Social Workers, Family Safeguarding Team

About Us

We have now implemented the Family Safeguarding Model in 2022, a new multi-disciplinary approach that supports a whole-system change to child protection for children up to adolescence, focusing on supporting the needs of children and adults so that children can safely remain within their families. This is a great opportunity to join us now and be part of this pioneering work as we continue to learn from multi agency family work and support more families to look after their children in their families and wider communities.

In addition, we have an established and growing our ASYE programme, linked to our Social Care & Leadership Academy, offering mentoring support, fostering a culture of learning and challenge, manageable caseloads and good quality supervision, as we commit and invest in growing our own talent, as well as our experienced social workers.

About the role

We have an exciting opportunity for social workers to join our Family Safeguarding teams. Recruiting for Qualified, Experienced and Advanced levels.

This service works with families following assessment, where longer term support is required. This can include where children are considered to be in need or subject to child protection processes. The service works with families to support children remaining at home in the community however where this is not possible the teams also work with children becoming subject to pre-proceedings and court proceedings.

The service provides support via a new Family Safeguarding model that is a strength based approach involving the use of motivational interviewing. Teams are also multi-disciplinary and include social workers, family support practitioners, and adult specialist workers. The adult specialist workers have a specific focus on supporting parents/carers experiencing complex issues of domestic abuse, mental health and substance misuse.

The teams within the service have monthly group supervision and undertake their recording in a workbook. Interventions are focused around a Family Programme which has seven modules – this enables us to work in a purposeful and transparent manner.

Our offer to you:

• £3000 “golden hello” payment after one year’s service
• Retention payments of £2000 after completing two years’ service and a further £2000 after three years’ service
• Relocation allowance of up to £8,000 (eligibility criteria applies)
• Competitive salaries
• Free car parking at our central Swindon campus and easy commuter links to many locations

Please see our Rewards and Benefits offer for more details.

About You

Your aspirations should be limitless and you will be as determined and passionate about Children’s Services as we are. As a local authority, we continuously drive forward improvements in our services. We want our Social Workers to be part of our transformation, contribute to improving the safeguarding of our children, and we will make sure you have the full support network and training to do it.

Our teams are ambitious and proactive and we are looking for people who will share that ambition and be a part of our journey.

Candidates must be fluent in the English language (as a requirement of Part 7 of the Immigration Act – for the effective performance of a customer-facing role).

Our commitment to your development

We are dedicated to ensuring that you can progress your continued professional development and access training and learning opportunities linked to the BASW competencies for career progression.

We have an established Social Work & Leadership Academy. The Academy aims to celebrate the best in professional practice in Social Work and Social Care Leadership. The Academy represents an opportunity for us to demonstrate how we support, develop and value the professional disciplines in Social Work and Social Care through a targeted framework of career development and learning opportunities.

Your next steps

Read the role profiles and select the Apply button where you will be redirected to the Swindon Borough Council website to complete our online application process. Clicking the ‘Apply’ button on this job website is not an application, you must register on the Swindon Borough Council website in order to be considered for the role.

For further information about the role, please contact Linda Grant, Service Manager, at LGrant@swindon.gov.uk or Alison Smith, Service Manager, at ALISmith3@swindon.gov.uk

If you are experiencing technical issues submitting your application please email resourcing@swindon.gov.uk