Family Help Senior Lead Practitioner

Contract Type: Permanent

Salary: Grade I SCP 35 - £46,142 to SCP 39 - £50,269 with a professional bar at SCP 37 £48,226**

Hours Per Week: 36

Base Location: Tameside One, Ashton-under-Lyne

Interview date: Tuesday 31^st March 2026

The Role

Are you passionate about making a real difference in the lives of children and families? Do you bring compassion, curiosity, collaboration, conversation, and courage to your practice? If so, Tameside is looking for you.

This is an exciting time to join Tameside Children’s Services. As we continue to build on the implementation of Families First Reforms.

This is your opportunity to build your leadership skills, inspire, and shape the future of family help services in Tameside. As a Family Help Senior Lead Practitioner, you will support the Team Manager in delivering tailored assessments and support plans that truly make a difference. You’ll also be at the forefront of developing creative solutions that prevent issues from escalating, safeguarding and promoting positive outcomes for children and their families.

At the heart of this role is our Heart of Support Practice Approach, underpinned by the 5 C’s Compassion, Curiosity, Collaboration, Conversation and Courage. These values are the golden thread in how we work with children, families and each other. You will champion the Heart of Support and play a pivotal role in embedding systemic practice across the service.

If you’re looking for a role where you can build your leadership skills, this is it.

You will be supported by your Team Manager for Family Help with a comprehensive induction, ongoing training, and regular supervision to help you reach your full potential.

About You

We are looking for Family Help Senior Lead Practitioners (Social Work Qualified) to support children, young people and their families in our newly formed Family Help Service.

You will provide our families with high quality support and respond to their individual needs as required. You will support families to develop solutions to their needs and provide high levels of intervention to keep children and young people with their families.

You will support children and young people who are identified as children in need and ensure that appropriate plans are in place to meet families’ individual needs effectively enabling families to make positive and sustained changes. You will support the leadership of the Family Help service by offering quality assurance, advice and guidance to Family Help Lead Practitioners and others contributing to a consistently high standard of practice across the Family Help Service ensuring high quality support by providing quality assurance, advice and guidance to Family Help Lead Practitioners.

You will take into account the views of children, young people and families and partners to continually improve service delivery. You will facilitate workshops and group supervisions to support decision making, provide opportunities for reflection and ensure appropriate plans are in place to meet families’ individual needs effectively enabling families to make positive and sustained changes.

You will attend and chair a range of multi-agency meetings to share important information and contribute to decisions that support the individual needs of children, young people and families. You will contribute to the leadership of the Family Help Service through mentoring, coaching and practice development to support Family Help Lead Practitioners and achieve positive outcomes for children, young people and families.

We’re looking for someone who:

• Is passionate about highquality, childcentred practice and improving outcomes
• Can champion and embed the Heart of Support Practice Approach and the 5 C’s
• Has experience in practice development, quality assurance and workforce development
• Inspires others, builds strong relationships and influences across services
• Is reflective, resilient and able to respond to emerging priorities
• Is dedicated to developing people and supporting a stable, skilled, confident workforce

If you want to help shape practice, culture and learning across Children’s Services, this role offers a genuine opportunity to make a lasting impact.

About Us

Message from Jill Colbert, Director of Children’s Services

“I joined the council at the beginning of 2025 and was instantly charmed by the warmth, openness, and energy of colleagues.

“I came to Tameside for one reason; because I know we can do fantastic things for our families here.

“We’re a children’s service on a significant improvement journey. We know what needs to be different for our children and families and we’re ambitious to deliver that change.

“We have a growing range of specialist services for children, where you can test and grow your skills and practice. We have a Social Work Academy that is led by people who bring passion to learning and who know that the DCS’ of the future are right in front of them. We are working on our progression pathways so that staying in Tameside is rewarded and recognised. We have investment in innovation and improvement from the council so that we can grow services and support for families that we can sustain, from family hubs through to complex safeguarding.

“I am so certain that we can build a proud, inclusive and safe climate for great practice to flourish in Tameside. I’d love you to join me on the journey here at Team Tameside.”

At Tameside, we are committed to ensuring all our Citizens lead long, fulfilling and healthy lives. We are committed to supporting economic growth, providing high quality health and care services, protecting our most vulnerable and creating strong and supportive, self-sufficient communities.

We recognise that our people drive our success and enable the organisation to deliver on its vision, purpose and priorities, and that our people are our most important resource and asset. Our values underpin our practice and behaviours, and are at the heart of everything that we do; and we understand that how we do things is just as important as what we do. We pride ourselves on living by our STRIVE values of Support, Trust, Respect, Integrity, Value Diversity and Engage. Our values underpin our practice and behaviours and are at the heart of everything that we do. How we do things are just as important as what we do.

Our employees’ skills, experience and knowledge are essential to our success along with their happiness, wellbeing, commitment, enthusiasm and motivation to be the best they can be.

Our Heart of Support Practice Approach

At Tameside, we believe in:

• Compassion understanding the lived experiences of children and families.
• Curiosity asking questions that lead to deeper insight and better outcomes for children.
• Collaboration working together across services to deliver joined-up support.
• Conversation listening and engaging meaningfully with children, families and professionals.
• Courage leading with courage, making bold and compassionate decisions that put children first.

We are committed to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children, young people and adults and expect all staff to share this commitment. This position is subject to Enhanced with Barred List Disclosure Procedures.

** This post is classified as being in a professional job category. As such the grade for the job has a professional grade development bar which employees can progress through subject to meeting the following criteria:

1. Relevant professional qualification for the job role at Level 6 or above, AND

2. Minimum of 2 years post qualification experience in the role, AND

3. Maintained membership of a regulated body where this is a requirement to practice in the role where applicable, AND

4. Professional standards practised to the highest expected level.

This post is a designated customer facing role under the fluency duty and requires a specified level of spoken English.

If you have completed the GM Elevate (Leadership Development) Programme, please indicate this within the ‘About You’ or ‘Supporting Statement’ section of your application.

Unfortunately, at this time we are not able to offer sponsorship.

We are committed to developing a culture which respects individuals, appreciates difference and allows everyone regardless of background to reach their full potential. We are proud to be an accredited disability confident employer. Reasonable Adjustments will be considered in accordance with the Equality Act 2010 in relation to the Job Role Criteria.

Our rewards and benefits package can be viewed here

We have made a commitment to improve the employment opportunities for people with disabilities, care leavers, carers, and ex-military personnel.

For further information about this role please contact Nik Joseph, Head of Service for Family Help and Families First Transformation on 0161 342 5056 or email nik.joseph@tameside.gov.uk