Private Secretary I - Office of Fiscal Services

Private Secretary I

Salary Range: Private Secretary I, SR-20: $5,133.00 per month

Examples of Duties

Receives telephone calls and personal callers and determines the identity and nature of the call; determines which calls and callers must be directed to the official served, can be referred elsewhere or handled personally; tactfully holds calls and personal callers to brief the official served on the background and obtain required information;

Makes all arrangements for conferences including informing participants of topics to be discussed and providing background information, attending and taking notes, preparing summary accounts with emphasis on commitments made and developments of concern to the official served and his/her other staff, and duplicating and distributing handout material and summaries of the meeting;

Receives incoming mail, maintains control records on incoming correspondence and action documents, and follows up on work in process to insure timely reply or action;

Reads outgoing correspondence for procedural and grammatical accuracy, conformance with general policy, factual correctness and adequacy of treatment, and calls any deviations or inadequacies to the attention of the writer or more rarely to the official served;

Keeps the calendar of the official served and schedules appointments and conferences without prior clearance, seeing that the official served is fully briefed on the matters to be considered before the scheduled meetings;

Drafts letters of acknowledgement, commendation, notification, etc., on own initiative;

Interviews and makes selection of stenographic and other clerical employees in the immediate office, makes assignments, schedules relief and lunch hour coverage, arranges overtime work as necessary, etc.;

Insures that official, social obligations are met such as arranging luncheons, issuing invitations or notices, arranging seating, assuring invitation and presence of guest speakers, etc.;

Obtains specialized information for the official served from technical sources outside the agency or from diverse or numerous documents and organizes the material so as to facilitate focus on most important parts;

Observes need for administrative or procedural notices and instructions, prepares drafts of necessary issuances, and distributes and explains notices and instructions to appropriate staff;

Devises and installs office procedures;

May operate a typewriter, word processor or personal computer to type correspondence, reports and other materials;

May take and transcribe dictation by shorthand, speedwriting or stenotype of correspondence, reports and other materials.

Minimum Qualifications

Experience Requirement: Except for the substitutions provided for in this specification, applicants must have had the kind, amount and quality of experience described in the following paragraphs:

General Experience: One-half year of work experience which involved performance of tasks which demonstrated knowledge of English grammar, spelling and arithmetic; and the ability to read and understand oral and written instructions, and speak and write simply and directly.

Specialized Clerical Experience: Two years of progressively responsible typing, stenographic and/or substantive clerical work experience which demonstrated possession of, in addition to the knowledge and abilities noted under General Experience, knowledge of common office appliances and equipment and the ability to carry out procedures in clerical work systems and to perform secretarial-type tasks including, but not limited to, several of the following: Serving as telephone and walk-in receptionist; maintaining a system of files; making travel arrangements; composing correspondence; obtaining and presenting information from files; routing correspondence; reviewing out-going correspondence for format, grammar, spelling and typography; maintaining a log of pending work; etc.

Secretarial Experience: In addition to the above General and Specialized Clerical Experience, three years of progressively responsible typing, stenographic and/or substantive clerical work experience which demonstrated possession of the ability to perform secretarial duties including, but not limited to, the following: (1) providing personal assistance to an administrator or executive by attending to the administrative details of an office; (2) having an overall awareness of the activities and administrative framework of a program/organization; and (3) exercising sound judgment.

Substitutions Allowed: Any combination of work experience and/or education, although not cited elsewhere in this specification, which clearly demonstrates the applicant's possession of knowledge, skills and abilities comparable in quality and quantity to those described in this specification may be accepted as satisfying a portion or all of the minimum qualification requirements.

Substitution of Education for Experience:

Graduation from high school with courses in basic English and arithmetic may be substituted for the required six months of General Experience.

Successful completion of a substantially full-time equivalent clerical, stenographic or secretarial curriculum leading to a degree or diploma at an accredited community college, business or technical school which included courses in business English, arithmetic, office clerical procedures and office machines may be substituted for one year of Specialized Clerical Experience.

Partial completion of a substantially full-time equivalent clerical, stenographic or secretarial curriculum at an accredited community college, business or technical school which included courses in business English, arithmetic, office clerical procedures and office machines may be substituted for the Specialized Clerical Experience on a month-for-month basis.

Education in an accredited university in a baccalaureate program may be substituted for the Secretarial Experience, on the basis of fifteen semester hours for six months of experience, up to a maximum of one year provided it included at least two or more of the following types of courses: human relations in business, business correspondence or communications, principles of management, personnel management relations, office management, business administration, etc.

Quality of Experience: Possession of the required number of years of experience will not in itself be accepted as proof of qualification for a position. The applicant's overall experience must have been of such scope and level of responsibility as to conclusively demonstrate that applicant has the ability to perform the duties of the position for which applicant is being considered.

Supplemental Information

Salary: The advertised salary is based on full-time employment and includes shortage and school year differentials, if applicable. Requirements: Applicants must meet all the requirements for the position they are seeking as of the date of the application, unless otherwise specified. Unless specifically indicated, the required education and experience may not be gained concurrently. Calculation of experience is based on full-time, 40-hour workweeks. Part-time experience is pro-rated. Example: Twelve months of experience at 20 hours/week is equivalent to six months of experience, not one year. Also, hours worked in excess of 40 hours/week will not be credited. Example: Twelve months of experience at 60 hours/week is equivalent to one year of experience, not one and a half years.

Temporary Assignment: Claims of Temporary Assignment (TA) experience to meet the minimum qualification requirements must be verified and attached to the application using one of the options below:

A copy of the applicant's TA History Report or equivalent system-generated report;

A signed letter from the applicant's supervisor that includes the applicant's name, his/her TA job title, the TA start and end dates (from mm/yy to mm/yy), his/her specific TA duties performed, and either the TA hours worked per week or total TA hours worked; or,

Copies of the applicant's signed SF-10 Forms.

Documents: Attach all relevant supporting documents to your application. Documents that were attached to applications submitted before November 16, 2023 do not automatically attach or transfer to applications submitted on and after December 16, 2023. All submitted documents become the property of the Hawaii State Department of Education.

Information about Temporary Positions: Temporary positions may be extended year to year, dependent upon funding and departmental needs. Making yourself available for temporary positions increases your employment possibilities and may lead to permanent opportunities. A person hired for a temporary position may also become a temporary employee upon satisfactory completion of the initial probation period of at least six months. Once a temporary employee, you would be eligible to apply for promotion and transfer opportunities to permanent as well as other temporary positions. You may also enjoy other rights and benefits as afforded to an employee in a permanent position, with the exception of return rights and placement rights associated with a reduction-in-force.

Hawaii State Department of Education