Senior Psychologist

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Joining #TeamNELFT means you'll become part of a welcoming and supportive working environment. We're CQC rated Good, and we want you to join us on the journey towards an Outstanding rating. NELFT has sites across North East London, Essex, Kent and Medway. We provide community and mental healthcare services to adults and children within these areas.

The Trust has award winning equality and diversity initiatives and staff health and wellbeing activities. We invest heavily in your development, because when you are valued and supported, we provide the best care to our patients. We are a Level 3 Disability Confident Leader, have been featured in the Working Families Top 10 Employers benchmark for three consecutive years, and we have achieved a Carers UK Level 1 Accreditation. Along with our staff networks and training opportunities, we work hard to embed a just and compassionate culture here at NELFT.

Find out more about NELFT careers and what makes our Trust a great place to work, in this video

Job overview

Acute Inpatient & Home Treatment Team Psychology Services

This is an 8a post, but we welcome applicants at Band 7 and a job plan would be tailored to reflect Band 7 competencies.

The Acute and Rehab psychology service is an exciting and dynamic team of psychological professionals working in crisis settings - home treatment crisis teams, psychiatric inpatient wards and a range of other settings.

This opportunity is for a full time clinical/counselling psychologist posts for Home Treatment Team and Inpatient Services.

Please get in touch for more information if you are interested in the vacancy.

The successful applicant would join our well respected and exciting Acute Psychology Service. We are passionate about tackling social inequalities and making therapy accessible to everyone. Our work focuses on supporting people from marginalised communities.

The team are at the forefront of national developments in inpatient and acute working. We are actively involved in research and keen to recruit people who share that vision of contributing to best practice, national guidelines and an evidence base. For example, a number of our team were involved in contributing to the psychological services for acute adult mental health BPS/ACP-UK guidelines.

We are committed to supporting staff development through our in-house CPD package, and where funding allows, we aim to open up further training opportunities in models like Systemic Family Therapy, EMDR, FLP, and CBT for psychosis.

Main duties of the job

The role will involve creative and thoughtful input including offering opportunity to develop skills in assessing, formulating and treating high risk behaviours using evidence based interventions. We work closely with our multi-disciplinary colleagues through consultation, training, reflective practice and opportunities are available to develop these skills in integrated working .

The posts would suit someone who has a strong interest in working with crisis interventions as part of a multidisciplinary team in an inpatient or home treatment setting.

We are keen to recruit the right people who share our passion for working with people in crisis. We offer excellent development opportunities including supervision (individual and group) to really develop psychological skills to a high standard, working groups to engage our team in current issues faced by psychology, and service improvement projects.

We also support the development of leadership skills and aim to nurture our staff and support them to become confident supervisors, devise and implement training, and conduct research.

Diverse & Inclusive Culture

Our award winning EDI team work hard to support our staff. We pride ourselves on having a diverse and inclusive workforce that reflects the communities we serve, and inclusive initiatives and processes in place.

Working for our organisation

Our Values 2025 - 2030

Working with our colleagues, patients and carers we have co-produced three new values that we aim to embed within our culture here at NELFT.

They are:

We are kind.

We are respectful.

We work together with our communities.

These three values help us to strive to provide the best care by the best people.

Starting with NELFT

NELFT place a great deal of importance on new starters being properly welcomed and inducted into the Trust. All new starters will join the Trust on the first Monday of each month and will undertake a comprehensive induction of up to two weeks which will include mandatory training, systems training and the allocation of equipment. As part of the process new starters will have the opportunity to also meet the executive team, senior managers, and attend a number of drop-in sessions focusing on engagement, health and wellbeing and key processes. The induction will be held at our head office in Rainham, Essex.

Probationary Period

This post will be subject to a probationary period.

High Cost Area Supplement - Outer London

This post also attracts payment for High Cost Area Supplement of 15% of the basic salary (minimum payment of £4,714 and a maximum payment of £5,941 - per annum, pro rata for part time

Detailed job description and main responsibilities

Applicants should have:

• Doctoral level training in Clinical/Counselling Psychology and registration with the Health and Care Professions Council (HCPC) OR accredited psychotherapy qualification in CBT/DBT/systemic or psychodynamic therapy and registration with an appropriate professional body
• Experience of working in an evidence-based way with clients presenting with severe mental health difficulties, people in crisis and their families and carers.
• Experience of working in a multi-disciplinary service context.

We would be happy to discuss the possibility of setting this post up as a band 7 post with a development plan to allow progression to an 8a. This option would suit someone who has an interest in gaining experience in crisis work and an opportunity to develop towards an 8a role.For non-psychologist applicants, job plans would be tailored based upon each individual's specific skills and experience.

Please see the attached job description and person specification for more information about this role and working at North East London NHS Foundation Trust. We encourage you to refer to this when completing your application.

We welcome your application even if you do not meet all the criteria listed in the person specification. Please apply as soon as possible as some posts close early to limit the number of applications.

Certificates of Sponsorship

Although we are a registered sponsor organisation, we are unable to offer sponsorship for all job roles. Please check your eligibility under the UKVI points-based system. When calculating the basic salary for sponsorship, HCAS (High-Cost Area Supplement) is not included to ensure fairness and consistency within our Trust.

Use of AI

Please see attached document regarding acceptable use of AI during the recruitment process.

Person specification

Qualifications

Essential criteria

• Doctoral qualification in psychology (clinical or counselling psychology) accredited by the British Psychological Society (BPS) if undertaken in the UK
• Professional registration with the HCPC

Experience

Essential criteria

• Experience of working with people with mental health difficulties and their families

Desirable criteria

• Experience working in acute, crisis or inpatient settings

Knowledge

Essential criteria

• Advanced knowledge and skills in the use of complex methods of psychological assessment and treatment of individuals, frequently requiring sustained and intense concentration.

Benefits

We believe in bringing your authentic and best self to work, in order to deliver the best care to our patients. We are committed to supporting our employees holistically. Here is a snapshot of what is on offer at NELFT:

• A long-standing and award-winning approach to equality and diversity with supportive networks for ethnic minority staff, staff with disabilities or long term/chronic conditions and LGBT staff.
• A commitment to supporting colleagues to achieve a work life balance, through flexible working opportunities and our effortsto support our working parents and carers. This has resulted in us being recognised as a 'Top 10 Family Friendly Employer' from the Working Families Charity.
• Proactive health and wellbeing support, including access to our employee assistance programme, staff psychological support, individual wellbeing conversations and a network of health and wellbeing ambassadors.
• Detailed information about our wellbeing and benefits offer can be found in this link.

As a flexible working friendly organisation, we want to be sure that you can work in a way that is best for us and for our patients, and for you. Speak to us about how we might be able to accommodate a flexible working arrangement whether that's a job share, part time hours or another flexible pattern.

Supporting our Armed Forces

We recognise the valuable contribution that the Armed Forces community make to our organisation. We have signed the Armed Forces Covenant and achieved Gold Award under the Armed Forces Employer Recognition Scheme. We have supportive policies, guaranteed interview schemes for veterans. reservists and military spouses and give additional leave to our Reservists so that they can attend their annual camp.

Equal opportunities employer

We are committed to equal opportunities and diversity and positively encourage applications from all sections of the community regardless of any protected characteristic.

We are a Disability Confident employer and have made the pledge to commit to employing more people with disabilities. If you require this application in another format i.e. Braille or audio tape please contact the recruitment team on 0300 300 1530 or email recruitment@nelft.nhs.uk.

Correspondence with us

You are advised to regularly check your emails (including any junk mail/spam folders) for correspondence related to this post.

As part of our recruitment process, we may be required to share information you provide on the application form with NHS Counter Fraud Authority (NHSCFA) and/or other organisations for the purpose of the prevention, detection, investigation and prosecution of fraud or any other unlawful activity affecting the NHS. We also use third party providers to check and verify your qualifications who may be contacting you on our behalf to verify the same.

Employer certification / accreditation badges

Applicant requirements

You must have appropriate UK professional registration.

This post is subject to the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974 (Exceptions) Order 1975 (Amendment) (England and Wales) Order 2020 and it will be necessary for a submission for Disclosure to be made to the Disclosure and Barring Service.

Application numbers

We reserve the right to close this vacancy early if we receive sufficient applications for the role. Therefore, we encourage you to submit your application as soon as possible to ensure consideration.

If you require any additional support during the application process please contact recruitment@nelft.nhs.uk. We are happy to make reasonable adjustments to support you throughout the recruitment journey.
Documents to download

• Job Description (PDF, 513.7KB)
• Candidate Recruitment Pack (PDF, 671.2KB)
• Acceptable Use of AI in Recruitment (PDF, 3.9MB)