Assistant Service Manager

*About Us At Hounslow*
We'd love you to join us at the London Borough of Hounslow Our people are deeply committed to providing excellent services to our residents, doing all we can to make lives as good as they can be.

We are an outstanding council, serving an outstanding borough.

With brilliant, visionary leadership, a dynamic Cabinet and a can-do culture, we've built strong partnerships which have transformed how we serve one of London's most diverse boroughs. Hounslow is the world in one place and full of potential. We are stepping up for our residents like never before.

*About Our Commitment To Diversity And Inclusion*
We live by five core values: Lead with Heart, Do New, Pass on the Power, Harness the Mix and Be a Rock. All our work has equality, diversity and inclusion at its very heart, best articulated in "Harness the Mix". It's about breaking down barriers between our parts and people and unlocking the problem-solving power of our amazing mix of minds. We serve a diverse community, we have a diverse workforce and we are committed to being an inclusive employer.

We work hard to create representation across our workforce and leadership community, we have thriving employee network groups and our learning and development programmes help us lead, model and breathe ways of working that eliminate inequality, inequity, injustice and bias.

As part of this and under our commitments as a Disability Confident Employer, we make reasonable adjustments to accommodate our candidates. There's space for you to tell us what you need within our application form.

*Our Benefits
About The Role*
This is an exciting opportunity to join our Homelessness, Independence and Preventative Services which adopts a preventative approach across the housing, health and social care agendas. You must be professional, energetic and enthusiastic as we are interested in what you can bring to help us improve and develop our services to support some of our most vulnerable residents. We are looking for someone to take a lead role in housing allocations to council properties and nominations to Registered Providers

You are highly organised and will manage the team that allocate permanent council accommodation and nominate to Registered Providers to ensure properties are let as soon as practicably possible. You will ensure that viewings and signups for new tenancies are carried out promptly, taking account of individual customer needs. You will monitor and provide key performance data on Allocations.

You will engage with our service users via a combination of customer facing contact via telephone and email, ensuring customer records are accurate and up to date at all times. You are highly motivated to to promote our service and actively participate in developing service improvement across the Homelessness, Independence and Preventatives Services. You work collaboratively across the service and with other professionals to achieve individual outcomes for residents while supporting the shared goals of the council.

*About The Team You'll Be Working In*
This is an exciting and busy role in the Allocations team. The service is developing and progressing our agenda to reduce the use of temporary accommodation and achieve more upstream prevention outcomes.

• You directly manage a team of front-line staff who allocate Council and Registered Providers Housing. Your staff accompany service users on viewings.
• This is a key position with Homelessness, Independence and Preventative Services. If you want to work in the public sector and be part of a progressive team, this is a unique opportunity for you as we are interested in what you can bring to help us improve and develop our services for our customers. You are a visible leader adept at managing high volumes of work involving vulnerable residents. You will demonstrate compassion, energy and enthusiasm to be ready for a new and exciting challenge where every day is different.
• You will be working in a service that makes a real difference to the lives of people who are homeless or at risk of losing their housing.
• You will work collaboratively with your colleagues and partner agencies to develop and lead initiatives so that residents get the best service and opportunities to live independently and safely in their home so they are not at risk of homelessness.
• You will mentor and support staff handling a full range of complex, contentious and sensitive matters that arise when dealing with residents losing their home or already homelessness, ensuring resources are targeted in the right place at the right time and cross cutting issues are identified with joined up solutions borough wide.
• To operate effectively in a highly changeable and demanding working environment with multiple competing priorities, ensuring timely and relevant interventions are carried out to prevent escalation of need, decisions are made to fulfil statutory requirements and legal challenges are responded to.

*About You*
You have extensive knowledge and experience of the Housing Act 1996 (as amended) and the Homelessness Reduction Act 2017, working with vulnerable people, and experience of leading multi-disciplinary housing teams and work involving complex needs and diverse client groups and an expert knowledge of homelessness and associated legislation.

• You have a strong ability to lead, motivate, manage and develop staff in a challenging, high volume, fast paced working environment, supporting staff to deal effectively with the demands of frontline work while delivering key service objectives.
• You are an expert communicator who engages effectively with a broad range of people, including applicants, colleagues, and elected members, to motivate, influence, negotiate and persuade and achieve multi-disciplinary outcomes to meet wide ranging needs.
• You act with integrity, take personal responsibility and handle stress effectively, being a confident decision maker while motivating others to achieve successful corporate preventative outcomes, using proactive and creative solutions.
• You work flexibly and independently, adapting to changing needs and proactively keep the team up to date with legislation, policy and guidance to ensure legally compliant recommendations and decisions.
• You have excellent analytical and problem-solving skills, a comprehensive understanding of issues faced by vulnerable people and you work collaboratively with others to meet a range of needs while leading and managing a team to achieve targets and service objectives and make the team the very best it can be.
• It is desirable that you have a degree or equivalent qualifications.
• You can travel independently around the Borough to visit properties and meet other professionals in community settings.

If the points above resonate with you, we would like to hear from you.

• Are you passionate about customer services?
• Are you an experienced homelessness professional?
• Are you looking to workin

Read more about the work you'll be doing in the Role Profile.

*When Interviews Will Be Held And Who To Contact*
The key information you need about the role should be in the role profile, but if you have any further questions about the role, please contact:

*Email:
Interviews for this job will be held during November 2025.
(Internal Candidates - please seek your line manager approval before applying for this role as secondment.)
Email:
Interviews for this job will be held during November 2025.
(Internal Candidates - please seek your line manager approval before applying for this role as secondment.)*