Child Protection Chair and Quality Assurance Officer

Job Title: Child Protection Chair and Quality Assurance Officer
Starting Salary: £53,806 + £8,560 market enhanced payment, progressing to £59,497 per annum + £8,607 market enhanced payment
Hours: 37
Location: Team base is Farnham house in Stevenage, but candidate will be conferencing in person in one of our suites in Stevenage, Apsley or Hertford
Contract Type: Permanent
Directorate: Children's Services

About the team

The Child Protection Conferencing Team, within the Quality Assurance, Improvement and Practice Service provides independent, child‑centred oversight of safeguarding decision‑making, while also monitoring, evaluating, and improving the quality of multi‑agency child protection practice across Hertfordshire.

Alongside its core function of chairing multiagency child protection conferences, the service is a key agent in upholding practice standards in relation to

• analysis, risk assessment, risk management, and threshold decision making
• accountability and professional challenge
• quality and robustness of support and interventions to address risk outlined in child protection plans
• keeping children central to all decision making, planning and multiagency intervention, bringing to life children’s lived experiences and proportionate responses to keep them safe from harmAbout the role

About you

This role will require you to:

• Chair complex multi-agency Child Protection Conferences for children who are considered at risk of significant harm in line with the core principles of Hertfordshire’s family safeguarding programme, maintaining an independent perspective to ensure that plans are collaborative, supportive and effective in engaging change for children and their families
• Facilitate conferences to an excellent quality, role modelling partnership with families and keeping children, their views and lived experiences at the centre of all decision making and planning
• Undertake robust and timely scrutiny of your allocated child protection plans to ensure the support and protection provided by the multiagency network is progressing in line with the children and family’s needs and/or any delay or issues increasing risk to the children are escalated
• Undertake a quality assurance role in relation to children in need of protection or in care, by actively monitoring practice standards, systems and processes and identifying any practice deficits to improve service delivery for children, young people and their families.
• Contribute to the support and robust challenge, including the challenge to multiagency partners in the formulation, monitoring and review of plans for children at risk. Advising on improvements in order to ensure that they are in line with the required standard. The role will require the post holder to have a high-level understanding of all relevant internal policies, an awareness of relevant legislation and partnership working skills to assist senior management in the strategic development of ongoing service delivery. The post-holder should be able to inspire respect for decision making across professional boundaries.
• Develop, enhance and maintain excellent working relationships with key/core statutory partners, locality specific service providers, stakeholders, multi agencies (e.g. Health, Police, Education) and the wider community, to develop joint planning and delivery mechanisms thus ensuring that positive outcomes are secured for young people and corporate parenting is fully understood.
• Lead and participate in case audits on the quality of childcare work, analysing and challenging practice, identifying gaps and developing strategies for addressing shortfalls.
• Maintaining an allocated case load of children at risk, rigorously monitoring and tracking individual plans and permanency plans, and implement the conflict resolution procedure where necessary.
• Robustly raise issues in accordance with the conflict resolution protocols, national standards, legislation, county and directorate policies.

Essential:

• Professional SW Qualification and SW England registration
• Detailed knowledge of the Children Act, Working Together, Care Planning Regulations and IRO Guidance and other relevant legislation, guidance and research findings
• Substantial frontline child protection practice experience within children’s social care (enquiries, assessments, reviews, conferences, decision-making and supervision)
• Experience of chairing multi-disciplinary meetings.
• Promote effective working relationships with teams, service areas and partner agencies, and able to effectively manage the interaction of people with different perspectives
• Know how to work skilfully and confidently with families and parents in child protection, situating them as partners where safe to do so, and including those who have demonstrated resistant, hostile and/or deceptive behaviour
• Excellent analytical and risk assessment skills
• Knowledge of risk management processes and the ability to assess and manage risk professionally and organisationally
• Effective organisation and time management skills, in order to meet service objectives and deadlines.
• Ability to use IT systems effectively
• Experience in working in safeguarding children and experience in ability to recognise, analyse and manage risk
• Experience in working with children, families and colleagues from partner agencies
• Ability to demonstrate awareness and understanding of equality, diversity and inclusion and how this applies to this role.
• Driving licence and access to a vehicle

Desirable

• Relevant post qualifying studies
• Evidenced continued professional development relevant to the role

We welcome applications from candidates who currently reside in the UK with established proof of right to work documentation. We are not able to offer sponsorship at this time for this role.

This job role is Level 13. Please locate the job profile here:

Job profiles - Health and social care

To hear more about this opportunity please contact: Zuzana Ghouse <Zuzana.Ghouse@hertfordshire.gov.uk>

Interview Date: 10th 11th and 12th June

Benefits of working for us

How to apply

As part of your application, please upload your most recent CV. Ensure your CV is up to date with your employment history (including any employment gaps), and including any training/qualifications. We encourage you to include examples of where you have demonstrated the requirements/criteria in the advert / job profile to allow the panel to fully recognise your skills and abilities. You will have the opportunity to include a short covering paragraph within your application to give us a little more information about your skills, knowledge, and experiences.

Additional information

Disability Confident
We are proud to be a Disability Confident employer and guarantee an interview to anyone disclosing a disability whose application meets the minimum criteria for the post.

Safeguarding
This role has been identified as requiring a Disclosure & Barring Service (DBS) check.

Driving required
You’ll need to have the ability to drive and/or travel around Hertfordshire, either using your own mode of transport or a company car to travel to other locations.

English Fluency
The ability to converse at ease with members of the public and provide advice in accurate spoken English is essential for the post (for those whose language is a signed language the provision of a sign language interpreter who speaks English to the necessary standard of fluency will be required). Further information about the legal requirement can be found here.