Head of Acute Services H&F in London

West London NHS Trust provides a full range of mental health, community and physical healthcare services for children, adults and older people living in the London boroughs of Ealing, Hammersmith & Fulham and Hounslow. We also provide some specialist services that are commissioned regionally, such as our medium secure services; and nationally, such as the Cassel Hospital for people with complex and severe personality disorder and our high secure services at Broadmoor Hospital.

An exciting opportunity has arisen for an exceptional and highly experienced candidate to operationally manage our acute mental health services at Claybrook Centre in H&F. This is a full-time position with operational responsibility for the 3 acute mental health inpatient wards, one male Psychiatric Intensive Care Unit (PICU), the Health Based Place of Safety and the H&F Crisis Assessment Home Treatment Team located on site. This role comes at an exciting time when we have the development of new services and are working on piloting a number of improvement initiatives across the borough. Your role will be pivotal in the development and implementation of these transformation initiatives. Additionally, you will provide leadership and support embedding these new initiatives in practice. The successful candidate will have a positive and enthusiastic attitude with a focus on team working and collaboration. You will have extensive clinical expertise and a proven track record of effective people management. You will also need to demonstrate a sound understanding of crisis, community and acute services and the wider landscape across systems. The Borough Senior Management Team is a well-functioning and cohesive team with a positive and caring approach. The successful candidate should expect to be well supported with a robust development plan.

Main duties of the job:

• To provide strong operational management and leadership to the Matrons, and inpatient ward managers and multi-disciplinary teams in the inpatient unit.
• To support & deputise for the Associate Director.
• To support the AD to deliver financial balance within the portfolio and the wider Service Line.
• To support the Associate Director in leading locally the service developments within the Local Services Transformation plan which includes the crisis alternatives.
• To support the associate Director to ensure delivery of key metrics within the portfolio, and other agreed outcomes to support business as usual.
• Be accountable for overall standards of nursing practice which aims to improve the experience and outcomes for service users.
• Ensure that clinical governance mechanisms are in place, driven at a local level, ensuring lessons are learnt and experience informs ‘best practice’.
• To communicate effectively with all staff, recognising the need for good information during periods of change.

At all times supporting the Trust and where relevant Local Authority’s reputation and that of all senior colleagues, maintaining a positive attitude with strong commitment to results.

Person specification:

• Qualifications: Professional Qualification, Evidence of up-to-date personal development, NMC Registration, Masters or equivalent.
• Experience: Substantial experience managing mental health nursing and Mental health care at 8b or above, Substantial experience in adult/older people or CAMHS services, Experience of the development of good relationships across a range of multi-disciplinary key stakeholders, Ability to lead and embed substantial change, Experience of working with staff side colleagues to promote good working relations, Experience of dealing with risk management both organisational and clinical, Ability to work in complex situations and successfully problem solve both proactively, as well as reactively, Experience of preparing papers and presenting to Board, Experience of leading change management projects.
• Knowledge: Knowledge of the mental health system, policy at national strategic level, Knowledge of key legislation that relates to the delivery of mental health services, Knowledge of commissioning – the split between CCG and other commissioning roles, Good understanding of key deliverables in the contract, Knowledge of Business Intelligence and how to be used to support front line services, Good knowledge of governance processes and what ‘good’ looks like, Good range of IT skills.
• Skills: Communication skills both verbal as well as other skills, Good knowledge on how to communicate a volume of information to a large group of staff, Ability to communicate & negotiate in complex & crisis situations, Be able to analyse information from different sources and distill effectively into a concise narrative for verbal and written uses, Be able to work systematically in a proactive way as well as to respond quickly when crisis management needed, Good people and business management skills, Ability to work without supervision within an accountability framework.
• Other Requirements: A well-developed team player, High degree of motivation and commitment to the organisation, Flexible and focused, Ability to see the bigger picture as well as the local picture at any one time, Honesty and integrity.

As an employee of West London NHS Trust, you have a responsibility to maintain a sound understanding of, and a commitment to uphold the National Health Service values and principles set out in the NHS Constitution.