Senior Social Worker
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Thank you for your interest for the North London NHS Foundation Trust (NLFT), it is an exciting time to join us and being part of our journey to improve mental health care across North London and deliver excellent services to our local people. We will achieve this through the North London Way, as we:
- Collaborate at every level by living our Values to create the right conditions for us all to work together.
- Develop our new Trust culture, to help make our new Trust a great place to work and to receive great care.
- Empower our teams to lead the planned improvements in our services, by skilling them and giving them the tools to make the changes.
- Focus on delivering excellence at every level to improve our performance and ensure consistently high-quality care across all our services.
- Ensure that research, Quality Improvement, and technology lead the way and are embedded in our services.
- Take a trauma informed approach to everything we do
We proactively welcome diversity in our workforce and pride ourselves on being an inclusive employer. We aim to recruit from our local communities and provide opportunities to all including apprenticeships, veterans, care leavers and more.
The North London Way to deliver, Better Mental Health, Better Lives, Better Communities.
Our trust website is: https://www.northlondonmentalhealth.nhs.uk/
Job overview
An opportunity has opened up for a talented individual to join the Community Forensic Learning Disability team as a Senior Forensic Social Worker . This community team is part of the Forensic LD Pathway, which also includes Medium and Low Secure wards.
It provides care and support for service users living in the North Central London area. It provides a combination of case management of restricted individuals, co-working with local community LD Teams, It also provides a wide range of local training and risk assessment expertise to local community teams, accommodation providers and local services. There is also an opportunity for inpatient forensic LD in-reach work.
The successful applicant will work within a multi-disciplinary team, providing Social Work expertise to the team's functioning. They will have strong clinical skills and will carry a small caseload, acting as care coordinator and Social Supervisor for patients discharged from secure settings. They will be required to work proactively with the in-patient service to enhance the discharge process.
The post holder will have an input into providing training to local providers on areas such as risk assessment. They will ensure that the team delivers on its KPIs and will liaise closely with the performance managers to ensure that data is appropriately collated and reported.
Main duties of the job
Your responsibilities will include taking responsibility for individuals' care and promoting recovery, including:
Working closely and assertively with inpatient services to identify service users who are able to transition into the community, and co-produce plans to facilitate this transition.
1- Working collaboratively with service users in a recovery-focused, strengths-based way, identifying appropriate goals to promote their recovery.
2- Ensure that the views and wishes of service users and carers are central to the care planning process and that their participation is maximised.
3- Undertake care coordination duties in line with the Care Programme Approach to manage a caseload, working effectively with other members of the multi-disciplinary team.
4- Ensure that specialist forensic risk assessments are undertaken collaboratively with service users and colleagues.
Working for our organisation
The partnership between Barnet, Enfield and Haringey Mental Health NHS Trust (BEH) and Camden and Islington NHS Foundation Trust (C&I) is going from strength to strength since it was originally established in 2021 forming the North London Mental Health Partnership.
In order to meet the needs of the new Partnership services you may be required from time to time to work at different locations to your normal place of work. This may mean that you are required to work at any location that fall under Barnet, Enfield and Harringay Trust and Camden and Islington Trust. The Trust reserves the right to require staff to work at such other places or locations as it considers reasonable and necessary on a temporary or permanent basis.
Detailed job description and main responsibilities
The Job description and Person Specification, detailing the main responsibilities and the skills, knowledge, qualifications and personal attributes required for this role, are attached.
Person specification
Qualifications
Essential criteria
- Qualified Social Worker
- Evidence of post qualification training
Desirable criteria
- Social Supervision training
Experience and Knowledge
Essential criteria
- Experience of working with restricted patients
- Experience of working with people with Learning Disabilities/Autistic people
- Evidence of multi-agency working
- Extensive knowledge of the Mental Health Act 1983
Desirable criteria
- Evidence of undertaking risk assessments and providing risk management strategies using the HCR-20
- Forensic Community Mental Health Experience
Skills and Abilities
Essential criteria
- Ability to formulate care plans and care packages
- Ability to plan and organise a range of complex managerial or clinical activities which require judgments to be made on competing factors
- Ability to work independently and autonomously
- Excellent communication skills , verbal and written
Desirable criteria
- Knowledge of Criminal Justice System and the needs of Mentally Disordered Offenders
Personal qualities
Essential criteria
- Ability to effectively manage, prioritise and organise workload, and work under pressure to meet competing deadline
- Willingness to assertively promote new models and challenge practice not in line with the team's goals and values.
- Ability to deal with challenging situations and communicate effectively with patients.
- A 'can do' positive attitude
References will be required to cover your last 3 years of employment/training. One has to be from your current or most recent employer and the others from your previous employer. The references should be from persons with management responsibility or HR.
If you have been unemployed for a period of four years or more, please give the details of your last employer and one character referee of your choice (not members of your family). If more applicable, references will be requested from your teacher or head of faculty. Please ensure you provide full contact details.
Vacancies that are advertised as Fixed Term Contracts will also be available as secondment opportunities for substantive internal staff.
Please be aware that your documents eg. Passport/NI Card, will be electronically scanned using Home Office accredited Verification System.
Due to the high number of applications that are received for some posts, we will close vacancies before the stated closing date once the first 50 applications are received. Therefore, please apply as soon as possible.
All non-medical posts with the Trust are subject to a probationary period of six months, during which time you will be required to demonstrate to the Trust's satisfaction, your suitability for the position in which you will be employed.
Should you not hear from us within three working weeks of the closing date for this post, then regretfully in this instance, you have not been shortlisted.
By applying for this role, you accept in the event you are successful that your personal data may be transferred from the Trust to another NHS organisation where your employment transfers within the NHS. This is in accordance with the streamlining programme which is aimed at improving efficiencies within the NHS both to make costs savings for NHS organisations but also to save you time when your employment transfers.
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.
Documents to download
- Senior Forensic SW Band 7 JD and PS (PDF, 536.3KB)
- Functional Requirements PDF (PDF, 178.7KB)