Support Worker

**Job Title**:Support Worker
**Contract Type**:Permanent
**Salary**:£25,965.41 per annum (£27,112.48 per annum is achieved after 18 months successful performance in the role)
**Working Hours**:37.5 hours per week
**Working Pattern**:Monday - Friday plus 1 in 4 weekends (when working a weekend you will not work Friday & Monday) plus some bank holidays
**Location**:St. Saviour's Dispersed, Vaughan House, Guildford

**The difference you will make as a Support Worker**

This role is for St. Saviour's Dispersed based at Vaughan House in Guildford.

St. Saviour's Dispersed is our supported housing project for single homeless people aged 18-65 in Surrey. It’s comprised of 18 shared properties housing for 68 people. Customers have complex support needs around substance misuse, mental health, and offending behaviour. We have properties in Guildford, Woking, Knaphill, Epsom, Waverley, Dorking and Addlestone.

We work with customers to help them to gain independence, achieve success in employment, education or training, and rebuild family and social connections as well as providing a complete supported housing service.

You will provide support in a variety of ways. For example, connecting them with employability coaches and other support agencies, helping them manage their money, signing up for benefits or to move on to a more permanent home.

It will be your job to help boost their confidence and support them on their journey as they rebuild their lives. Through all of this you will need to keep records of everything, so there is some admin to do. At times this role is tough, but most of the time it can be incredibly rewarding. You will need to be resilient, empathetic, and able to leave your work at work and not take it home with you.

**About you**

We are looking for someone with:

- Experience of working with vulnerable people
- Experience of delivering structured support and risk management
- To be a team player with a caring and empathetic nature with a resilient, can-do attitude, able to work as part of a team
- An understanding of supporting vulnerable people - this could include having your own lived experience of homelessness or drug or alcohol addiction. Ability to work flexible hours to meet customer and business needs, which may not include normal office hours and may include lone working

**Why Riverside?**

At Riverside, we’re a housing association with a difference - enhancing the everyday for all our customers. For 90 years, we’ve been revitalising neighbourhoods and supporting communities by providing the homes they need to live full, fulfilling and rewarding lives.

We have a portfolio of over 75,000 affordable residential and retirement homes across the UK. Our work ranges from homelessness services to social care, employment support to retirement living, and we need the best people on board to help us.

Working with us, you’ll enjoy:

- Competitive pay & generous pension
- 28 days holidays plus bank holidays
- Flexible working options available
- Investment in your learning, personal development and technology A wide range of benefits

**Diversity and Inclusion at Riverside**:
We are inclusive. At Riverside, we value diversity in all its forms. We foster a workplace where all individuals are respected, empowered, and heard. Our commitment to inclusivity drives our success and enriches the lives of our customers and colleagues.

Riverside is a Disability Confident Employer and operates a Guaranteed Interview Scheme for any applicant who declares they have a disability. If the applicant meets the minimum requirements for the role (as set out in the role profile and/or person specification) they will be guaranteed an interview.

**Role Profile**

**Supporting Customers**:
We use Psychologically Informed approaches and Trauma Informed Care principles to support our customers to develop new ways of thinking and to make steps towards independence, by:

- Leading on Co-producing bespoke support and move-on plans, involving key stakeholders (e.g. family/other support providers), where appropriate
- Organising and carrying out regular planned reviews of support and risk plans, or following an incident/significant change in a customer’s circumstances
- Engaging customers to meet agreed outcomes and develop life skills
- Assisting customers with day-to-day support and tenancy-related matters
- Identifying and promoting opportunities for employment, education and training and supporting customers to remove barriers to accessing these opportunities
- Signposting customers to appropriate external support services, including interventions such as food banks and other community resources
- Supporting customers to be ‘tenancy ready’ to enable successful move on
- Supporting customers to be financially independent through budgeting plans and maximising income
- Supporting and monitoring customers’ healthcare needs, ensuring appropriate contact with healthcare professionals
- Empowering customers