Job Title: Children's Senior Practitioner – Family Safeguarding Teams
Location: Hertfordshire with bases in Hertford, Stevenage & Apsley
Salary: £40,221 per annum plus £6,243 Market Enhancement, with the opportunity to progress to a maximum of £44,428 per annum plus £6,084 Market Enhancement. + one off £1k Welcome Payment
Hours: 37 per week
Contract: Permanent

As an innovative authority, we are committed to developing motivational social work practice and you will be trained to work in this way. You will be working at the forefront of best practice to deliver first class support to vulnerable children and families which will expose you to managing complex and diverse caseloads.

By changing our approach to families, they are changing their approach to us and we are managing to keep far more children at home safely with their families. With dedicated Diversity & Inclusion strategy and focus groups, we promote diversity and inclusion across the delivery of services and within our workforce. We will offer a stimulating working environment, regular supervision meetings and training opportunities to help you to reach your full potential with the assistance and guidance of our specialist L&D teams.

The pandemic has brought about changes in the way we work and having learnt from this and from feedback from our staff and communities, we are embedding important principles around ‘Our Way Forward’.
The overarching vision for Children’s Services is that we work in a ‘flexible and balanced’ way with a focus on ‘continuous improvement’; this is underpinned by a ‘mix and blend’ approach by adopting hybrid ways of working, balancing the need for collaborative workspaces with the right technology for staff to work from home and touchdown areas where this is right for you and for our families.

Our Family Safeguarding Teams are a pioneering model of social work which consist of multi-agency teams that work with Child Protection and Child in Need cases and conduct the majority of our care proceedings. These multi-disciplinary teams consist of professionals in children’s and adult social work, domestic abuse, sexual abuse, substance misuse and mental health who work together to tackle the root causes of risk in families.

As a Senior Practitioner, you will already have highly developed specialist knowledge of Social Work practice. Your advanced expertise and knowledge will help you to take the lead on the most complex cases within the department.

This is a varied and challenging role where you will have shared responsibility for leading less experience staff. You will have a key role in researching and sharing up to date social work practice alongside creating a clear vision for the future and ensuring the best outcomes for children and their families are realised.

Excellent written and verbal skills is essential as you will need to prepare and deliver welfare reports to conferences and court hearings.

As a qualified and registered social worker, you will have significant senior level frontline experience in a safeguarding team.

Recent experience of case work in Assessments, Child Protection, Children Looked After and Care Proceedings and an in-depth knowledge of relevant childcare legislation is necessary to undertake work in this role effectively.



Application Information
Benefits of working for us:

Competitive Starting Salary
One of welcome payment of £1k for all external appointments who have completed their ASYE at the time of application.
Monthly Market Enhanced Payment
Relocation expenses of up to £6k (terms and conditions apply)
Up to 33 days annual leave entitlement
Free parking at all of our sites
Care Lease Scheme (depending on the role)
Flexible Working Arrangements (depending on the role)
Excellent Career Development
Salary Exchange for Additional Benefits
Excellent Pension Scheme with Employer Contributions
Shopping Discounts
Support Groups & Wellbeing Schemes
We welcome applications from people already located in the UK, additionally sponsorship opportunities may be available.

Disability Confident: We are proud to be a Disability Confident employer and guarantee an interview to anyone disclosing a disability whose application meets the minimum criteria for the post.

English Fluency: The ability to converse at ease with members of the public and provide advice in accurate spoken English is essential for the post (for those whose language is a signed language the provision of a sign language interpreter who speaks English to the necessary standard of fluency will be required). Further information about the legal requirement can be found here.

Safeguarding: Safeguarding children and adults is of utmost importance to Hertfordshire County Council. The Council requires employees to abide by legislation and best practice to enable Hertfordshire to achieve this. This role has been identified as requiring a Disclosure & Barring Service (DBS) check. For more information Click Here

Driving Roles Only: As part of this role, you will be required to travel to other HCC Sites/Residences either using your own mode of transport or a company car. In light of this, the ability to drive and/or travel around the County is required for this role a DVLA check will be required on appointment.

CS Roles Only: We expect all Children Services employees to fulfil Hertfordshire's Professional Promise for how children, young people & young adults with special educational needs and / or disabilities and their families should be treated. It is our agreement to place families and children at the centre of what we do, and helps parents and carers to understand and be able to hold us to account for how we provide our services. For further information please visit: ‘Professional Promise’



How to Apply
As part of the application, you will be required to upload your most recent CV ensuring gaps in employment have been addressed.