Experienced Social Workers - Children's Services

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SOCIAL WORKERS AND SENIOR SOCIAL WORKERS

Join us and help build a Fairer Newham

As part of our commitment to building a Fairer Newham we are reimagining the way that we serve the families that we support. We are realising positive change by combining our Assessment and Intervention social work services into our new Family Support and Safeguarding Service.

This new service will enhance the family led, relational values that are already at the centre of our practice and will continue the evolution of our firmly embedded Circles of Support practice model. We’re keeping children at the heart of everything we do whilst improving the overall experience of the families, partners, and social workers in our sphere. We want to be at the forefront of evoking positive change in the sector and we’re looking for experienced, committed, relational social workers to join us and help us get there. Above all, we want to do the best for Newham’s children and families.

Why are we making these changes to the way we support our children and families?

• Our children, young people and families have told us time and time again that having to retell their story to multiple social workers is exhausting – so we have listened. The new service will enable the same practitioner to build a relationship with the family from initial contact and assessment until we reach the best and safest outcome for the child.
• This consistency in support provides a relational opportunity to work in a genuine partnership with families as they develop meaningful plans from the outset, with a social worker they know and trust.
• We anticipate that in time the new service model will continue to strengthen the stability of our social care workforce, made up of practitioners who are dedicated to making a lasting difference to the families they work with and building a Fairer Newham.
• We envisage that the streamlined support and accurate assessments that a single practitioner will make whilst supporting the family through the social care system will help families earlier and before crisis.

What will the Family Support and Safeguarding (FSS) service look like?

The FSS service consists of four services and twenty teams, supporting families from first point of contact and assessment and throughout any subsequent longer term intervention (e.g. referral to partners, CP, CiN) until the best, safest outcome is for the child is attained. Two of these teams will work exclusively with children and families whose lives are influenced by disability or SEND to ensure that we retain the expertise necessary to support these families. Where proceedings are necessary court work is moved on to our Children in Care service.

Social workers in the FSS service are caseholding and will be on duty 1 week in 16; we hope this will be a welcome change for social workers who are used to busy assessment services, and a positive CPD opportunity for practitioners whose experience is mainly in longer term work. We have appointed an additional duty manager to support colleagues for the first few months of the service to ensure implementation is smooth. There will also be CPD opportunities for senior social workers to line manage and support lesser experienced colleagues, students, and NQSWs; bridging the gap between family facing practice and management whilst enhancing their CVs.

Who are we looking for to join us?

We’re looking for conscientious, considerate and empathetic social workers who are committed to working relationally with families whilst putting every child’s welfare, potential, and future at the heart of their work. Newham is committed to our workforce being representative of the families we work with, to enhance cultural competence and adjust our practice to suit the individuals we serve. We are looking for colleagues who share our values and are passionate about tackling disproportionality wherever they find it and building a Fairer Newham.

You will have a genuine interest in a restorative, relationship based practice model, drawing on systemic thinking to inform your approach to building effective relationships with children, families and communities. We’d love to hear from social workers who are keen on learning and growing with us over a number of years and as an employer we’ve been working hard to provide the development our practitioners need and want. Our Academy offer has been commended by Ofsted and we promoted 38 internal colleagues in children’s social care in 2024.

We are looking to work with qualified, registered social workers who have experience in either assessment or long term work with families. The most important thing for us is that our social workers are dedicated to securing the best and safest outcomes for our children.

If you share our values please submit an application via the Newham Council website