The Company

Usborne is an independent, family business, creating books which spark curiosity in children of all ages. These range from books for babies such as the bestselling THAT’S NOT MY®… series of touchy-feely books, to YA fiction from acclaimed authors such as Faridah Àbíké-Íyímídé and Ravena Guron – with everything from Sticker Dolly Dressing to Philosophy for Beginners in between.

Whilst the company is now a market-leader in children’s publishing and one of the best-known brands in children’s books globally, the company retains a friendly and familial feel. If you want to work somewhere close-knit enough for people to know your name, but which has a first-class reputation around the world, Usborne is the place for you.

The Team

This role reports into our Head of Facilities and is part of our small and friendly Facilities Team.

The Facilities team is responsible for ensuring that our offices in London, Wolverhampton and Oxford run safely and efficiently for our 285 colleagues. The team provides operational support on matters including health and safety, workplace operations, library and book management and day-to-day administration.

The Role

We are looking for a confident and experienced Office Manager who can respond calmly and professionally to everything from routine requests to unexpected problems.

Working closely with your Facilities colleagues the Office Manager will work collaboratively to support our c200 staff in London and provide support to our Oxford and Wolverhampton offices as required.

Responsibilities

Day to day, the successful candidate will:

• Manage office services, suppliers, stock, events, access arrangements and administrative processes.

• Manage the company’s book collections, ensuring the in-print library and out-of-print archives are well organised, maintained and accessible.

• Manage the Facilities helpdesk, allocating queries and ensuring requests are dealt with effectively.

• Oversee postal and courier services.

• Support the Head of Facilities with health and safety compliance, including Health and safety inductions, risk assessments and other compliance matters.

• Coordinate annual and ad-hoc company events.

• Manage relationships with contractors and suppliers.

• Line manage the Facilities Administrator.  

• Maintain accurate records of department activities and support effective budget management.

• Play an important role in business continuity and emergency response.

Experience / Skills

• 3+ years’ experience in an office management capacity ideally within a similar sized organisation.

• Strong supplier, contractor, procurement, stock and budget management skills, with an eye for value for money.

• Health & Safety experience / qualifications, and experience undertaking workplace Risk Assessments, would be advantageous.

• Ability to organise and prioritise a varied workload, balancing everyday tasks with urgent or unexpected issues.

• Clear and professional communication skills and is able to provide clear direction to the team and other colleagues.

• Able to build strong relationships at all levels and can work effectively with internal and external stakeholders.

• Excellent attention to detail, record keeping and confidence working with MS Office suite.

Location and Benefits

We offer a 35-hour working week from our office in Farringdon, London. Due to the nature of the role, this position is fully office based. There will be occasional travel to our offices in Oxford and Wolverhampton.  

In addition to our transparent salary grading structure, we also offer a range of great benefits including:

• 25 days paid holiday entitlement plus bank holidays, increasing with service.

• Industry-leading Pension Scheme and Life Assurance.

• Employee Assistance Programme and Mental Health First Aiders.

• Healthcare Cashback scheme.

• Virtual GP service.

• Enhanced Family Friendly benefits.

• Paid Volunteer Day.

• Rewards and Discount services and shopping.

• Cycle to Work Scheme.

• 75% discount on Usborne books.

Recruitment Process

We are unable to offer visa sponsorship for this role and therefore applicants must have the right to live and work in the UK at the point of application. 

We expect to undertake first round interviews online in early October with a further interview in person to be held shortly after. We are ideally looking for someone to take up the post no later than mid-November.

Please let us know if you require reasonable adjustments at any point during the application and/or recruitment process.

Usborne is dedicated to building a diverse taskforce that reflects the wide range of communities that read our books globally. Decisions are made based on the individual’s skills and experiences.

AI notice

The use of AI has become more prevalent in recruitment application answers and content and whilst AI is undoubtedly a useful tool, we'd like you to answer the questions using your own words and reflecting your own actual experience. AI usage is flagged by the Applied system and may result in your answers being automatically rejected or down marked.