Service Lead

ABL Health Ltd; England; On-site; GBP 65,000 - 90,000; Full time

Job summary

ABL Health is seeking a Service Lead for the Kent Specialist Stop Smoking Outreach Service. You will provide day-to-day leadership to Specialist Stop Smoking Advisors and an Administrator, ensuring evidence-based tobacco dependency interventions across Kent and the CoSTED Programme.

You will shape service planning, governance and continuous improvement, working with clinical leads and the data team to monitor KPIs, support referrals, and deliver training to professionals.

Qualifications

• An experienced leader with experience delivering health and wellbeing services across community settings.
• Proven ability to motivate and manage teams to achieve outcomes.
• Strong collaboration with commissioners, clinicians and partners.

Responsibilities

• Lead a team to deliver targeted outreach and bespoke tobacco dependency support.
• Oversee performance, governance, data quality and reporting.
• Support service development, planning and continuous improvement.
• Engage with stakeholders across community, primary and secondary care to improve referrals and outcomes.

Skills

Leadership

Project management

Stakeholder engagement

Data-driven

Education

Degree or equivalent in health improvement/public health/social care

Job description

ABL Health have expanded the Kent stop smoking offer with a Specialist Stop Smoking Outreach Service, commissioned by Kent County Council. This transformative service seeks to work collaboratively with communities and Secondary Care to transform the lives of the local Kent population. The service will support residents to help them stop smoking and improve their wellbeing - all embedded in sustainable behaviour change.

Main duties of the job

As the Service Lead, you will provide day-to-day leadership and professional support to a team of Specialist Stop Smoking Advisors and an Administrator, ensuring the delivery of high-quality, evidence-based tobacco dependency interventions to priority community groups and the CoSTED Programme across Kent. You will lead service planning, development and continuous improvement, using audits, observations, performance reviews, feedback and evaluation to maintain high standards of practice and drive positive outcomes. You will oversee performance against KPIs, ensure accurate and timely client records and service data, produce high-quality reports, and support robust governance processes to ensure the service remains safe, effective, responsive and well-led. Working closely with clinical and professional leads, the data team and senior management, you will identify opportunities to improve service delivery, increase referrals and strengthen outcomes. You will also build effective relationships with stakeholders across community, primary and secondary care settings, support referral pathways and feedback processes, deliver brief stop smoking advice training to professionals, contribute to multidisciplinary meetings, campaigns and social value initiatives, and represent the service professionally at partnership meetings and external events.

About us

ABL is an exciting fast-growing community health organisation. ABL is an experienced, CQC registered, provider of community health services. As an organisation we are passionate about delivering evidence based, innovative, effective and relevant health care services in partnership with individuals, communities and stakeholders.

Job responsibilities

you will lead a team to provide targeted outreach, flexible, bespoke tobacco dependency support, with a focus on priority cohorts where smoking prevalence is high and engagement requires a consistent innovative co-productive approach. The priority cohorts you will be supporting are:

Mental Health

Social Housing

Workplace

CoSTED Programme -Proactive outreach and VBA within A & E Departments

This is a leadership role where the post holder will have a real influence on the clinical and operational excellence of the service. Working with the System Integration Lead, the post holder will create strong partnerships with community groups and organisations to deliver tobacco dependency services in a bespoke manner, based on the requirements of each cohort. You will also work proactively with secondary care settings and will support stop smoking specialist practitioners to deliver outcomes that benefit clients referred to the service.

Main Duties and Responsibilities

1. Leadership & Quality Improvement

Lead a team of stop smoking specialist advisors and an administrator to deliver tobacco dependency support to priority community groups and the CoSTED Programme across Kent providing day to day supervision, performance management and professional support.

Develop and coordinate the Kent Specialist Stop Smoking Outreach Service team to ensure delivery of high-quality, evidence-based interventions to priority groups across Kent.

Support staff through regular audits, observations, and development planning to maintain high standards of smoking cessation/tobacco dependency practice and to inform service development plans.

Provide strong practice leadership aligned with the organisations values, modelling best practice and promoting reflective practice and continuous improvement.

Drive quality improvement and contribute to the overall objectives of the Kent service.

Support governance processes to ensure the service remains safe, caring, effective, responsive and well-led in accordance with ABL Health internal standards.

Produce high-quality reports that showcase effectiveness, highlight trends, and recommend actions to improve performance.

2. Service Development & Operational Management

Lead on internal performance review boards to monitor the service for continued improvement

Lead on service planning, development, implementation, and coordination of all elements of the Kent Specialist Stop Smoking Outreach Service.

Work collaboratively with the ABL Healths Lead Clinical Supervisor/Professional Lead for Smoking Cessation to embed best practice into the Kent Specialist Stop Smoking Outreach Service.

Ensure key performance indicators (KPIs) are met, providing regular updates to the Head of Service.

Work effectively with the data team to ensure service data demonstrates clear and measurable outcomes.

Plan and organise workloads efficiently to meet service priorities and deadlines.

Ensure robust, accurate, and timely client records are always maintained.

Use reflection, feedback, and evaluation to continually refine and improve the Kent Specialist Stop Smoking Outreach Service.

Support the promotion and communication of the Kent Specialist Stop Smoking Outreach Service to increase referrals and awareness.

3. Stakeholder Engagement & Partnership Working

Provide very brief stop smoking advice training to appropriate professionals and stakeholders to strengthen service delivery and collaborative working across Kent

Work collaboratively with key stakeholders across community, primary care, and secondary care settings to ensure seamless referral pathways and effective referral feedback processes.

Participate in multidisciplinary meetings as required, providing specialist input to support integrated care.

Build strategic relationships that help increase referrals, improve communication, and strengthen service reach.

Contribute to wider service campaigns, community engagement, and social value initiatives.

Promote the service externally and represent it professionally at events, meetings, and partnership activities.

Skills and Competencies Required

An experienced leader with experience in delivering health and wellbeing related services across community settings and to priority groups with the ability to motivate, engage and support teams to achieve the highest standards and outcomes.

Skilled in project management accustomed to using tools and processes to identify project goals, set and manage the schedule, anticipate, and identify issues, remove obstacles, delineate responsibility, track task completion, and communicate progress

Experience in leading evolving and developing services within a complex health system.

A strategic thinker, able to foresee and take action to deal with problems and opportunities.

An adept communicator who adapts the message to fit the needs of the audience including clients, staff, volunteers and partner agencies

Results orientated always working actively to outperform their goals.

Be able to build strong relationships, foster trust and co-operation among colleagues and stakeholders for best outcomes.

Be quality driven; naturally seek high standards for self and others and actively seek to improve them.

Value and remain open to new ideas and perspectives.

Please note that we are unable to offer sponsorship for this role

Person Specification

Experience

• Experience of working and engaging with communities (LGBTQ+, social housing, workplace, mental health substance misuse and other priority groups) Delivery/management experience e.g., stop smoking, weight management, physical activity or other types of behaviours change interventions. Experience in managing teams Project and operational management experience Demonstrable experience in working with a range of stake holders to improve health outcomes for the population Experience in contract and performance management including writing service reports Experience in using data to inform service development to improve outcomes
• Previous experience of working in Smoking Cessation services. Experience working with commissioners

Job Specific Requirements

• The ability to travel independently across the county.
• Work flexibly and adapt to suit service need

Qualifications

• Degree (or equivalent experience) in health improvement/public health/social care related field

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.