Hamptons are working with a Local authority in London who are on the lookout for an Interim Service Lead for their Adolescent Safeguarding & Well-Being Service

The role:

•To lead and continuously improve the quality and effectiveness of a group of teams providing children’s social care services within the Adolescent Safeguarding & Well-Being Service.

•To act as a key player within the service contributing to the effective development of services which improve outcomes for children and young people at risk of harm, vulnerability and exploitation 

•To place children and their needs at the heart of what you do and promote the effective engagement of children and young people in planning, delivering and improving services.

Responsibilities:

•Lead and motivate the front-line managers reporting to you, their staff and those you work with to perform effectively and contribute to delivering highly effective services for children and young people.

•Promote a child centred outcome focus through constructively and effectively challenging professional and managerial practice 

•To ensure that service delivery, support and quality assurance processes are monitored, reviewed and redesigned to ensure the optimal efficiency and effectiveness of the service area.

•Make best use of resources through efficient service processes, promoting work presence and best practice.

•Be accountable for the performance of the services you are responsible for as measured by national and local performance indicators.

•Meet improvement targets set through the timely effective implementation of improvement actions.

•Contribute to developing and be responsible for delivering effective multi-agency strategies and service delivery arrangements.

•To hold devolved responsibility for managing resources including staffing, financial, information and IT.

•Make professional decisions on individual cases that have significant implications for the commitment of financial resources and protection of children and young people, and chair meetings and make decisions about the handling of individual cases using professional expertise and knowledge of how to prioritise and make the best use of resources.

•Provide regular briefings and reports on the quality and performance of the service provided to senior managers, and where required to Elected Members, including providing advice on complex matters with significant financial or organisational implications for the department and Council.

•Ensure that contracted services are delivered to the required quality and improving outcomes for children.

•Ensure compliance with formal inspection and audit systems and support the effective inspection of services by regulatory bodies and external inspectors.

•Ensure staff supervision and support is provided to the required standard and addresses the performance improvement requirements and professional development needs of staff.

•To find solutions to complex or critical problems relating to organisational arrangements, budget and resource use and implementing strategies.

•To work closely with colleagues in policing, community safety, health, education, voluntary, community and faith-based organisations and other children and young people’s services, and provide leadership to the planning, service design, commissioning and review processes for children’s social care services.

•To chair multi-agency partnership panels in relation to children and young people who are vulnerable to harm, exploitation and other forms of extra-familial risk. To hold key stakeholders and partners to account for delivering on agreed actions in a timely manner and to regularly review decisions made at panel. 

•To provide strategic oversight for children and young people known to the service where there are concerns about their vulnerability/susceptibility to harm, exploitation and other forms of extra-familial risk.  

•Be responsible for the recruitment of staff as in accordance with legislation, policy and guidance, good practice and giving full regard to equal opportunity considerations.

•To ensure the effective conduct of staff and be responsible for ensuring that appropriate investigations into staff conduct are carried out and for presenting and chairing disciplinary and grievance cases as delegated.

•To ensure that the Council’s sickness and absence procedure is being effectively implemented.

•To promote the safety and well-being of staff and service users ensuring that routine Health and Safety arrangements are being complied with, ensuring that procedures relating to the protection of children are complied with.

•To liaise and work with departmental and corporate colleagues to ensure that financial management, human resource management, premises and equipment, information and IT processes are co-ordinated and harnessed to support the effective delivery of an assessment and social work care planning service.

•To monitor and review patterns of service demand, financial, staffing and other resources deployed to meet need, in order to ensure that resources are effectively deployed in a way that achieves best value.

•Ensure that complaints arising from looked after children or other children in need are dealt with in accordance with the policies and procedures of the department.

•To provide an out of hours telephone contact on an agreed basis in respect of the children’s services.

About You:

•Registered Social Worker with Social Work England (SWE).

•Evidence of continued professional study or management development relevant to the post since qualification.

•Demonstrable successful experience in leading and motivating managers to deliver a high quality service as a manager at Team / Unit or equivalent level within an urban and culturally diverse environment.

•Experience in using quality assurance and audit systems and processes effectively to analyse the quality of services and identify improvement actions.

•Experience of work effectively with inter-agency and departmental partners to deliver on an agreed product or goals.

What's on offer: £45 – £47.50 per hour – Inside IR35 

About The Client: The client is based in London

Recruitment Timeline: Interviews to take place ASAP as the role requires an immediate start 

To apply, please complete the below form and include an up to date CV.

Or for a confidential discussion about the role, please contact Jo Parnell on jo@hamptonsresourcing.com or 01926 353970

Hamptons is passionate about equality, and is committed to developing an inclusive workforce. We do not discriminate against any employee or applicant regardless of your individual needs. Any reasonable adjustments will be fully supported during the application and hiring process.