Early Help Worker

Early Help Worker – 12 Month Fixed Term Contract

An exciting opportunity is now available within Wokingham Borough Council's Integrated Early Help Service as we look to recruit an Early Help Worker to work within our busy team on a 12 Month Fixed Term basis.

As an Early Help Worker, you will be responsible for promoting and safeguarding the welfare of children aged 0 to 18 years. You will manage a defined caseload and work with children, young people and their families to reduce risks associated with poor outcomes for children, including pre-birth.

As a lead professional you will complete 'whole family' Early Help Assessments to gain an understanding of the children and family’s needs and develop a time-limited action plan to help the family achieve identified outcomes. This includes ensuring that the voices of children and young people are heard, and modelling positive parenting and co-parenting.

You will work closely with other support services including Children's Social Care, Schools, Early Years, Health and Domestic Abuse services to coordinate wrap around, strength-based support for family's. You will take a lead professional role in organising and chairing 'Team Around the Family' meetings to ensure that plans are effective and families are making progress with healthy change and increased resilience.

You will have a good understanding of risk factors associated with poor outcomes for children and young people and be able to demonstrate an inclusive, systemic approach to your work to ensure that the service you deliver is welcoming, professional and accessible, to all including ethnic minority groups, fathers and male carers, families with complex needs who may be open to CSC, children and young people who may be experiencing harm outside of the family home and families with physical and mental health issues.

Benefits

We offer a fantastic range of employee benefits, including a generous annual leave entitlement of 28 days (rising to 33 days after 5 years continuous local government service), plus Bank Holidays, flexible, hybrid working, a local government pension scheme, employee assistance programme, sports & leisure discounts, onsite gym and much more!

Candidate Requirements

Experience of working with children (0 to 18yrs) and families.

Experience of managing a caseload of families with complex needs.

Excellent communication skills, be creative, resilient and adaptable to change.

Essential to the work is a personal robustness to be able to cope with the demands of the role and an ethos of partnership and collaboration.

Daily use of a car and full driving licence is also essential for this post.

Closing Date: Sunday 30th June 2024, 11pm

Interview Date: TBC

For an informal conversation about the role, please contact Beccy Franklin , Assistant Team Manager, Early Help at .

Please be aware that we will be reviewing the applications we receive on a daily basis, and we reserve the right to close the advert early if suitable candidates are identified.

Whilst this is a fixed term contract appointment, for anyone already employed by Wokingham Borough Council this would be classed as a secondment if successful. Therefore, the usual permission requests for secondments apply and you must speak to your line manager in the first instance before applying.

Please note, due to the requirements and essential criteria for this vacancy, previous unsuccessful applications made within the last 6 months, need not apply.

Wokingham Borough Council is committed to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children and vulnerable adults and expects all staff, other workers and volunteers to share this commitment. All successful candidates for this role will be subject to Disclosure & Barring Service (DBS) checks along with other relevant employment checks.

Wokingham is an equal opportunities employer.