North Yorkshire is England’s largest county and a beautiful, vibrant place to live and work. North Yorkshire Council has a strong reputation for delivering high-quality services. Our Children’s Services are nationally recognised for excellence and routinely share best practice across the sector. Our teams are proud of what has been achieved and are committed to continuous improvement, ensuring services deliver real impact for children, young people and families while making effective use of public money. While we are proud of our track record, we know there is more to do. We are deeply committed to ensuring children and young people are safe, happy, healthy and able to achieve within inclusive, high-quality services that value diversity and individuality. We prioritise supporting families to enable children to thrive within family environments wherever possible. With characteristic Yorkshire resilience, we continue to respond to increasing complexity of need and rising demand. We do this through strong partnerships, embracing challenge and a relentless focus on improvement. That is where you come in. Having a strong reputation matters, it matters to ensure our staff feel proud and are recognised for their outstanding contribution to enabling every child to thrive. High performing inspection assessments and inspection readiness is an important part of reputation building in children’s services. In this role you help us evidence our great work and show case this to inspectors while helping prepare for inspections, reducing the natural nerves during inspection episodes. About the role The Inspection Coordination Officer plays a key role in ensuring North Yorkshire Council is fully prepared for, effectively supported during, and well‑organised after external inspections. These include ILACS, Local Area SEND Partnership Inspections, Joint Targeted Area Inspections (JTAI), Adult and Community Learning inspections, and HMIP inspections of Youth Justice Services. You will act as the single point of contact for inspectors throughout inspection activity, coordinating communication, managing evidence, organising logistics, and supporting services to respond effectively. This is a new role, providing the opportunity for the post holder to really shape our approach and make their mark. The role is highly visible and will work with senior leaders across Children’s Service and the wider Council, and excellent career enhancing opportunity. Key responsibilities • Lead and coordinate inspection preparation and delivery across CYPS. • Maintain a central evidence base, including self-evaluations, performance data and audit materials. • Liaise with internal teams and multi‑agency partners to ensure inspection readiness. • Act as the nominated point of contact for inspection teams. • Organise logistics including rooms, scheduling, documentation and stakeholder engagement. • Provide clear communication and updates to senior leaders. • Support the development and monitoring of post‑inspection action plans. Who we’re looking for You will be experienced in children’s social care and inspection regimes within a local authority context. We are looking for someone with strong organisational and planning skills, excellent written and verbal communication, experience working across services or partnerships, and the ability to work under pressure. Confidence working with senior officers and external partners is essential, alongside strong analytical skills and attention to detail. Working arrangements The role is based at County Hall, Northallerton, with hybrid working available alongside onsite working. During active inspection periods, on‑site presence is required. Some travel across North Yorkshire may be necessary. Further Detail The postholder will coordinate the activity required for all external inspections of North Yorkshire Children and Young People’s Service including: a) Children Service (ILACS) Inspection b) Area Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND) Partnership Inspection c) Joint Targeted Area Inspection (JTAI) d) Adult and Community Learning e) HMIP Probation Youth Justice Inspection NB this will include any focused visits, peer reviews, mock inspection activity as well as successor inspections that may change as inspection frameworks continue to develop. The role will support the Children and Young People’s Directorate in the preparation for, support during and progression of actions after inspection. Individual services remain focused on the work that is being inspected; however the inspection process itself requires clear planning and logistical delivery which will require the postholder to work across the different services within the Children and Young Peoples Directorate and wider Council. The post holder will provide continuity across the service for officer’s involved in different inspections. The role will: - Lead the inspection self evaluation process, evidencing local practice against inspection frameworks and coordinating the collation of data, evidence and intelligence with service leads, strategy and performance and partner agencies. - Plan and coordinate inspection readiness activity, maintaining the annual schedule of preparation (including multi agency audit days) and ensuring all evidence, documentation and children’s records are organised, centralised and accessible for inspectors from the outset. - Act as the Single Point of Contact for inspectors, sharing the self evaluation, coordinating communication, responding to key lines of enquiry, and providing logistical, practical and evidence related support throughout the inspection. - Coordinate evidence gathering and stakeholder engagement, arranging meetings and activities with local area partners, early years settings, schools, colleges, commissioned services, NYC learning and development, children and young people, and parent/carer groups, ensuring contact information and relevant insights are available. - Ensure providers, partners and families are informed about inspections and understand how they can contribute their views, including those outside the local area but within the local offer. - Liaise across all local agencies during the inspection, ensuring consistent responses, smooth coordination of activity, and the timely flow of information until publication of the final inspection report. - Facilitate regular feedback sessions with inspectors, enabling discussion of emerging findings with leaders and maintaining effective communication throughout the inspection. - Support the development and monitoring of post inspection action plans, working with system leaders to respond to findings and providing progress updates to the inspectorate. - Provide regular updates for senior leaders across the Children and Young People’s directorate and wider Council on inspection readiness, activity and emerging themes. - Advise partners and commissioned services on potential conflicts with North Yorkshire Council policies or legislation during inspection preparation and response. This post is classified as suitable for hybrid working with an office base at County Hall, Northallerton. It will require travel across North Yorkshire and occasionally beyond. The post holder will need to ensure that they are on site at County Hall, Northallerton throughout the inspection period and have ability to travel when and where required to discharge duties of this post The posts are politically restricted under the terms of the Local Government & Housing Act 1989. For an informal conversation contact: Head of Children’s Partnership and Evaluation Emma.Phillips@northyorks.gov.uk Key Documents Job description