Lived Experience Support Worker, Ref:0190ZS

We Are With You; Bournemouth; On-site; GBP 24,000 - 29,000; Full time

Job summary

We Are With You in Bournemouth is recruiting a Lived Experience Support Worker to join our community drug and alcohol service. Based at the Station Approach office, you will use your own lived experience to support clients on their recovery journey.

You will work with Recovery Workers to encourage service use, assist with outreach, harm reduction, and structured interventions, and you may need to disclose personal experiences in a professional, supportive manner.

Qualifications

• Must have lived experience of drugs or alcohol and be willing to use it to help others
• Ability to build trusting relationships with clients and professionals
• Experience (voluntary or paid) in health and social care or clear motivation to apply

Responsibilities

• Based at the Station Approach office in Bournemouth.
• Use your lived experience to engage and support clients on their recovery journey.
• Work with Recovery Workers, supporting outreach, harm reduction, and structured interventions.

Skills

Lived experience

Empathy

Communication

Job description

Lived Experience Support Worker, Ref:0190ZS

Join our team as a Lived Experience Support Worker in Bournemouth.

Are you a compassionate and motivated individual who wants to change peoples lives? Our Bournemouth Community Drug and Alcohol service is looking for a Lived Experience Support Worker to join them in providing high quality recovery care to a diverse client group. If you are looking for a role where you can connect with and support people who are using drugs or alcohol using your own lived experience, and are passionate about changing peoples lives for the better, wed love to hear from you.

As a Lived Experience Support Worker in BCP youll join us on a salary of £26,250 per annum pro rata. This role is a full time (37.5 hours) fixed term contract for 12 months.

Youll be part of a dedicated local team supporting people across our communities to make positive, lasting changes. At WithYou, were committed to supporting our staff just as much as the people we work alongside. Youll have access to a supportive and inclusive team environment and a range of wellbeing benefits to help you thrive both professionally and personally.

Please note that having experienced your own journey with drugs or alcohol and being willing to use that experience to help others is essential for this position.

The closing date for applications is 17th November 2026. Please note: This role may close earlier than the stated deadline if we receive a high volume of applications.

Main duties of the job

We are looking for a Lived Experience Support Worker to join our team. You will be based at our Station Approach office in Bournemouth. This role is suitable only for candidates who have had personal lived experience of drug and alcohol issues and who are willing to draw on this experience in their day to day work. This is likely to involve disclosure of this personal experience.

We are part of a large integrated drug and alcohol service working with some of Bournemouth's most excluded and disadvantaged people.

The successful candidate will work alongside Recovery Workers, using your knowledge and experience to encourage people to use the service and support them when they are not, working with individuals to achieve their goals. Using your lived experience, you will support our clients with their journey either into recovery or maintaining their recovery.

Our Lived Experience Support Workers are an active and integral part of our teams, bringing ideas and solutions so we can develop and improve our recovery communities and helping our clients to get onto the path to recovery. In your role, you will reach people through outreach, harm reduction, structured interventions and activities and will show through your own experience, knowledge and learning that change is possible.

About us

As an organisation, we continue to build an inclusive culture that encourages, supports and celebrates the diverse voices and experiences of our staff. We know that representing the communities we serve is key to us meeting our vision of a future where everyone lives a life free from the harm associated with drugs and alcohol. We welcome the unique contributions that you can bring and we encourage people from underrepresented communities and backgrounds to apply to join our team, including people with lived experience, people with disabilities, people from racialised communities, LGBTQ+ people, people of all ages and armed forces veterans.

As part of our commitment to the Armed Forces Covenant we provide a guaranteed interview scheme for candidates that are veterans and meet all the essential criteria for a role. With You is also a Disability Confident Employer and we offer a guaranteed interview scheme for candidates with a disability and meet all the essential criteria for a role.

If you have a disability, a learning difficulty such as dyslexia or a medical condition which you believe may affect your performance during any aspect of our selection process, well be happy to make reasonable adjustments to enable you to perform at your best.

Please note that you will be required to provide 3 years worth of references and where applicable, undergo an enhanced DBS check, to be considered for a role at WithYou.

Please review our recruitment FAQs before submitting your application.

Job responsibilities

Please see the linked job description and person specification for more information on the role and its responsibilities.

Person Specification

Experience

• We're looking for a compassionate and motivated individual, with an exceptional ability to build meaningful relationships:
• You will have been on your own journey with drugs or alcohol.
• You will have relevant experience (voluntary or paid) in the health and social care sector and/or clear motivations for applying.
• You will be able to develop relationships of trust whilst maintaining professional boundaries.
• Ability to work effectively with people regardless of their backgrounds.
• You will have the ability to be part of a team and also be able to use your own initiative and work alone.
• Ability to build effective relationships with colleagues and other agencies.
• 12 months not in treatment and 24 months away from problematic substance misuse.
• Willingness to use personal experience to engage and motivate service users.
• Above all, we are looking for someone who is passionate about what we do and has a positive and engaging approach to our clients and key stakeholders.

Disclosure and Barring Service Check

This post is subject to the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act (Exceptions Order) 1975 and as such it will be necessary for a submission for Disclosure to be made to the Disclosure and Barring Service (formerly known as CRB) to check for any previous criminal convictions.