Family Support Worker (fixed term contract)

Fixed Term Contract for 12 months

Do you have experience of intensive one to one work and group work with parents, children, and young people from complex families?  If so, then now is an exciting time to join Slough Children First as we look to recruit Family Support Workers to our Early Help service. 

As a Family Support Worker, you’ll act as the dedicated Lead Professional at all stages of support, ensuring parents and children engage and comply with the family’s action plan, as well as conducting comprehensive whole family assessments and producing appropriate written reports detailing family assessments.

You’ll benefit from working in a team that provides supervision, support and development opportunities and you will be a part of our journey to improve the lives of children and families in Slough.

Main Accountabilities

• To conduct comprehensive whole family assessments as required and produce appropriate written reports detailing family assessment and ensuring that these are recorded on the eCAF system.
• Deliver brief and short term interventions when this is sufficient to meet family needs, and long term interventions using the Dundee Model of family support.
• To act as dedicated Lead Professional at all stages of support from pre-assessment through to exit strategy, using support and challenge measures to ensure that parents and children engage and comply with the family’s action plan.
• Coordinate support from external agencies and lead the Team Around the Family (TAF) approach.
• To work with families at various times including early morning, evening and weekends, delivering services where they are required such as the family home and community settings.
• To maintain effective records of family interventions and use the outcomes-based Family Star assessment tool to evidence the achievement of outcomes and enable evaluation recording these on the eCAF system.
• To promote and contribute to early intervention processes using step up and step down approaches, supporting Social Care where appropriate and understanding when statutory interventions are required.
• To ensure all interventions are conducted within an anti-discriminatory framework, and take into account issues such as race, gender, sexuality, disability etc., and deliver appropriate services to the diverse communities of Slough.
• The post holder will be expected to take on additional duties and changes to the job description as required by your line manager commensurate with the post.

Person specification

Education, Training & Experience

At least two years experience of intensive one to one work and group work with parents, children and young people from complex families (Essential)
At least one year’s experience of acting as lead professional delivering family-focused interventions. Experience of monitoring, reviewing and evaluating work (Essential)
Experience of working with statutory and voluntary organisations, including co-ordination of multi-agency Interventions (Desirable)
Proven track record of working with families with multiple complex needs (Essential)
Experience of monitoring, reviewing and evaluating work (Essential)
Thorough understanding of how complex families with entrenched negative behaviours interact (Essential)
Knowledge of Child Protection policies and procedures and Safeguarding and CAF (Essential)
Understanding of and commitment to the need for sensitivity and confidentiality (Essential)
Educated to A level or NVQ3 in Child Development, Youth    Support, Health or Social Care, and/or a relevant professional   qualification in these areas (Essential)
Be able to demonstrate continuous professional development in related disciplines (Essential)
Be able to travel around Slough (Essential)
Qualification in a specialist area e.g. Emotional Health (Desirable)

General & Specific Knowledge

Ability to work flexibly (including early morning, evening and weekends) and communicate with a range of organisations and service providers within the Slough area, including the ability to co-ordinate a multi-agency intervention (Essential)
Ability to assess complex family needs and work with families and agencies to form a comprehensive plan of action (Essential)
Ability to organise and prioritise own work and self motivation in order to obtain objectives (Essential)
Ability to work on a one to one basis and monitor and evaluate outcomes, including having good recording skills and keeping accurate client records (Essential)
Ability to work as a member of a team (Essential)
Ability to develop and apply equal opportunities and anti-discriminatory practice (Essential)
Computer literate (Microsoft Word and Excel) (Essential)
Experience of using the Common Assessment Framework to assess cases and show progress (Essential)