Assistant Director Improvement

Gloucestershire County Council; Gloucester; Hybrid; GBP 89,000 - 98,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Flexible and agile working

30 days annual leave

LGPS

Employee Assistance Programme (EAP)

Occupational Health service

Cycle to Work scheme

Green Car Salary Sacrifice Scheme

Employee discount scheme

Job summary

Gloucestershire County Council is seeking an Assistant Director for Children's Improvement and Transformation on a fixed-term cover basis. You will lead cross‑county programmes to improve outcomes for children and families, bringing strategic leadership for a broad change agenda across SEND, education and social care.

Working with the Executive Director and senior colleagues, you will drive sustainable, evidence-based improvement, empower teams, and ensure services remain inspection-ready and

Qualifications

• Senior leader with expertise in children's social care, SEND or education services.

Responsibilities

• Lead countywide programmes to improve services for children and families.
• Act as strategic lead for improvement and transformation across major programmes.
• Empower leaders, strengthen partnerships, and ensure inspection-ready services.

Skills

Leadership

Change management

Stakeholder engagement

Job description

We are now seeking a new Assistant Director for Children's Improvement and Transformation, on a fixed-term cover basis, who will play a central role in shaping the future of services for children and families across Gloucestershire. This is an exceptional opportunity for a senior leader with expertise in children's social care, SEND or education services, and a passion for driving sustainable, evidence based improvement. You'll lead countywide programmes that strengthen practice, accelerate our improvement journey, and embed a culture of high performance and continuous learning. Working closely with the Executive Director for Children's Services and the senior leadership team, you will help us deliver better outcomes, better experiences and better life chances for the children and young people who need us most. As the strategic lead for improvement and transformation, you'll bring clarity, ambition and system-wide leadership to complex change programmes, most notably leading the Families First Partnership Programme and working across our wider transformation programmes contributing to Best Start in Life, SEND Reform and fostering and sufficiency agendas. You will empower leaders and teams, strengthen partnership working, and ensure our services are inspection-ready, resilient and delivering excellent practice every day. You would be joining Gloucestershire at an exciting time in our transformation journey with our Families First reforms going live imminently and our work to develop the SEND reform plans embedding at speed. You will lead a multi-disciplinary team focused on supporting Gloucestershire to realise the benefits of these programmes and drive outcomes for children in the county. This is a role for someone who thrives in complexity, builds strong and trusting relationships, and brings energy, courage and inclusive leadership to a fast-moving environment. If you are motivated by making a tangible difference, committed to fairness and equality, and ready to help shape a service that truly reflects our aspirations for Gloucestershire's children, we'd love to hear from you.

We want to be an employer of choice, attracting and retaining excellent people to work for us, so that we can best serve all of Gloucestershire's diverse communities. Our promise to you is that we will provide an inclusive and supportive working environment that enables you to bring your whole self to work and realise your full potential. It is a legal requirement, under the Immigration Act 2016, that anyone appointed to a 'customer facing role' must be able to demonstrate an ability to fulfil all spoken aspects of the role with confidence in fluent English. Hybrid working arrangements are available for the majority of our roles, giving teams the opportunity to work in a way that suits them, balancing service need and individual choice, with a mix of both remote and office working.

• between £88,671 - £97,706 per annum subject to experience
• flexible and agile working
• 30 days annual leave
• family friendly policies and benefits to help support you and your family
• Local Government Pension Scheme (LGPS)
• access to our Employee Assistance Programme (EAP) that provides free, confidential, counselling and advice for employees, available 24 hours a day, online and by telephone
• an in-house Occupational Health service
• employee discount scheme
• Cycle to Work scheme (eligibility criteria and t&cs apply)
• Green Car Salary Sacrifice Scheme (eligibility criteria and t&cs apply)