Senior Practitioner – Children in Care, North Essex
Essex County Council - Senior Practitioner – Children in Care, North Essex
Permanent, Full Time
About The Role
Senior Practitioner - Children in Care, North Essex. Permanent, Full Time.
Salary: £46,574 to £56,027 per annum
Location: Colchester
Working Style: Community-based worker
Closing Date: 16 September 2025
Essex County Council understand how important flexibility and wellbeing is for our colleagues working across children\u2019s Social Care and that we need to think differently. We have therefore developed a nine-day working fortnight for full time frontline Social Workers within Children’s services. If you would like more information on this, please follow this link.
We are a friendly, supportive, and hard-working team where we always hold children at the centre of what we do. We have created an open, reflective and learning culture where social workers feel enabled and supported to raise issues, consider different perspectives, challenge authority, and try out different approaches in a safe and non-blaming environment. Good quality reflective supervision is provided to all social workers and senior practitioners.
As a Senior Practitioner you will provide leadership in the team, provide both support and mentoring to newly qualified or less experienced staff, facilitate reflective group supervision, oversee the team’s duty service, deputise for the Team Manager when needed and have responsibility to lead in a practice area.
There will be opportunities for your own professional development and for being part of developing our team and service.
Children in Care
Children in Care (CIC) teams work with children and young people up to the age of 18 who are in care. They are placed with a foster carer or live in residential homes. The CIC teams work to ensure the child\u2019s care experience is positive and that work undertaken supports their transition into leaving care or returning home. The CIC teams receive cases in proceedings after the first hearing, visit children in placement, develop permanency plans (which include Special Guardianship Order (SGO) and adoption), undertake life-story work to help a child understand the reasons for being in care and support children to return home to birth family.
Skills, Knowledge And Experience
* A recognised social work qualification i.e. Diploma, degree or master’s in social work, CQSW, CSS or equivalent, with current registration with Social Work England as a registered social worker.
* Evidence of continuing professional development, aligned to any relevant Professional Competency/Capability frameworks or Knowledge and Skills Statements.
* Significant experience of social work, demonstrating a comprehensive and up to date understanding of all relevant legislation, regulation and guidance.
* Experience of mentoring both Social Work students and newly qualified and experienced Social Work staff, being a subject matter expert in professional social work practice.
* Experience of chairing meetings involving clients, family members and/or carers and other multi-agency professionals.
* Developing strong relationships with partners, other agencies and the local community to achieve joint objectives and offer a supportive framework for children, young people and families.
* In depth understanding of delivery of value for money interventions balanced against need.
* Proven track record of clear decision making in order to highlight and limit the potential risks associated with intervention.
Essex County Council is committed to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children and vulnerable adults and expects all employees and volunteers to share this commitment.
Essex County Council is a Disability Confident Leader. We’re committed to interviewing all disabled applicants who meet the minimum requirements of the job. Please speak to our Recruiters if you require any reasonable adjustments during the process. We’re also committed to interviewing all veterans and care leavers, who meet the minimum requirements of the role.
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