South West Yorkshire Partnership NHS Trust
Mental Health Practitioner
The closing date is 03 October 2025
Are you an experienced Mental Health Practitioner looking for an exciting opportunity to make a difference in the lives of young people within the Kirklees area? Would you like to be part of a diverse and innovative service who offer mental health support in an educational setting?
We are seeking applicants to join our Mental Health Support Team who cover the schools and colleges in Kirklees. This is an exciting time to join our team who deliver evidence based interventions to children within our schools with mild to moderate mental health conditions. Focusing on early intervention we also provide training and workshops to schools using the whole school approach, which enables schools to provide a culture of wellbeing for all their pupils.
You will be part of a supportive and resilient team within a trust which places staff health and wellbeing at the top of its agenda. Our team sits within our CAMHS service which means that we can provide expert CPD opportunities, further training and supervision from a diverse range of experienced practitioners.
All employees of the Trust are strongly encouraged to be fully vaccinated against COVID-19 to protect patients.
Main duties of the job
This role would suit an experienced healthcare professional with experience in assessing and working with young people with mild- moderate mental health concerns and preferably experience delivering CBT interventions.
As a band 6 mental health practitioner you will be expected to confidently manage a caseload of young people including triaging, consulting with schools/ parents and assessing CYP with a range of mental health issues and making decisions as to what support they may need.
You will support the senior leadership team and be involved with service development of the MHST, taking initiative to identify opportunities to improve the service.
You will be expected to draw on your experience to lead case management supervision and supervise the junior staff within the team.
You will be able to make decisions on suitability of new referrals, adhering to the services referral protocols, refer unsuitable clients on to the relevant service or back to the referral agent as necessary.
At the time of advertising, this role does meet the minimum requirements set by UK Visas and Immigration to sponsor candidates to work in the UK. We look forward to receiving your application.
About us
We are a specialist NHS Foundation Trust that provides community, mental health and learning disability services for the people of Barnsley, Calderdale, Kirklees and Wakefield. We also provide low and medium secure services and are the lead for the west Yorkshire secure provider collaborative.
Our mission is to help people reach their potential and live well in their communities, we do this by providing high-quality care in the right place at the right time. We employ staff in both clinical and non-clinical services who work hard to make a difference to the lives of service users, families and carers.
We encourage and welcome applications from all protected characteristic groups, we value diversity and want our workforce to be reflective of our communities.
Being a foundation Trust means we’re accountable to our members, who can have a say in how we’re run. Around 14,300 local people (including staff) are members of our Trust.
Join us and you will be one of over 4,500 staff committed to supporting and improving the mental, physical and social needs of the thousands of people we meet and help each year.
We are committed to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children, young people and vulnerable adults and expect all colleagues and volunteers to share this commitment.
We do reserve to right to close vacancy before the advertised closing date if necessary, so please apply as soon as possible.
Job responsibilities
For full job description, please see attached supporting documents.
JOB SUMMARY
The post-holder will:
Provide assessment and treatment to children and young people with mental health needs;
Work autonomously and collaboratively within the MDT, providing consultation for other agencies/professionals;
Promote the safeguarding and welfare of children and young people.
To provide routine and urgent assessment and interventions to young people with a wide range of emotional and psychological problems who are referred to specialist CAMHS, in keeping with evidence based practice with supervision from a senior clinician within professional guidelines and within the overall framework of the teams policies and procedures.
KEY RESULT AREAS:
To support the ongoing process of delivering a comprehensive CAMHS system.
To provide assessment, interventions, therapy to children, young people with the most severe, complex and persistent mental health problems, including those who are severely mentally ill or at suicidal risk and where appropriate, families as both an autonomous practitioner and as part of a multidisciplinary team in a variety of settings to address need. This will include working with the CAPA model.
To apply a sound knowledge of safeguarding children and guidelines in clinical work.
To be committed to a quality approach for patient care.
The post-holder will demonstrate high levels of concentration and provide sustained effort in assessment of complex family issues.
To manage own caseload, accessing support and guidance appropriate to individual need.
To operate within the clinical and case management supervision framework.
To provide training, consultation and supervision to other service providers, partner agencies and junior members of staff as required regarding intensive interventions with children, young people and families.
To participate in the development, audit and review of this extension to existing service provision.
To undertake extended hours of work alongside fellow specialist CAMHS practitioners.
To work collaboratively with all services to provide coherent and co-ordinated mental health services for children and young people as well as other significant partners, ensuring timely transition and relevant consultation, training and support to universal services and targeted groups.
To use a range of Information Technology systems (including Rio) ensuring high quality data is collected appropriately, kept securely and confidentially
To participate in an agreed clinical audit programme for the service, and ensure lessons learnt from both audit and clinical incidents are reported.
To comply with both clinical and corporate governance frameworks.
To support the engagement of service stakeholders and users in the development and monitoring of service delivery and identify opportunities for service improvement and redesign.
To actively promote user/carer involvement in all aspects of care planning/delivery whilst respecting the rights, capabilities and wishes of the individuals concerned.
To work in an innovative and child, young person and family centred way, in a culture of continuous improvement and learning.
Apply Trust policies and procedures in instances of aggression, acute distress and disturbed mental health presentations.
To maintain relevant professional registration
To identify and communicate any concerns through the relevant management processes.
To demonstrate continued practice development and engage in annual appraisal.
We are aware that an increasing number of applicants are using AI technology to generate responses on NHS Job application forms. Over reliance on AI-generated content in application forms is strongly discouraged and we will conduct a thorough screening process before selecting candidates to progress to the next stage. If you are using AI to enhance your application, please disclose this in your NHS Jobs application form.
Person Specification
Personal Attributes
* Able to work autonomously and as part of a team.
* Commitment to multi-agency approach.
* Ability to work and make decisions under pressure.
* Calm, confident, innovative, creative and assertive.
* Clarity of decision making.
* Willingness to be flexible and adaptable in accordance with changing service priorities.
* Commitment to challenging discrimination and improving accessibility of services.
* Ability to cope calmly in a crisis.
* To demonstrate good self care and encourage the same in team members.
* A Current driving licence and access to a car during the working day is essential (reasonable adjustments will be considered for any applicants who are unable to drive due to a disability).
Qualifications
* Relevant professional qualification, e.g. nursing, or other professional allied to medicine.
* Dip SW or relevant mental health profession.
* Membership of professional body.
* Post graduate qualification in mental health (e.g. CBT, Family Therapy, Counselling).
* A teaching and assessing qualification.
Physical Attributes
* Ability to undertake the duties and demands of the post. A satisfactory sickness record over the previous 2 years (subject to the need to act with fairness and equality of opportunity, particularly where the sickness is related to a disability and/or pregnancy).
Training
* Training and experience relating to specialist CAMHS.
* Experience of delivering training to others.
Experience
* Substantial post qualification experience, some of which must be working with Children, young people and their carers in a mental health or other complex care setting.
* Multidisciplinary team working.
* Inter-agency liaison and consultation.
* Experience of supervising/mentoring junior staff.
* Knowledge of relevant legislation and guidance e.g. NHS plan, Mental Health Legislation, Childrens act, Education Act, Working Together, Childrens NSF, Every Child Matters, etc.
* Clinical/therapeutic knowledge and skills in mental health.
* Experience in assessment and risk management and ability to implement evidence based practice.
* Proven ability to work with other agencies and disciplines and in partnership with other organisations.
* Experience of safeguarding children and young people.
* Experience of community settings.
* Experience of working in different cultural contexts.
* Knowledge and experience of working with Equality and Diversity.
Special Knowledge & Skills
* Good verbal and communication skills.
* Ability to manage own caseload.
* Good negotiation skills, and problem solving skills.
* Effective record keeping and report writing skills to include care planning and risk assessments.
* Have good team working skills. Be able to work across disciplines with an ability to predict and manage inter-disciplinary tensions and foster good working practices.
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.
South West Yorkshire Partnership NHS Trust
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