Job overview
About the role
The Principal Social Worker works with the Practice Development Manager to lead and develop services for children, young people and carers. The role manages Consultant Social Workers, Social Workers, ChISVAs and trainees, ensuring high standards of safeguarding, case management and professional practice. Responsibilities include oversight of referral triage, assessment, prioritisation, decision making, supervision quality, staff performance, wellbeing, audit and research. The post holder leads case management processes, supports risk management, deputises for the Practice Development Manager and embeds Barnahus child protection standards.
The role involves overall day-to-day management of a multidisciplinary team including consultant social workers, social workers, trainees, and ChISVAs, with responsibility for supervision, performance, and practice quality.
About you
You are an experienced social work manager with strong operational leadership in complex safeguarding services. You provide expert consultation in multidisciplinary settings, chair multi agency meetings and ensure compliance with statutory and national guidance. You have strong knowledge of the criminal justice process for child victims, can represent the Lighthouse at local and national forums, and contribute to service development, quality improvement and inclusive practice.
Main duties of the job
The role includes providing reflective and clinical supervision, as well as specialist expert consultation to internal colleagues and external partners across social care, education, police, health, and CAMHS.
Development and oversight child-friendly criminal justice activity within the Lighthouse, including use of VRI and Section 28 processes, ensuring compliance with Home Office ISVA guidance.
Working closely with the Practice Development Manager, the role supports training, practice development, quality assurance, performance monitoring, audits, and research. It contributes to contextual and transitional safeguarding approaches, development of practice directives in line with Barnahus Standards, continuous improvement of the Lighthouse Child House model and excellence in social work practice.
The post holder represents the Lighthouse at local and strategic forums, deputises for the Practice Development Manager when required, ensures compliance with statutory safeguarding frameworks, and delivers high-quality, child-centred care through expert knowledge of the CSA pathway. The role also provides specialist advice on acute safeguarding interventions and oversees robust referral triage and case management processes to ensure effective care pathways for vulnerable children and young people
Working for our organisation
University College London Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust (UCLH) is one of the most complex NHS trusts in the UK, serving a large and diverse population. We provide academically led acute and specialist services, to people from the local area, from throughout the United Kingdom and overseas. Our vision is to deliver top-quality patient care, excellent education, and world-class research.
We provide first-class acute and specialist services across eight sites:
1. University College Hospital (incorporating the Elizabeth Garrett Anderson Wing)
2. National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery
3. Royal National ENT and Eastman Dental Hospitals
4. University College Hospital Grafton Way Building
5. Royal London Hospital for Integrated Medicine
6. University College Hospital Macmillan Cancer Centre
7. The Hospital for Tropical Diseases
8. University College Hospital at Westmoreland Street
We are dedicated to the diagnosis and treatment of many complex illnesses. UCLH specialises in women’s health and the treatment of cancer, infection, neurological, gastrointestinal and oral disease. It has world class support services including critical care, imaging, nuclear medicine and pathology.
We are committed to sustainability and have pledged to become a carbon net zero health service, embedding sustainable practice throughout UCLH. We have set an ambitious target of net zero for our direct emissions by 2031 and indirect emissions by 2040.