Missing Support Worker

The Cambridgeshire Adolescent Service is focused on safeguarding vulnerable young people who are facing risks outside the home. We achieve that by building:

• Relationships with children and their networks, using a trauma-informed approach.
• Safety, through direct work with children and addressing the contexts of harm.
• Connections with community resources that can move children towards positive futures.

The service is comprised of two Adolescent Social Work Teams and the Missing and Exploitation Team (M&ET), which is our specialist team for supporting children at risk outside the home. Missing Support Workers undertake a key role in offering return home interviews to children who have been missing from home or care, to help inform responses that will promote safety and prevent harm. The M&ET works alongside all colleagues in Children's Services, but particularly the Adolescent Social Work Teams and Youth Justice Service. As a result of these close links, you will be working alongside social workers, youth justice officers, police, psychologists, education officers, substance misuse workers and health workers.

In Cambridgeshire we strive to ensure that children are at the heart of everything we do and to provide practitioners with the tools and resources they need to do their best practice.

What will you be doing?

As a Missing Support Worker, you will be line managed by the Senior Practitioner within the team. You will be assigned a number of children daily, who have been reported missing in order to complete return home interviews. You should be skilled in establishing a rapport with the young person and their parent/carer in order to gain their voice in relation to the missing episode. Prior to meeting the child, you will need to gather relevant information from agencies, working with them and historical concerns around risk. You will need to communicate with those supporting the child, to organise and carry out the return home interview according to the needs of the child but within timescales where possible; this may include travelling outside of the county.

Missing Support Workers collaborate closely with partner agencies, attending meetings and sharing relevant information as needed, and giving advice on next steps for support and safeguarding. The Missing Support Team also facilitate training for children and professionals covering a wide range of subjects including risk assessment, missing protocol, risk outside the home, and transforming lives. We also provide support packages for parents whose children are frequently missing.

About you

You will be ideally educated to A Level/NVQ level 3 standard or equivalent with GCSE level C in Maths and English. You will have in-depth knowledge of child protection and safeguarding processes and services, knowledge and awareness of issues relating to communities from different racial and cultural backgrounds, equal opportunities and have good working knowledge of the relevant legislation relating to young people. You will possess the ability to identify, record and report potential risk and to advocate for the voice of the child in professional settings. You will be empathetic and able to create a rapport, to manage conflict and uncertainty and to problem solve on a wide range of issues, whilst reacting to ongoing change. You will have experience of working with young people with challenging behaviour, have experience in advising and advocating on behalf of young people and be someone self-motivated, who can work on their own initiative as well as part of a team. You will be able to work flexibly including weekends if required with a willingness to travel both inside and outside of Cambridgeshire county.

About us

Cambridgeshire is a great place to work and live with a diverse population, an urban centre in Cambridge, historic Isle of Ely, Huntingdon and St Ives as well as more rural landscapes. Our four values are central to our culture, driving everything we do. We are proud to serve the diverse communities of Cambridgeshire and want our workforce to be reflective of this diversity, which we firmly believe benefits our colleagues, the organisation and our communities.