Lead Support Worker March

Alder Close Respite, based in the town of March, provides short-term respite support for adults with a learning disability and/or autism. Our service offers individuals the opportunity to enjoy a safe, supportive environment while giving carers a valuable break from their caring role.

As a Lead Support Worker, you will play a vital role in enabling people to live as independently as possible and to enjoy lifestyles similar to those of other members of the community. You will support and empower individuals to enhance their quality of life, maximise their potential, and continue developing independence skills during their stay at respite.

We are a dedicated and supportive team, committed to person-centred care and creating meaningful experiences for the people we support. If you are compassionate, motivated, and passionate about making a difference, we would love to hear from you.

Appointment to this post will be subject to the outcome of an Enhanced Disclosure obtained through the Disclosure and Barring Service. The Council is committed to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children and vulnerable adults and expects all staff and volunteers to share this commitment.

What will you be doing?

As a Lead Support Worker, you’ll play a vital role in ensuring our service delivers exceptional, person-centred support every day. Working closely with the Manager, you will help drive the service forward, ensuring it is always aligned with its vision and committed to achieving the best outcomes for the people we support.

You’ll take responsibility for maintaining high standards across the service, ensuring all records and documentation are accurate, up to date, and compliant; including care plans, medication management and recording, risk assessments, safeguarding, and incident reporting. You’ll also work collaboratively with a range of professionals, confidently contributing to meetings and applying key legislation such as the Mental Capacity Act and Deprivation of Liberty Safeguards in your day-to-day practice.

This is a hands-on and rewarding role where you’ll support individuals with a range of needs, including more complex health conditions, empowering them to live as independently as possible within their homes and local communities. Alongside this, you’ll take a lead role in supporting and guiding your team, providing encouragement, direction, and leadership to ensure consistently high standards of care and support.

You’ll also play a key part in managing staffing resources, helping to ensure the service is safely staffed and supporting the ongoing development of your colleagues.

In return, you’ll benefit from a comprehensive training programme, strong career development opportunities, and the support of a dedicated and passionate team.

This role requires you to work a range of shifts between 7am and 10pm, including sleep-ins, bank holidays, and one weekend in four (with enhancements paid).

About you

You are someone who is committed to learning, growing, and continually developing your skills. We offer excellent training and development opportunities, and you will bring the motivation and dedication to complete further qualifications, embrace new challenges, and build your expertise alongside a supportive and collaborative team.

While experience of working with vulnerable people, either professionally or in a personal capacity, is valuable, what truly sets you apart is your ability to communicate effectively. You’ll have strong verbal and written communication skills, alongside confident IT skills, and the creativity to think differently and problem-solve in a person-centred way.

You approach your work with sensitivity, professionalism, and integrity, demonstrating a clear understanding of confidentiality both within and outside the service. You will also have a strong commitment to equality, diversity, and inclusion, actively promoting anti-discriminatory practice and respecting the individuality of everyone you support. A good understanding of person-centred approaches and equal opportunities is essential.

You’ll be equally comfortable working independently or as part of a team, whether that’s lone working or contributing to group activities, always maintaining a high standard of care and collaboration.

You will need a proficient level of spoken and written English to support accurate case recording and communication, and you will hold a Level 3 qualification in Health and Social Care (or a related subject).

Please use your supporting statement to outline how your skills and experience match the essential criteria outlined in the Job Description/Person Specification attached to this vacancy.

Our benefits

We value our colleagues in Cambridgeshire County Council and have developed a number of benefits in addition to the basics like annual leave, sick pay, pension and mileage:

• A comprehensive wellbeing package to cover all aspects of wellbeing, both in and out of work, which can also be accessed by your family.
• Buy up to 4 weeks additional annual leave (pro-rata) through our salary sacrifice scheme (subject to operational considerations).
• Take your bank holidays flexibly to better suit your personal circumstances.
• Make Additional Voluntary Contributions (Shared AVCs) to your pension with tax and National Insurance savings.
• Access to development opportunities, apprenticeships and qualified coaches to support your personal and professional growth.
• Paid volunteering hours each year so you can make a positive impact on our community during your normal working day.
• Access to Peer Support Groups through our IDEAL staff equality, diversity and inclusion network.
• Opportunities to nominate and receive Employee Recognition Awards.
• An Our Cambs Rewards account, giving you access to in-store and online discounts as well as our Car Lease and Cycle to Work schemes.

Take a look at our Employment Benefits Brochure attached to this advert to find out more.

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. If you don’t meet every single requirement in the job role but think this could be you, please don’t be put off. We are committed to building a workplace that is compassionate and inclusive as well as diverse, so if you think you could be a good candidate for this role please consider applying and speak to the recruiting manager if you have any questions.

Our Equality, Diversity and Inclusion Strategy, along with our employee network 'IDEAL' and self-organised peer support groups help us to foster an inclusive, supportive and safe working environment where people feel valued, respected, and empowered. We collect relevant diversity data for monitoring as part of the recruitment process to understand the diversity of our applicants and monitor any trends throughout the recruitment processes so that we can take meaningful action.

We are proud to be a Disability Confident Leader. We fully support providing reasonable adjustments throughout our recruitment process, as well as when you join us, and we encourage candidates to contact the Hiring Manager, whose details can be found in the advert, to discuss any adjustment needs. Through a Guaranteed Interview Scheme, we will offer an interview to all applicants who disclose a disability and meet the essential criteria for a job vacancy. On your application form you can indicate you are disabled. Some examples of reasonable adjustments during the recruitment process could include additional time to complete an assessment or printing a document on pastel coloured paper with larger font size and line spacing. We would value talking about what might be possible to enable you to join us and thrive, so if there is something that would help you to do your best during your journey with us, please get in touch.

Visit our jobs and careers section to find out more about our wide range of learning and development opportunities; apprenticeships; our wellbeing package; staff benefits; our commitment to equality, diversity and Inclusion.