Head of Service - Corporate Parenting

We are excited to announce an opportunity at Cambridgeshire County Council for a Head of Service in our Corporate Parenting Service. This is a key leadership role that will directly impact the lives of children and young people in care, as we continue our journey of improvement. Following our last inspection in March 2024, which was graded as Requires Improvement to be Good, we are seeking a passionate and experienced individual to help us achieve our goal of an outstanding service at the next inspection.

As Head of Service, you will lead the operational delivery of the Children in Care and the Leaving Care services. You will bring a strong understanding of care planning, along with the legislation governing care leavers, and the new requirements for care leavers’ separate judgement under the Children’s ILACS Inspection. There has been incredible pace in driving improvement in the service and we are looking for someone who can continue taking the service forward.

This is a great opportunity for someone who is committed to improving outcomes for children and young people and who can bring vision, leadership, and dedication to ensure their needs remain at the heart of all we do.

We offer flexible work base location options across Cambridgeshire, providing an excellent opportunity for a balanced work-life arrangement, along with the support and supervision you need to succeed in this challenging yet rewarding role.

If you have the ambition and expertise to lead this vital service and want to make a lasting difference, we’d love to hear from you.

For an informal discussion please contact Service Director, Ranjit.Chambers@cambridgeshire.gov.uk

Interviews will be held in person on 13th December 2024.

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.

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
• 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.

You will become part of a fresh and energetic team with an ambitious commitment to the children and families we support. We know we need to improve and are confident we can deliver the changes, but we can’t do it without you.

By joining us you will be supported personally and professionally to deliver in this key role. Enabling you to provide leadership to children’s social care delivery teams ensuring a high standard of practice, taking key operational decisions to improve the outcomes for the children and families of Cambridgeshire.

You will hold statutory duties and work across the system with partners to deliver the best outcome possible for Cambridgeshire’s children and young people.

You will be a qualified social worker with current Social Work England registration, and a post-graduate management qualification.

You will have comprehensive knowledge and experience of operational safeguarding children services and corporate parenting. You must be confident to lead with compassion but be able to deliver creative and innovative solutions.

You must have a solid understanding of the issues and challenges faced by local government and the skills to establish and sustain positive relationships across the system building trust and confidence.

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 Employer. 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. Some examples of adjustments 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.

http://www.cambridgeshire.gov.uk/council/jobs-and-careers