Family Support Practitioner

London Borough of Hounslow; Hounslow; On-site; GBP 30,000 - 50,000; Full time

Job summary

Join a forward-thinking council dedicated to enhancing the lives of families in Hounslow. This role focuses on supporting vulnerable children and young people through comprehensive assessments and tailored support plans. You will work collaboratively with families and partner agencies to ensure effective interventions, promoting resilience and independence. The council values diversity and inclusion, offering a dynamic work environment where your contributions can make a significant impact. If you are passionate about safeguarding and have the skills to support families, this opportunity could be the perfect fit for you.

Qualifications

• Substantial experience working with children and families is essential.
• A social work qualification and at least 3 years of experience are required.

Responsibilities

• Support vulnerable children and families, improving their functioning and resilience.
• Conduct assessments and create support plans for families in need.

Skills

Experience with children and families

Relationship building skills

Safeguarding knowledge

Assessment and support planning

Communication skills

Organizational skills

Education

Social work qualification

3 years postgraduate experience

Job description

About Us At Hounslow

We’d love you to join us at the London Borough of Hounslow! Our people are deeply committed to providing excellent services to our residents, doing all we can to make lives as good as they can be.

We are an outstanding council, serving an outstanding borough. With brilliant, visionary leadership, a dynamic Cabinet and a can-do culture, we’ve built strong partnerships which have transformed how we serve one of London’s most diverse boroughs. Hounslow is the world in one place and full of potential. We are stepping up for our residents like never before.

About Our Commitment To Diversity And Inclusion

We live by five core values: Lead with Heart, Do New, Pass on the Power, Harness the Mix and Be a Rock. All our work has equality, diversity and inclusion at its very heart, best articulated in “Harness the Mix”. It's about breaking down barriers between our parts and people and unlocking the problem-solving power of our amazing mix of minds. We serve a diverse community, we have a diverse workforce and we are committed to being an inclusive employer.

We work hard to create representation across our workforce and leadership community, we have thriving employee network groups and our learning and development programmes help us lead, model and breathe ways of working that eliminate inequality, inequity, injustice and bias.

As part of this and under our commitments as a Disability Confident Employer, we make reasonable adjustments to accommodate our candidates. There’s space for you to tell us what you need within our application form.

Our Benefits

About The Role

To work with children and families to address multiple and complex needs, improving family functioning and resilience, reducing the need for statutory interventions.

To develop, deliver and evaluative creative, robust and outcomes led packages of intervention and support for children, young people and their families, based on whole family assessment.

To provide an integrated response to meeting the needs of parents, children and young people through collaborative working with colleagues, partner agencies, young people and their families/ carers.

To contribute to the success of Hounslow’s Families First Programme by working competently with families who meet the national Troubled Families criteria.

Key Accountabilities

1. To work effectively as part of the Council’s Safeguarding & Specialist Services, delivering corporate objectives through the work of the department.
2. To act, at all times, in line with the professional standards of conduct and performance as defined by the L.B. Hounslow Code of Conduct.
3. To participate in training ensuring own and team’s continuous professional development.
4. To work according to the council’s data protection and confidentiality standards.
5. To hold case responsibility for, manage and prioritise a caseload (approximately 12 cases), working alongside families in their homes and the community for up to six months.
6. To support families to achieve change, build resilience and reach a point where the family can function effectively independent of targeted or specialist services.
7. To support families to access and engage with mainstream services for e.g. raising awareness of services available, signposting to appropriate services, supporting families to attend appointments and meetings if needed, supporting parents to complete forms and advocating on their behalf.
8. To undertake whole family assessments in partnership with families and professionals to identify needs, risk, vulnerability and resilience factors for children and families.
9. To develop holistic, outcome-based family plans based on assessment on need.
10. To take on the role of “Lead Professional” and work as part of a “Team around the family” as appropriate, working closely with the professional network to co-ordinate plans and review progress.
11. To devise and provide 1:1 practical and emotional support programmes, based on need, to strengthen family resilience and independence, enable families to do more for themselves and solve their problems within their own social networks.
12. To deliver parenting programmes and additional group work as determined by the needs of the service.
13. To work flexibly as required to meet the needs of families, including occasional early morning and evening working.
14. To very occasionally undertake specific, time limited, pre-planned weekend work by arrangement with the line manager and in circumstances where the necessary intervention cannot reasonably take place during the week (for example, attending a Family Group Conference).
15. To participate in a rota system for screening referrals to the service as required, consistently applying thresholds and signposting to alternative provisions where appropriate.
16. To work within the Troubled Families framework by undertaking whole family assessments, implementing plans and providing evidence of sustained and significant progress in line with the Hounslow Families First Outcome Plan.
17. To work within the Local Authority’s agreed policies and procedures for sharing information, reporting concerns and liaising with colleagues within the service.
18. To keep up to date records of assessments, plans and work undertaken and provide written reports which are concise, informative and evidence based.
19. Prepare reports and actively contribute to the plan of action resulting from attendance at Child Protection Conferences, Core Group and Child in Need meetings.
20. To use regular supervision, training opportunities and team meetings to reflect on and ensure safe practice, develop good communication skills for working with children, young people and families and therapeutic skills.
21. To develop an area of specialism and expertise in line with service needs for e.g. this could be around domestic violence, neglect, parental mental health, substance misuse, child sexual exploitation or sexually harmful behaviour.

About The Team You’ll Be Working In

This role is placed in Family Help Team.

About You

1. Your primary focus will be supporting vulnerable children and young people in the London Borough of Hounslow.
2. As a Family Support Practitioner, you'll ensuring that support is provided to those who are most in need. You will be responsible for assessing people's support needs, and signposting those who are not eligible for support to other organisations for assistance.

Do you think you have what it takes?

Your Skills

1. Substantial experience working with children, young people and their families.
2. Relationship building and direct work skills.
3. An enthusiasm and passion for the safeguarding of children and young people.
4. Ability to deliver high quality assessments, support plans and reports and first-class communication and organisation skills.

Professional Qualifications

1. You should hold a social work qualification and preferably have at least 3 years postgraduate experience through employment.

Essential For The Role

1. DBS – Enhanced (3 years) with children barred list check.

We value diversity in its broadest sense. We're committed to creating an inclusive culture where everyone is able to be themselves, give their best and reach their full potential. We believe that a diverse workforce helps us to better understand our communities and deliver the best services for our residents. We want to receive applications from all regardless of age, gender identity, disability, marriage or civil partnership, pregnancy or maternity, religion or belief, race or ethnic origin, sex, sexual orientation, transgender status or social economic background. We want to harness the mix and ensure that everybody can apply and be part of our recruitment processes. We will therefore make reasonable adjustments to accommodate our candidates.

This post is considered by the authority to be a customer-facing position; as such it falls within scope of the Code of Practice on English language requirement for public sector workers. The council therefore has a statutory duty under Part 7 of the Immigration Act 2016 to ensure that post holders have a command of spoken English sufficient for the effective performance of the job requirements.

When Interviews Will Be Held And Who To Contact

The key information you need about the role should be in the Role Profile, but if you have any further questions about the role, please contact:
Email:[e-mail]

Interviews for this job will be held during week commencing 28th April 2025.

(Internal Candidates: please seek line manager approval before applying for this role as secondment.)