Advanced Practitioner, Permanent in Coates

This is a Gloucestershire County Council job.

We are currently recruiting for an Advanced Practitioner to join our Children in Care team based in Cheltenham.

For all your hard work, you will receive the following:

• between 48,226 - 51,356 per annum subject to experience
• 4,000 welcome payment*
• 2,000 retention payment*
• up to 8,000 relocation package**
• flexible and agile working opportunities
• 25.5 days annual leave rising to 30.5 days after 5 years continuous service (pro rata for part-time staff)
• option to purchase 10 days of additional leave per year (pro rata for part-time staff)
• family friendly policies and benefits to help support you and your family
• supportive and positive working environment with regular, robust supervision
• Local Government Pension Scheme (LGPS)
• access to our Employee Assistance Programme (EAP) that provides free, confidential, counselling and advice for employees, available 24 hours a day, online and by telephone
• an in-house Occupational Health service
• employee discount scheme
• links to employee networks such as Prism (LGBT+) and the Young Employees Network
• career development and qualification opportunities
• access to our Social Work Academy
• Cycle to Work scheme (eligibility criteria and t&cs apply)
• Green Car Salary Sacrifice Scheme (eligibility criteria and t&cs apply)

*Please note that all our welcome and retention payments are subject to terms and conditions as well as tax and national insurance deductions.

**Please note that our relocation policy is subject to terms and conditions.

Right child, right support, right time, every time.

In our recent inspection in June 2025, our Children's Services have been officially judged as Good with Outstanding elements. Ofsted also said Leaders have set out a clear vision for delivering success for children, by modelling values and creating a culture where the workforce, children and families feel valued and heard; risk is managed confidently with bottom lines clearly set out. This marks an important step in our journey to improve outcomes for our children and young people, and we remain focused on our mission: to continue building on this success and ensure that every child and young person in our county has the opportunity to thrive.

Gloucestershire offers a range of opportunities to develop your career, supported by a phenomenal Social Work Academy offer, a developing systemic practice methodology, an ambitious leadership team and an award-winning workforce. We are a local authority adopting, and training all colleagues in, systemic social work practice. If you would like to be part of an authority that takes a relational approach to working with families and focuses on what needs to change in the system around a child and family to enable children to thrive, then consider a role with GCC.

Our teams consist of a Team Manager, an Advanced Practitioner, and four Social Workers. We have two teams who have one Family Support Worker each. All our teams have permanent, experienced managers in place. We are a friendly and welcoming service, with cohesive teams who work together to provide children and young people with the best possible care from their corporate parents. These dedicated social workers are responsible for all children who are looked after by Gloucestershire as a local authority after their care proceedings end, ensuring that their care plans and permanence are progressed in timely ways. All teams work in partnership with internal and external professionals as well as birth families. This includes Fostering, Every Story Matters, Children and families commissioning, Independent Reviewing Officers, Education and Health.

As an Advanced Practitioner, you will be at the heart of Gloucestershire's practice model, holding an expert and influential role within your team. You will play a key part in supporting the development and delivery of high-quality, complex social work practice through joint working, professional advice and guidance, and quality assurance activity. You will model Gloucestershire's relational systemic practice approach and actively promote our practice standards, supporting a strong and reflective practice culture across the team. Advanced Practitioners provide direction and constructive challenge to team members to improve the quality of practice. This includes activities such as quality assuring assessments, undertaking joint visits, and supporting reflective discussion on practice, helping staff to develop confidence, skills and professional judgement. The post requires a strong capacity to support and influence others. You will contribute to the professional oversight of work within the team, offering guidance, mentoring and support to social workers, and working closely with Team Managers to promote safe, effective and consistent practice. As part of the role, you may provide Newly Qualified Social Workers with monthly reflective supervision and undertake observations of practice, with overall responsibility for NQSW management remaining with Team Managers. You will also support and contribute to the learning and development of Social Work students within the team. You will jointly lead on a specific area of practice, offering a weekly consultation that practitioners across the service can book into, providing specialist support and helping to strengthen practice in this area. You will work closely with the Social Work Academy through regular forums and training activity, contributing to the development of standardised practice and bringing new learning opportunities back into your team. Advanced Practitioners hold a small number of cases, ensuring sufficient capacity to focus on professional leadership, practice development and support for colleagues.

As well as your experience, there are some things we require of you to be successfully appointed to this post:

• a full driving licence and willingness to drive
• DBS clearance (Enhanced Adults and Children's)
• to have completed your ASYE year (if you qualified after 2012)

For an informal chat about this role, please contact. We reserve the right to close an advertisement earlier than the stated closing date if we receive a suitable number of applications. Interviews are due to take place in person at Grosvenor Hall in Cheltenham on Tuesday 23rd June. If you would like to find out more about our Children's Service please take a look here: Children's Social Care Careers | Careers hub. We welcome applications from newly qualified and social workers in the early years of their career. Depending on your qualification date and previous experience, you will be invited to either join our accredited ASYE programme or to complete an alternative early-career development in-house pathway. The appropriate option will be explored and confirmed as part of the interview and offer process. We may be able to offer sponsorship for this role, in line with Home Office guidance and subject to pre-employment checks. Applicants must already hold a valid right to work in the UK that Gloucestershire County Council can transfer.

Under the terms of our Safer Recruitment Policy, if you are invited to interview, we will take up safeguarding references prior to your interview to understand your suitability to work with vulnerable children. These references will then be discussed in your interview. Please give details of at least two referees, one of whom must be your present and/or last employer and the other from a previous employer(s). These will need to cover the last three years of employment/education. In the case of applicants leaving full-time education or not having worked since doing so, the Head of School, College or University should be one of the named referees. We do not accept references from friends or family members or workplace colleagues (who are not more senior). To ensure we process your application in a speedy and efficient way, we will contact your referees by DocuSign. Where appropriate, please inform them of your application.

To access the Job Profile for this role, please follow the link below:- Advanced Practitioner job profile. This position is subject to a DBS check. Gloucestershire County Council is committed to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children and young people or vulnerable adults and expects all staff and volunteers to share this commitment. We want to be an employer of choice, attracting and retaining excellent people to work for us, so that we can best serve all of Gloucestershire's diverse communities. Our promise to you is that we will provide an inclusive and supportive working environment that enables you to bring your whole self to work and realise your full potential. It is a legal requirement, under the Immigration Act 2016, that anyone appointed to a customer-facing role must be able to demonstrate an ability to fulfil all spoken aspects of the role with confidence in fluent English. Hybrid working arrangements are available for the majority of our roles, giving teams the opportunity to work in a way that suits them, balancing service need and individual choice, with a mix of both remote and office working.