Personal Assistant CV Example (New Zealand)

A Personal Assistant to a general manager in a New Zealand council, a Crown entity or an iwi organisation does more than keep a diary. The PA runs the manager's week across council meetings, community hui and site visits, prepares and proofs the papers that go to elected members, handles correspondence that may be released under the official information laws, and is the first person a ratepayer, a contractor or a journalist speaks to. The hiring manager reads a PA CV for the level of the person supported, the committees and papers handled, the systems used and the evidence that confidential matters stayed confidential.

The Sample CV below is for a Personal Assistant in Palmerston North with eight years supporting senior people in local government and a law firm, now PA to the General Manager Infrastructure at a district council. Its bullets are about the work the council measures: agendas and papers out on time under the meetings legislation, official information requests logged and answered within the statutory period, a diary that runs across council, community and contractor commitments, travel booked inside policy and a record-keeping habit that survived an audit.

Tailor it to the employer. A council wants the meetings and official information side, the records system and the way you deal with elected members and the public; an iwi or hapū organisation wants comfort with tikanga, hui and whānau contact; a law or accounting firm wants client billing, file management and absolute discretion; a corporate wants travel, board papers and events. The US counterpart of this page is the personal assistant resume example, written for American executives and household roles on a Letter page; a New Zealand PA CV runs to two pages of A4 with referees named, and the Civic template suits a public sector reader.

Updated . The person and employers in this Sample CV are fictional. Written for applicants in New Zealand; the page for applicants in the US is the personal assistant resume example.

Personal Assistant sample CV

Drawn at A4 proportions, the paper a New Zealand CV is printed on.

Sophie Alderton

Personal Assistant to the General Manager Infrastructure, District Council, Meetings, Official Information and Records

Hokowhitu, Palmerston Northsophie.alderton@example.com021 555 0159

Summary

Personal Assistant with eight years supporting senior people in local government and professional services, currently PA to the General Manager Infrastructure at a district council with around 180 staff and a roading, water and parks portfolio. Run a diary that spans council and committee meetings, contractor site visits, community hui and ministerial visits, prepare and proof the group's papers for the Infrastructure Committee, and log and track official information requests to the statutory deadline. Trusted with confidential procurement, employment and legal matters, and the person the executive team rings when they need to know where a paper is.

Experience

Personal Assistant to the General Manager Infrastructure, Oroua Downs District Council

– Present

Palmerston North

  • Manage the General Manager's diary across council and committee meetings, contractor and site visits, community hui, iwi liaison meetings and visits from ministers and agency officials, rebalancing it weekly as priorities move.
  • Coordinate the Infrastructure group's papers for the Infrastructure Committee and full Council: collect drafts from five activity managers, proof and format them to the council's template and get them to the governance team by the agenda deadline, with no late paper in three years.
  • Log every request for official information addressed to the group, allocate it to the right manager, track it to the twenty-working-day limit and prepare the response for sign-off; the group has met the statutory timeframe on every request since I took it on.
  • Draft correspondence for the General Manager's signature to ratepayers, contractors and community boards, and handle the first contact with people who are upset about roadworks, water outages or a consent, calmly and within the council's complaints process.
  • Book domestic travel for the group's managers within the council's travel policy and reconcile the General Manager's purchasing card monthly, with no audit queries over three financial years.
  • File correspondence and papers in the council's electronic records system to the Public Records Act standard, and trained the group's new coordinators on it.
Personal Assistant to two Partners, Rangitīkei Street Legal

–

Palmerston North

  • Supported two partners in a property and commercial practice: diaries, client appointments, settlement dates and court and tribunal filing deadlines across both partners' files.
  • Prepared and sent monthly client invoices, chased overdue accounts and reconciled the partners' time entries, cutting the time between month end and invoices out by a week.
  • Opened and closed client files, ran the anti-money laundering identity checks the firm required for new clients and kept the deeds register.
  • Organised the firm's annual client function for around 150 guests within budget two years running.
Office Administrator, Manawatū Plains Seed and Grain

–

Feilding

  • Ran the front desk, the phones and the managing director's diary for a seed and grain business with 40 staff and a seasonal peak.
  • Processed supplier invoices and freight bookings during harvest, when the office handled several hundred consignments a week.
  • Took minutes at the weekly operations meeting and chased the actions that came out of it.

Education

New Zealand Diploma in Business, Level 5, Administration and Technology

Manawatū Institute of Technology, Palmerston North

Completed part-time while Office Administrator; papers in business communication, administration systems and project coordination.

NCEA Level 3

Hokowhitu Grammar School, Palmerston North

Excellence endorsement in English; Te Reo Māori to Level 2.

Skills

  • Diary and inbox management for a senior leader
  • Council and committee agendas and papers
  • Official information requests and statutory timeframes
  • Minute taking and action tracking
  • Electronic records management to the Public Records Act
  • Correspondence drafting for signature
  • Travel booking and expense reconciliation
  • Microsoft 365, Teams and SharePoint
  • Event and hui coordination
  • Client billing and time reconciliation
  • Confidential procurement and employment matters
  • Conversational te reo Māori and tikanga in a workplace setting

Certifications

  • Minute Taking for Local Government, Lower North Island Governance Training,
  • Privacy Act and Official Information in Practice, Council in-house training,
  • Te Reo Māori for the Workplace, Level 2, Manawatū Institute of Technology,

Start yours from this example

Opens this sample in the editor, in one of the templates below. Swap in your details, then tailor it to each vacancy in about two minutes.

Use this example

How a New Zealand CV differs

A New Zealand PA CV for a council, a Crown entity or a professional firm is a two-page document read by the manager you would support and an HR adviser, often alongside a short cover letter that speaks to the job description's key competencies. It names the role and level of each person supported, the committees and papers handled, the legislation the role touched, such as official information, privacy and public records, and the systems used, and it ends with two or three referees. Public sector readers also look for a line on the right to work and on comfort with te reo Māori and tikanga, which most councils now state as a preference.

For a personal assistant in New Zealand

  1. Who you supported, by role

    Write the role, not the name: General Manager Infrastructure, two Partners, the Chief Financial Officer. It tells the reader the level you worked at and keeps a private person's name off a document that will be shared.

  2. The legislation you handled

    Official information requests, the Privacy Act, the Public Records Act and the meetings rules for local government are part of a public sector PA's week. Name them with what you did, such as logging requests to the statutory deadline, and a council reader knows you can start without training.

  3. Papers, agendas and minutes

    Give the committees, the number of activity managers you collected drafts from and the deadline record. Elected members notice a late paper, and so does the manager who signs it.

  4. Te reo Māori and tikanga

    If you have workplace te reo, say so with the level, and mention karakia, hui and pōwhiri you have supported. Many councils and all Crown entities state a commitment to the Treaty partnership, and a PA who can represent the manager in those settings is valued.

  5. Referees named, with their role

    Two or three referees, usually the people you supported, listed with their role and organisation or offered on request. New Zealand employers ring them before an offer and will ask about discretion and reliability first.

Every CV in New Zealand

A4 paper
New Zealand prints on A4. Set the page size before you export; a Letter-sized PDF is the usual sign of a US template.
Two pages is normal
Two pages is the norm. One page for a first job; a third page only for a long senior career.
No photo
No photo, date of birth or marital status. New Zealand employers do not expect them and most prefer the CV without them.
Dates as DD/MM/YYYY
Day first where a full date appears, and month and year for each role. Never the US month-first order.
New Zealand English
New Zealand English follows British spelling: organise, programme, centre, licence, specialise.
Suburb and city, not a street address
"Mount Eden, Auckland" is enough on the contact line. A full street address is not expected.

More on applying in New Zealand, with every CV example for it, on the New Zealand page.

Templates for the personal assistant CV

All templates

Every template exports on A4. The previews are drawn on Letter; the editor sets the page size when you export.

How the CV changes with experience

The same personal assistant CV, written at three levels: a profile and three bullets for each.

Entry level

Zero to two years, or a first post in the title

Administrator with two years on a council customer services desk and a Level 4 business administration certificate, applying for a first PA or executive support role.

  • Handled front-counter and phone enquiries from ratepayers, logging requests for service and routing them to the right team.
  • Took minutes for the customer services team meeting and kept the action list.
  • Booked meeting rooms, travel and catering for two managers while covering the desk.

Mid level

Three to seven years, owns a process or a workload

Personal Assistant with five years supporting a chief financial officer in a Crown entity, confident with board papers, audit timetables and confidential financial matters.

  • Prepare the finance papers for the board and the audit and risk committee to a quarterly timetable.
  • Run the CFO's diary across the annual audit, the budget round and reporting to the monitoring department.
  • Coordinate the finance team's recruitment logistics with HR, from advertising to onboarding.

Senior

Eight years or more, leads people, budgets or programmes

Executive Assistant to the Chief Executive of a district council, leading the executive support team of four and the governance calendar for the Council and its committees.

  • Lead four PAs supporting the executive team, setting the standard for papers, records and official information handling across the organisation.
  • Own the Chief Executive's relationship calendar with the Mayor, iwi partners, the regional council and ministers' offices.
  • Coordinated the organisation's response to a major flood event from the emergency operations centre for three weeks.

Skills to put on the personal assistant CV

Hard skills

Council and committee papers
Papers that reach elected members late or wrong are visible to the whole council, and a PA who keeps the agenda deadline every cycle is the one a general manager wants.
Official information requests
Councils and Crown entities must answer requests within the statutory period, and a PA who logs, tracks and prepares the response protects the organisation from a complaint to the Ombudsman.
Records management
The Public Records Act makes filing a legal duty in the public sector, and an audit will find the correspondence that was left in an inbox.
Diary management across competing demands
A general manager's week is meetings, site visits, hui and crises, and a PA who can rebalance it without losing a commitment is the core of the job.
Correspondence drafting
Letters to ratepayers and contractors go out under the manager's name, and a PA who drafts them in the manager's voice saves hours a week.
Microsoft 365 and a records or document system
Every New Zealand council and firm runs on Teams, SharePoint and a records or practice management system, and naming the ones you know shortens your induction.
Travel and expenses within policy
Public money is audited, and a PA whose bookings and reconciliations have never raised a query is a safe pair of hands.

Soft skills

Discretion
You will see employment, procurement, legal and personal matters before anyone else, and the manager has to be certain they go no further.
Calm with the public
People ring a council when something has gone wrong, and the PA who takes the first call sets the tone for the whole complaint.
Comfort with tikanga and hui
Councils, Crown entities and iwi organisations open meetings with karakia, hold hui with partners and expect staff to engage respectfully, and a PA who is at ease in that setting represents the manager well.
Judgement about priorities
A PA decides what reaches the manager today and what waits, and that judgement is what separates a PA from a diary clerk.

Mistakes that cost personal assistant interviews

  1. A list of tasks with no judgement in it

    Managed diary, booked travel and took minutes describes every PA in the country. Show the decisions: how you rebalanced the week in a crisis, which paper you held back and why, how you handled an angry ratepayer before the manager had to.

  2. Naming the person you supported

    A CV that says PA to a named chief executive travels further than you think and reads as a breach of the discretion the job requires. Give the role and the organisation; interviewers will ask the name if they need it.

  3. Leaving out the legislation

    Official information, privacy and public records are the reason public sector PAs are hired at the level they are. If the CV does not mention them, a council reader assumes you have never handled a request.

  4. Not naming the systems

    Councils and firms advertise their records, meetings and practice management systems by name, and a CV that says computer skills instead of the systems misses the keyword match and the point.

  5. A one-page American executive assistant page

    A Letter-sized page built around a named executive's household and travel belongs to the US example this one pairs with. A New Zealand PA CV is two pages of A4, written about committees, legislation and systems, with referees at the end.

  6. No referees and no right to work

    Public sector employers check both before an offer. Add a line confirming your right to work in New Zealand and list or offer referees, or the HR adviser will come back asking.

Write bullets with the XYZ formula: what changed, the number that shows it, and how you did it, in one line.

Questions about the personal assistant CV

What is the difference between a Personal Assistant and an Executive Assistant in New Zealand?

In practice the title follows the level of the person supported: a PA supports a general manager, a partner or a director, and an EA supports a chief executive or a board and often leads other support staff. The work overlaps heavily, so apply for both and use the advert's title in your headline.

Should I name the person I was PA to?

No. Give the role and the organisation, such as PA to the General Manager Infrastructure at a district council. The reader learns the level from the role, and keeping the name off the CV is itself evidence of the discretion the job needs.

What should a council PA know about official information requests?

How to recognise one, log it, allocate it, track it to the twenty-working-day limit and prepare the response and any withholding grounds for the manager to sign. Say which of those steps you have done and your record on the timeframe; it is the most specific skill a council reader looks for.

What length does a New Zealand employer expect from a PA CV?

Two pages of A4. The first page carries the profile, the current role with the committees, legislation and systems, and your training; the second carries earlier roles, education and referees. One page is too short to show the range of a senior PA's week.

Do I need te reo Māori to work as a PA in the public sector?

It is not usually a requirement, but most councils and Crown entities state it as a preference and expect staff to be comfortable with karakia, hui and basic greetings. State your level honestly, list any workplace course and give an example of a hui or pōwhiri you helped organise.

How do I tailor my CV to a different PA vacancy?

Read the job description's competencies and move the matching experience to the top of your current role: papers and official information for a council, billing and files for a firm, board papers and travel for a corporate. Resume Master rewrites the CV against the pasted job description and keeps it to two pages in the order a New Zealand reader expects.

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