Lead Principal Practioner Psychologist AOT/GRIP

Gloucestershire Health and Care; Gloucester; On-site; GBP 67,000 - 77,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

NHS pension

27 days leave + bank holidays

Training and development opportunities

Cycle to Work scheme

Job summary

Gloucestershire Health and Care NHS Foundation Trust (GHC) is seeking a dynamic practitioner psychologist to join adult mental health services in Gloucester. You will lead psychological care across community teams, providing expert assessment, formulation and supervision within multidisciplinary teams.

The role drives service development, quality improvement and teaching, with responsibility for supervising other psychologists, assistants and trainees and advancing psychosis pathways across

Qualifications

• HCPC registration or eligibility to practice in the UK.
• CBT-Psychosis and Family Therapy qualifications are desirable.
• Experience working with adults with psychosis in AMH MDT settings.

Responsibilities

• Provide specialist psychological formulation, assessment and direct care within MDTs.
• Offer supervision, reflective practice and consultation to colleagues and teams.
• Lead workstreams on psychological approaches to care, especially psychosis pathways.
• Line manage and support other psychological professionals, assistants and trainees.

Skills

Leadership

Supervision

MDT work

Psychological assessment

Education

HCPC registration

Job description

Band 8b

Main area Adult Mental Health Grade Band 8b Contract Permanent Hours Full time - 37.5 hours per week Job ref 327-26-881

Site Pullman Place Town Gloucester Salary £66,582 - £77,368 per annum Salary period Yearly Closing 07/12/2026 23:59 Interview date 15/12/2026

We love what we do and we think you will, too!

At Gloucestershire Health and Care NHS Foundation Trust (GHC), we provide joined-up mental health, physical health and learning disability services to people of all ages across Gloucestershire. We run community hospitals and provide care and support in people’s own homes and in a range of other locations across the county.

We are on a mission to enable people to live the best life they can and we have a vision to work together to provide outstanding care. We put people at the heart of our services, focusing on personalised care by asking ‘what matters to you ’.

We’re passionate about making sure that everyone can contribute to achieving our mission and w e are continually working to support healthy and happy high-quality team s in all areas of the Trust.

Our application process aims to understand each candidates knowledge, skills and experience. We have found that candidates that use AI to generate their answers can lack specificity and fail to address key criteria outlined in the job description.

It is really important to personalise your application to convey your individual skills, knowledge, and experiences effectively and for us to understand why you are applying for this role with GHC. We discourage over reliance on AI-generated applications as it will lessen your chances of success in securing an interview with us.

Job overview

We are looking for a dynamic skilled and experienced practitioner psychologist to join our mental health service working with adults with psychosis. This is an exciting time to be joining the Trust as we are looking at improving our services for people experiencing psychosis and bipolar disorder and expanding the psychological provision in our teams.

Working across a number of community teams you will provide expertise in both direct clinical work and leadership/supervision of teams in psychological approaches to care.

This is a key clinical leadership role, working within teams and responsible for continuing to drive and embed the significant work already undertaken to develop services for people with psychosis across Gloucestershire.

The post holder will be responsible for providing highly-specialist advice and consultancy to staff, teams, and patients with direct responsibility for the provision of psychological services within the teams, including supervision of other psychological professionals including assistants and trainees. They will also have a key role to play in service development and quality improvement across care pathways.

Main duties of the job

This role covers teams based in Gloucester, Cheltenham and across the county. All reasonable flexible working requests will be considered, but the post holder will be expected to work across sites in line with service need.

Our specialist mental health services work with adults with severe mental health problems. About 60% of the people we work with have experienced psychosis, and we aim to provide psychologically and trauma informed care and evidence based interventions including CBT-P and Family Therapy.

In this role you will:

• Work as part of MDT's providing specialist psychological formulation, assessment and direct care.
• Provide supervision, reflective practice and consultation/advice to colleagues and teams,
• Contribute to quality improvement and service development, including research and development activities such as teaching.
• Leading workstreams on psychological approaches to care, and specifically working as a part of our developing psychosis pathways
• Line manage, supervise and support other psychological professionals, assistants and trainees.

The qualification, training & experience requirements for the role are underlined in the Job Description/Person Specification.

Working for our organisation

We have a skilled and dedicated workforce of over 5000 colleagues working in a diverse range of services over 55 sites and within people’s homes. We strive to enable a welcoming workplace culture that builds and celebrates civility, inclusivity and diversity, while providing a sense of belonging and trust.

Annual staff surveys, regular Pulse surveys and other engagement opportunities provide our people with lots of opportunity to tell us about their experiences of working with us. In the latest staff survey, 61% of colleagues gave us their views. It was great to hear that:

• 72% of colleagues would recommend the Trust as a place to work, ranking us 1st for Provider Trusts in the South West region on this question.
• 76% would recommend the standard of care provided in our services if a friend or relative needed treatment, also ranking us 1st in the South West region.
• 81% said that care of patients and service users is the Trust’s priority, compared with an average in comparable NHS Trusts in England of 64%.

This high-level overview shows we are in a healthy position, with higher scores than average for comparable organisations, alongside a great response rate, indicating good staff engagement. However, we also know we have plenty of room for improvement in many areas. To that end, we continue to prioritise and invest in our commitment to genuinely becoming a Great Place to Work with consistent top-quartile performance in the annual staff survey and Pulse surveys.

Detailed job description and main responsibilities

For the main duties and responsibilities for this role please read the attached job description and person specification. When completing your application please ensure your supporting statement reflects the criteria set out in these documents by showing how your experience and skills apply to this post.

Please read the job description and person specification carefully before making your application, in particular the requirements about professional registration, experience and qualifications in therapy modes.

To support compliance with UK immigration requirements, all applicants who require a visa to work in the UK must disclose their visa history in full. This includes current and previous sponsors, dates of sponsorship, visa category, and any changes of employment. If you are on a Graduate or Dependant Visa, please disclose the expiry date on your application. Incomplete information may mean we are unable to consider your application.

Person specification

Qualifications

• HCPC or other appropriate professional registration
• CBT-Psychosis / Family Therapy Qualifications (0-1-2)

Experience

• Working with client group adults smhp psychosis
• experience of working in AMH MDT
• Experience of being care coordinator
• Experience of working at highly specialist level

Skills

• Hold driving license
• Ability to participate in all mandatory and statutory training

When joining us, as well as becoming part of a team that makes a difference, we also offer:

• Free car parking at many of our sites
• 27 days leave plus bank holidays, increasing up to 33 days with long service
• A broad range of training and development opportunities, including apprenticeships up to Level 7 qualification.
• A multi-professional preceptorship programme for all Newly Qualified; Nurses, Nursing Associates, Internationally Educated Practitioners, Allied Health Professionals and Return to Practice Practitioners.
• Generous NHS pension and enhanced pay when if you work unsocial hours
• Flexible, family friendly and agile working opportunities
• Recognition and long service awards
• Fast Track physiotherapy
• Access to discounts and salary sacrifice schemes; including Cycle to Work, Car scheme and discounts on travel, leisure and retailers.

If you are aged 16-30, you may be eligible for financial and pastoral support from the King’s Trust, with whom we are in partnership with to support your first 6 months in role. We will pass on your details to the King’s Trust who will be in touch with you if you are eligible. If you would rather not be contacted, please let us know.

Employer certification / accreditation badges

You must have appropriate UK professional registration.

This post is subject to the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974 (Exceptions) Order 1975 (Amendment) (England and Wales) Order 2020 and it will be necessary for a submission for Disclosure to be made to the Disclosure and Barring Service.

Name Dr Jake Bowley Job title Lead for Working Age Adult Psychological Services Email address [e-mail] Telephone number 07887 521168 Additional information

An alternate point of contact is 0300 421 3436