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We are thrilled to announce that in 2024 Ofsted assessed our services as 'Good' in all areas and acknowledged that the pace of progress over the last few years has seen fantastic improvements for services for children in need of help, care and support. A stable senior leadership team, increased investment, strengthened partner agency working and a whole council approach to children, means that we are actively supporting the lives of children and young people in South Gloucestershire. We are delighted with the Ofsted outcome, but recognise that there can always be improvements, and as a senior leader you will make a difference and play a pivotal role in both maintaining and striving to build on our existing practice and performance.Scroll down for a complete overview of what this job will require Are you the right candidate for this opportunityWhat you will be doingFirst and foremost, you will maintain and improve on the work that has already taken place to improve our services, reviewing the steps already taken and implementing strategies to maintain performance and further improve.You will have accountability for the leadership of services to improve outcomes for all children and young people living in South Gloucestershire. Specifically, you will be expected to ensure that the council provides a consistently good quality service that protects and promotes the safety and wellbeing of children, particularly those most at risk of harm or poor outcomes.Directing, leading and determining service delivery, you will agree a strategy and operational provision to meet the full range of children's and young people's needs, ensuring services are within national and local performance and regulatory standards.You will lead your team through the government's proposals to reform children's social care, embedding new ways of working and best practice. You must have a full, valid driving licence with regular access to a vehicle or have an alternative means of travel.We are expanding our frontline teams, creating 60 new roles, which will mean consistently lower caseloads for our social workers, enabling them to deliver genuinely child-centred support.We're making it easier for staff to work flexibly, enabling them to work how and where they need to do their jobs as well as they can.We're strengthening our reward offer to recognise the fantastic job our staff do.We're adopting clinical supervision to support staff because we recognise that our work can be tough emotionally, helping staff to develop critical thinking skills and support their work with families.We're building early intervention partnership capacity, achieving better results for families through effective multi-agency working.We're increasing our investment in evidence-based specialist expertise and capabilities, including specialist trauma support and an in-house psychologist to support families.We're introducing new initiatives like the Mockingbird extended family model in fostering, a Caring Dads scheme, and a new approach to domestic abuse.We're enhancing our already exceptional training and development offer with a new systemic practice academy focused on relationship-based social work.We're investing in our systems and processes to support our work effectively.These investments demonstrate our absolute focus on providing an excellent, family-centred service. We keep workloads manageable, welcome flexible working, and are recognized for the opportunities we provide for career development, training, and secondment.Our commitments to youUnmatched training, development and secondment opportunitiesA proactive team with supportive managementCommitment to excellenceRealistic caseloadsFlexible working opportunitiesA comprehensive Assessed and Supported Year in Employment (ASYE) programmeSouth Gloucestershire offers a rich mix of stunning countryside and urban culture. It is conveniently located near the M4, M5, and M32, making it an easy commute from Bristol, Bath, Gloucestershire, Wiltshire, Oxfordshire, Somerset, and south Wales.Minimum RequirementsYou will have a professional accreditation or equivalent working knowledge with proven experience and be a qualified and registered social worker.It is important to us that you are aligned with our values and behaviours, especially those under 'Leading Others', where we require you to direct and support those with line management responsibilities to deliver results.Experienced in creating a vision and plans, you will enable managers to transform services, motivating them to improve delivery for children in need of help, care, and support.It is essential that you have experience of creating strategies, providing realistic long-term objectives and targets against national policy and frameworks, and creating an environment where people have stretching but achievable workloads.You can drive improvements for children and families, supporting innovation and consulting with stakeholders to make complex, long-term decisions that shape services.We require you to establish and maintain a positive culture where your managers feel able to support performance and challenge ineffectiveness to improve best practice.At South Gloucestershire Council, we'll support you at every moment. As part of our benefits package, you will receive generous annual leave (pro rata), employee wellbeing support, and access to a range of staff discounts, including eye tests, travel, shopping, and leisure activities.We recognize that our diverse team of skilled and dedicated people makes us a great place to work. We welcome applications from everyone and ensure that individuals are selected, promoted, and developed based on their merits and abilities.Our teams at South Gloucestershire Council are making a real difference to the lives of people who live, work, and learn here. We're building and shaping communities which people are proud of, working with the most vulnerable in our community to help them achieve their goals, and investing in our schools to ensure every child and young person in South Gloucestershire achieves their full potential.We've achieved a great deal, but we need talented and dedicated people to ensure we continue to make a difference.#J-18808-Ljbffr