Intensive Adolescent Support Worker

Kirklees Metropolitan Council; Wigan; On-site; GBP 31,000 - 34,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Exclusive rewards and benefits

Job summary

Wigan Council is seeking an Intensive Adolescent Support Worker to work with adolescents and families across the borough, delivering trauma-informed, direct work; the role focuses on preventing family breakdown and improving safety and wellbeing.

You will collaborate with the Staying Together Team within the REACH adolescent safeguarding service, travel across the borough, and report to professionals in multi-agency meetings, including flexible hours and weekend work.

Qualifications

• Excellent communication and engagement skills with adolescents and families.
• Flexibility in working week including mornings, evenings and weekends in a team rota.
• Ability to work with children, young people and adults who may be resistant or challenging.
• Understanding of contextual safeguarding, adolescent development and trauma.
• Able to produce accurate written reports and attend multi-agency meetings.
• Ability to travel across the borough with own car and full driving licence.

Responsibilities

• Provide immediate, flexible and responsive range of interventions based on trauma-informed approaches.
• Deliver tailored direct work packages for young people and their families.
• Build relationships quickly and provide calm, purposeful support to strengthen parenting capacity.
• Develop practical strategies that support positive change in complex family situations.

Job description

We’re on a journey to build a workforce reflective of our Borough.

We are committed to fostering diverse teams where everybody can bring their authentic selves to work and feel that they belong. If you want to work for a Council where everybody is encouraged to meet their full potential and make a difference in our neighbourhoods, we would love to hear from you!

Your role:

Are you passionate about making a real difference in the lives of children, young people and their families?

We are looking for a skilled and compassionate support worker to join our high performing Staying Together Team.

As an Intensive Adolescent Support Worker, you will work intensively with adolescents and families across the borough that have an allocated social worker and are experiencing family breakdown and complex harms that are impacting on their safety and wellbeing and leaving them vulnerable to entering care.

You will provide an immediate, highly flexible and responsive range of interventions, incorporating tailored direct work packages for young people and their families based on trauma informed and trusted relationship evidence-based approaches.

You will build relationships quickly, provide calm and purposeful support, strengthen parenting capacity and develop practical strategies that support positive change.

If you are resilient, relational, creative and confident working in complex family situations, we would love to hear from you.

This will be delivered from family homes, within the local community and workplaces to improve the quality of family life and prevent family breakdown.

About you:

We are seeking enthusiastic applicants for the Staying Together Team as part of our wider REACH adolescent safeguarding service who have excellent communication and engagement skills with adolescents and families. You will have flexibility in your working week including being part of a team shift pattern rota, around mornings, evening and weekend working.

You will have the essential skills in working with children, young people and adults who may present as resistant or challenging and be able to maintain a resilient, calm and ‘can do’ approach.

Have a good understanding of contextual safeguarding, adolescent development and the potential impact of trauma and adverse childhood experiences on adolescent safety, wellbeing and family functioning.

Be able to produce accurate written reports and attend professional multi-agency meetings. Be able to travel across the borough and transport children and young people when required, including having your own car and a full driving licence.

About us:

This is a unique opportunity to work with a skilled, motivated and dedicated workforce, who are passionate about getting it right and ensuring that adolescents have every opportunity to thrive and reach their full potential.

The Reach service is part of Children Services, it aims to improve the lives of young people and their families particularly where there are extra familial safeguarding concerns, risk of/or offending behaviour and risk of entering the care system.

Our culture is inclusive, where people are encouraged to be curious, creative and bring their own ideas. We learn from each other and are committed to making a meaningful difference to families.

You will benefit from quality training, regular supervision and opportunities to develop your practice.

The Progress with Unity plan is a place movement for change for the next decade, bringing a new era for Wigan Borough. It draws on the strengths of our individual organisations, recognising that together we can achieve much more for our communities by delivering on our 2 place missions; create fair opportunities for all children, families, residents and businesses and make our towns and neighbourhoods flourish for those who live and work in them.

Here at Wigan, we are proud to support flexible working patterns, when the service can accommodate this. We also take a blended approach to where we work, depending on the work we do. This may include working from home, the office, or the community. We like to thank our employees for their hard work and commitment by giving them the opportunity to access a range of exclusive rewards and benefits click here to find out more about working for #TeamWigan.

Wigan Council prides itself on equality, inclusion and promoting diversity within the borough and aims to recruit a workforce that reflects our diverse communities. We invest in training and developing our staff, in a positive learning environment, and aim to be a consciously inclusive employer. We welcome applications from everybody in the community and would particularly encourage applicants from our underrepresented groups to apply. At Wigan, it is really important to us that applicants demonstrate our Team Wigan behaviours, and we do all we can to make sure that everyone feels like they belong. We have guidance in place to ensure that all applicants are treated fair and consistently at every stage of the recruitment process.

To be appointed to this role you must be able to prove your right to work in the UK, and you must maintain a valid (active) right to work. Please note, at present we are not a licenced sponsor. Please visit the link below to check you qualify to apply. Prove your right to work to an employer: Overview – GOV.UK www.gov.uk Prove your right to work to an employer

Wigan Council is committed to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children, young people, and vulnerable adults, and expects all employees, workers and volunteers to share this commitment. Safeguarding is everyone’s responsibility. As part of this commitment, Wigan Council operates robust Safer Recruitment procedures

For further information, please contact Cathy Morley at [e-mail] or on 07917 263925

Interview dates:

20th and 21st October 2026

Company: Wigan Council

Salary: Grade 6, £30,515 – £33,673 per annum

Location: Wigan, Greater Manchester

Sector: Health and Social Care

Sector: Family Services

Job Role: Support Worker