Job overview
Join Us at a Time of Exciting Change
Are you an experienced Clinical Psychologist ready to lead and innovate? We are seeking a highly motivated Professional Lead to join our Milton Keynes Autism Assessment and Community Paediatrics Service. This senior role offers the opportunity to shape a multidisciplinary autism pathway, ensuring timely, high-quality assessments and post-diagnostic support for children and young people.
About the Role
As Professional Lead Clinical Psychologist, you will:
1. Lead autism/ASD assessments and neurodevelopmental formulations within a multidisciplinary framework.
2. Provide expert psychological input and consultation across the team.
3. Line manage psychologists and psychological practitioners, including recruitment, supervision, job planning, and performance management.
4. Deliver teaching, training, and supervision to psychology staff and wider professionals.
5. Drive service development, quality improvement, and co-production initiatives.
6. Ensure compliance with clinical governance, safeguarding, and Trust policies.
You will lead a small team of MDT practitioners offering assessment and brief psychological intervention, ensuring safety and quality of their work. You will inspire and support colleagues within a busy service and work closely with the MDT to deliver high-quality assessments and interventions for children and young people.
Main duties of the job
Main Duties
7. Lead Clinical Practice
8. Oversee autism/ASD assessments and neurodevelopmental formulations within a multidisciplinary framework.
9. Ensure high-quality, evidence-based psychological interventions for children and young people.
Provide Expert Consultation
10. Offer specialist psychological input and advice to the multidisciplinary team.
11. Support complex case discussions and clinical decision-making.
Leadership and Management
12. Line manage psychologists and psychological practitioners, including recruitment, supervision, job planning, and performance management.
13. Maintain compliance with clinical governance, safeguarding, and Trust policies.
Teaching and Training
14. Deliver training and supervision to psychology staff and wider professionals.
15. Promote continuous professional development and best practice across the service.
Service Development
16. Drive quality improvement, innovation, and co-production initiatives.
17. Lead implementation of digital tools and contribute to CNWL’s Neurodevelopmental Pathway Transformation programme.
Working for our organisation
Click here to find out more about working at CNWL!
Hear directly from our leaders and their vision for psychological professions in the Trust .
Learn more about working in Milton Keynes by following the link below.
Here at CNWL we encourage our psychological professions staff to pursue leadership opportunities in senior roles. Various prominent leadership roles within the Trust are currently held by Psychologists including: Director of Strategy and Integration, Chief Information Officer, 3 Clinical Directors. We try to facilitate the development of our psychological professions staff across all areas.
Detailed job description and main responsibilities
Main Responsibilities
Leadership & Governance
18. Act as the professional lead for clinical psychology within the service.
19. Oversee psychological governance and ensure compliance with Trust policies, clinical governance, and safeguarding standards.
20. Lead service planning and development for neurodevelopmental pathways across the county.
Clinical Responsibilities
21. Provide expert, highly specialist assessments for neurodevelopmental conditions, particularly autism.
22. Ensure timely access to assessments, post-diagnostic support, and interventions.
23. Work autonomously within professional guidelines, maintaining the highest standards of clinical care.
Team Management
24. Line manage psychologists and psychological practitioners, including recruitment, supervision, appraisal, and training.
25. Coordinate workload and support staff development to maintain service quality.
Collaboration & Consultation
26. Work closely with the Specialist Children’s Service Manager, Service Manager, and Clinical Director.
27. Participate in CNWL networks related to ASD and Community Paediatrics.
28. Provide consultation, training, and teaching within and beyond the team.
Quality & Evaluation
29. Lead quality improvement initiatives, service evaluation, research, and audit.
30. Monitor service effectiveness against key deliverables such as patient safety and care quality.
31. Report regularly to the Service Manager and Clinical Director.
Equality & Inclusion
32. Promote inclusive practices and foster good relations across diverse communities.
33. Encourage applications from all sectors of the community to ensure the workforce reflects the populations served.
CNWL Neurodevelopmental Pathway Transformation
This is an exciting time to join CNWL. We are implementing a new Neurodevelopmental (ND) pathway transformation programme, designed to improve access, consistency, and quality of care for children and young people with neurodevelopmental needs.
As part of this initiative, the autism assessment service is adopting innovative digital tools and platforms to streamline processes, enhance multidisciplinary collaboration, and improve patient experience.
The postholder will play a key role in embedding these digital solutions and contributing to the ongoing development and evaluation of the ND pathway transformation.
Vaccination
The successful applicant may have contact with patients or service users. As an NHS Trust we strongly encourage and support vaccination as this remains the best way to protect yourself, your family, your colleagues and of course patients and service users when working on our healthcare settings.
34. Due to the high response levels we receive for some vacancies, we may expire any of them prior to the advertised closing date and advise you to submit your application as soon as possible.
35. Applications from job seekers who require sponsorship to work in the UK are welcome and will be considered alongside all other applications. Before submitting your application and to avoid disappointment please check that you are eligible under the
36. Our Agenda for Change employment contracts are subject to a contractual 13 week probationary period.