Principal Applied Psychologist in Leeds

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Job Summary

Looking for a new challenge? We are looking for a compassionate and motivated Principal Psychologist to join the Secure Child and Adolescent Mental Health Service (Secure CAMHS) at Adel Beck Secure Childrens Home to deliver outstanding trauma‑informed care. The post holder will be an integral member of the team and have the necessary skills and experience to provide collective leadership, clinically lead and consult on highly complex forensic cases, offer supervision, lead and supervise audit, service evaluation and research, as well as manage the demands of service development and change.

We provide an MDT approach to assessment, formulation and intervention planning for children, tailoring individual care pathways to best meet their identified needs and achieve the best possible outcome for them. We work to ensure that the team around the child is working together, with the child at the centre. As a service we are involved in all transition and discharge planning, promoting continuity of care and sharing of information.

The service will meet your development needs through a comprehensive induction, bespoke training package and quality supervision plan. The post will be based at Adel Beck Secure Childrens Home.

At the time of advertising, this role does meet the minimum requirements set by UK Visas and Immigration to sponsor candidates to work in the UK. We look forward to receiving your application.

Key Responsibilities

1. Develop and maintain therapeutic relationships with clients, including in group settings. Joint working with complex cases which require more specialised levels of assessment and therapeutic skills.
2. Provide autonomous, highly specialist assessments of clients referred to the service based upon the appropriate use, interpretation and integration of psychological data from a variety of sources including psychological and neuropsychological tests, self‑report measures, rating scales, direct and indirect structured observations and semi‑structured interviews with clients, and, where appropriate, family members and others involved in the client’s care.
3. Communicate with clients with a wide range of difficulties and other presentations, including clients with complex mental health difficulties and plan and organise broad range of complex activities.
4. Formulate and implement plans for the formal psychological treatment and/or management of a client’s mental health problems including associated challenging behaviours, based on an appropriate conceptual framework of the client’s problem and employing methods of proven efficiency across the full range of care settings.
5. Make decisions and clinical judgements involving a range of highly complex factors in the context of inadequate or unavailable information, equivocal research/evidence or where expert opinion differs.
6. Exercise autonomous professional responsibility for the assessment, treatment and discharge of clients whose problems are managed by psychologically based care plans.
7. Act as care co‑ordinator where appropriate, ensuring the provision of a care package for the client’s needs, co‑ordinating the work of others involved with care, arranging the client’s reviews as required and communicating effectively with the client, the family and all others involved in the care and monitoring progress during the course of multidisciplinary interventions.
8. Communicate sensitive and complex information regarding personal psycho‑social problems in an empathic and supportive way using the highest levels of interpersonal skills in situations which can be highly emotional and sometimes antagonistic.
9. Hold responsibility and autonomy for the treatment and discharge of clients, ensuring appropriate assessment, formulation and interventions, communicating with the referral agent and others involved with the care on a regular basis.
10. Undertake risk assessments that will inform/advise other professionals and carers where there are concerns in relation to mental health or risk‑taking behaviour.
11. Work with colleagues from other professional backgrounds and agencies to enable them to incorporate specialist psychological knowledge into their work.
12. Provide a flexible approach to engaging service users who may have difficulties engaging with the service by offering appointments in other health centres and at home where appropriate.
13. Provide timely, appropriate and concise information (written and verbal) including the compilation of assessment and risk reports and summaries of therapeutic interventions including psychological reports in line with the Trust’s Information Governance protocols.
14. Plan and manage own time to meet expected workload across a number of complex activities and within specified time limits.
15. Engage in physical activity involving role play with clients in a therapeutic setting.
16. Be exposed to highly emotive information, distressing situations and a possible risk of challenging behaviours.
17. Contribute to the Safeguarding Adults and Children Agenda.
18. Actively promote user/carer involvement in all aspects of care planning and delivery whilst respecting the rights, cultural needs, capabilities and wishes of the individual concerned.
19. Support the Person‑Centred Planning Agenda.
20. Receive regular clinical professional and safeguarding supervision and be responsible for accessing this on a regular basis.
21. Be involved in the delivery of teaching, training, consultation and supervision and provide supervision to other colleagues and professionals as appropriate.
22. Provide training placements and participate in teaching for the relevant regional training programme; assess the clinical competence of trainees and provide formal feedback to the relevant training body.
23. Supervise and hold clinical responsibility for the caseload of clinical psychology trainees and psychology assistants.
24. Contribute to the pre‑ and post‑qualification teaching of clinical psychology as appropriate.
25. Maintain professional registration with the HCPC.
26. Consult with managers and colleagues regarding practice development and management issues.
27. Deliver services within the team based on the best evidence available.
28. Abide by the operational policy of the service and the Trust’s wider policies and procedures.
29. Use appropriate leadership skills in day‑to‑day practice and have knowledge of relevant national and strategic developments.
30. Develop programmes of care and care packages in a specialist area in line with the best available evidence.
31. Be responsible for a delegated area of service provision and work closely with the Directorate Team to develop this area.
32. Be involved in service delivery in line with Trust and Directorate priorities.
33. Represent the service at multi‑agency settings and contribute to the development of multi‑agency services.
34. Manage the clinical work of less senior psychology staff and other professional staff where appropriate.
35. Be involved, as appropriate, in the short‑listing and interviewing of staff where appropriate.
36. Work jointly with other team members in managing cases, and provide specific therapeutic techniques as required.
37. Participate in case management.
38. Keep up to date with recent developments in clinical practice and provide evidence‑based interventions and demonstrate this in everyday practice and at the annual appraisal.
39. Support the evaluation of practice with use of standardised measures and analysis of such.
40. Undertake R&D activity and lead on audit projects in line with the Clinical Governance Agenda.
41. Organise R&D activity of trainees/assistants and supervise their evaluation of practice, service‑oriented research projects and experimental case reports.
42. Keep comprehensive clinical notes and consultation records as defined in the operational policy, utilising both case files and the service’s electronic patient record system.
43. Keep an up‑to‑date electronic diary.
44. Be responsible for the prudent use of equipment and resources.

Person Specification

Special Knowledge & Skills – Essential:

• Skills in the use of complex methods of psychological assessment, intervention and management.
• Skills in change management.
• Knowledge of the theory and practice of at least two specialised psychological therapies.
• Well‑developed skills in communicating effectively, orally and in writing, complex, highly technical and/or clinically sensitive information to clients, their families, carers and other professional colleagues within and outside the NHS.
• Skills to work with clients with a range of difficulties and to utilise therapeutic methods of proven efficiency.
• Skills in providing consultation to other professional and non‑professional groups.
• Doctoral‑level knowledge of research methodology, research design and complex, multivariate data analysis as practiced within the clinical fields of psychology.
• Evidence of continuing professional development to meet HCPC requirements.
• Skills in risk assessment and management, needs assessment, care planning and case management.
• Knowledge and ability to apply relevant legislation and government policies in relation to the area of practice.
• Demonstrate leadership skills in relation to an area of practice.

Physical Attributes – Essential:

• Ability to teach and train others, using a variety of complex multi‑media materials suitable for presentations within public, professional and academic settings.
• Commitment to service evaluation and consultation with service users.
• Willingness to be flexible and adaptable in accordance with changing service priorities.
• Commitment to challenging discrimination and improving accessibility to services.

Experience – Essential:

• Experience of specialist psychological assessment and treatment of people across a range of care settings, which may include outpatient, community, primary care and inpatient settings.
• Experience of the application of clinical psychology in different cultural contexts.
• Experience of carrying out assessment and diagnosis and management within a multidisciplinary team.
• Experience of working as an HCPC clinical psychologist.
• Experience of leading in an area of service development.
• Experience of working with a wide variety of complex mental health.
• Evidence of continuing professional development in relation to the area of practice for this post.
• Experience of teaching, training and supervision.

Qualifications – Essential:

• Doctoral‑level training in clinical psychology, including specifically mental health, clinical psychometrics and therapeutic interventions.
• Registration with the HCPC as a Clinical psychologist.
• Training in the supervision of doctoral‑level trainee psychologist.
• Post‑qualification training in a relevant area of specialised practice relevant to the post.

Desirable:

• Training in change management/service development principles.

Personal Attributes – Essential:

• Ability to travel around the Trust as appropriate to the role.

Equal Opportunities

We encourage and welcome applications from all protected characteristic groups, we value diversity and want our workforce to be reflective of our communities.

Employer Details

South West Yorkshire Partnership NHS Trust
Adel Beck Secure Childrens Home
East Moor Lane
Leeds
LS16 8EB

Job Details

Reference number: C9378‑F0689A
Band 8b
Pay: £64,455 – £74,896 a year
Contract: Permanent
Working pattern: Full‑time, Flexible working

Important Notices

The post is subject to the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act (Exceptions Order) 1975 – a Disclosure and Barring Service check will be required. Applicants must have current UK professional registration.

Next Steps

For Full Job Description, please see attached supporting documents.

We are aware that an increasing number of applicants are using AI technology to generate responses on NHS Job application forms. Over‑reliance on AI‑generated content is strongly discouraged and we will conduct a thorough screening process before selecting candidates to progress to the next stage. If you are using AI to enhance your application, please disclose this in your NHS Jobs application form.