Audit Officer (Children’s Services) Interim

Location: Town Hall, London Borough of Havering

Hours Per Week: 36.00

Start Date: Immediate start

Start Time: 09:00

End Time: 17:00

Salary: £357.60 per day

Main Purpose of the Job/Key Objectives:

The Children’s Audit Team is responsible for delivery of strategic and operational Quality Assurance, audit planning and QA activity across the service, playing a key role in the identification of trends to inform the assurance planning process and training plan and drive service improvement and improve social care outcomes for children and young people. The post holder will facilitate the delivery of a regular learning and improvement plan, central to the borough’s improvement journey in social care. This role supports the allocation and undertakes case audits, moderations and follow up of recommended actions. The post holder will complete regular audit activity as requested by the Improvement Leads or Practice and Development Manager and ensure key messages are identified, learning is shared and recommendations for action are made, implemented and tracked for impact.

Responsible for planning and executing ‘practice week’ twice annually, supporting the entire leadership and management function in Starting Well to undertake learning reviews and observations of practice. The post holder will arrange and deliver audit training sessions, workshops and learning reviews to ensure that staff are fully aware of their quality assurance responsibilities, particularly in relation to our continuous improvement journey in social care. The role will support in collating feedback from service users and staff to inform service planning and improvement activity. Provide support to projects and other work streams which deliver the Starting Well Improvement Plan.

Experience:

• At least Advanced Practitioner level experience in a busy social work department
• Auditing experience (desirable)
• Project planning and organisational skills.
• Ability to use key IT systems to manipulate data, present plans and develop new structures/models (Microsoft Office suite including Visio).
• Excellent communication skills both written and oral, together with evidence of effective interpersonal and influencing skills.
• Ability to engage key stakeholders and elicit views/carry out consultation/focus groups to inform plans.
• Ability to self-manage and deliver against deadlines, but also collaborate with members of the team and key leads in HR and Finance.
• Experience of working with local authority/children’s services desirable.
• Financial analysis and projection/experience of supporting organisational change beneficial.
• Ability to demonstrate resilience to conflicting and competing demands, and the ability to proactively and independently manage and prioritise own workload.

Qualifications:

• GCSE Maths and English or equivalent.
• Social Work qualified
• Good level of self-awareness and understanding of strengths and limitations.
• A degree in any related subject or field
• Experience of delivering on support on projects.

Additional Requirements:

• The Council has a strong commitment to achieving equality of opportunity in its services to the community and in the employment of people. It expects all employees to understand, comply with and promote its policies in their own work, and to undertake any appropriate training.
• Comply with Health and Safety Regulations associated with your employment.
• Be aware of the council’s responsibilities under the Data Protection Act 1984 for the security, accuracy and relevance of all personal data held on such systems and ensure that all processes comply with this.
• To treat all information acquired through your employment, both formally and informally, in strict confidence. There are strict rules and protocols defining employees’ access to and use of the council’s databases, any breach of which will be regarded as subject to disciplinary investigation.
• You may be required to work at any Council site.
• Demonstrate a flexible approach in the delivery of work within the service area. Consequently, the post holder may be required to perform duties not specifically identified in the job profile but which are in line with the general responsibilities of the post.

Please note that if you are NOT a passport holder of the country for the vacancy you might need a work permit.