minimum of three (3) years of progressive professional office administration experience.
• Knowledge of Pepperdine.
• Exceptional writing skills.
• Able to maintain confidentiality.
• High degree of attention to detail; ability to listen attentively.
• Ability to work with a variety of people.
• Public relations skills.
• Ability to function under pressure.
• Ability to work efficiently; overall concepts and applications; aptitude and willingness to learn.
• Knowledge of Microsoft PC literacy; copy, fax and phone.

Preferred:

• Experience preferably supporting an executive-level administrator within a higher education or complex corporate environment.
• High proficiency across executive administrative software, including Microsoft Office Suite (Word, Excel, PowerPoint), Google Workspace apps, and fundamental database environments (such as PeopleSoft data entry).
• Superior writing, proofreading, and strategic editorial capabilities.
• Public relations acuity and advanced diplomacy skills.
• Absolute capacity to function effectively under intense pressure, navigate shifting timelines, and handle extremely sensitive personnel data with uncompromising confidentiality.

This is a Regular, Exempt, 40 hour per week position.

Expected Pay Range: $70,304 - $72,000 per year 

The above pay range reflects what Pepperdine University reasonably expects to pay for this position at time of posting. Actual compensation may vary based on relevant factors such as work experience, market conditions, education/training, and skill level. In addition to base pay, Pepperdine offers a robust and highly competitive benefits package.

Pepperdine is an Equal Employment Opportunity employer and does not unlawfully discriminate on the basis of any status or condition protected by applicable federal, state, or local law. Pepperdine is committed to providing a work environment free from all forms of unlawful discrimination and harassment. Engaging in unlawful discrimination or harassment will result in appropriate disciplinary action, up to and including dismissal from the University.

Pepperdine is religiously affiliated with the Churches of Christ. It is the purpose of Pepperdine to pursue the very highest employment and academic standards within a context that celebrates and extends the spiritual and ethical ideals of the Christian faith. While students, faculty, and staff represent many religious backgrounds, Pepperdine is permitted under applicable law and reserves the right to seek, hire, and promote persons who support the goals and mission of the institution, including the right to prefer co-religionists who support Pepperdine's Christian mission.

Qualified individuals should be able to show respect for workplace differences, and have the ability to work effectively with individuals from different backgrounds.

Offers of employment are contingent upon successful completion of a criminal, education, and employment screening. The University conducts such screenings in compliance with applicable laws and with the objectives of evaluating risk and supporting a safe environment for students, faculty, staff, and guests; safeguarding key University assets including people, property, information, and the University’s reputation; and providing comprehensive job-related information to University leaders to enable them to make prudent hiring decisions. Individuals will be required to disclose any criminal convictions on a designated form after receiving a conditional offer of employment; failure to disclose accurate information may result in withdrawal of the offer or termination of employment. Qualified individuals with criminal histories will be considered for employment in compliance with applicable laws, including the Los Angeles County Fair Chance Ordinance.