Head of Homelessness Prevention

**About Us**:
**THE EXTRAORDINARY STORY OF SERENA’S VISION**

Growth, Housing and Planning in Westminster City Council is a world of extraordinary stories. Where innovative and open-minded people bring everything to the cause. Even expertise from surprising places.

Take Serena. She is an absolute force of nature at the heart of our Church Street regeneration. And she puts the residents first in everything. Serena’s vision is clear. Regeneration isn’t just about bricks and concrete. It’s about communities. It’s about the environment. It’s about the lives of people and how they feel about where they call home. Serena is their advocate, making sure residents’ voices aren’t just heard, but drive the changes we’re making. The future is safe in her hands.

Please view the extraordinary story of Serena’s Vision **here**.

**The Role**:
As our Head of Homelessness Prevention & Commissioning in Housing Needs, you’ll make your own powerful contribution to the lives of Westminster’s most vulnerable residents, especially those who are homeless or at risk of homelessness.

Working closely with the Director of Housing and Divisional Head of Housing Needs, you will provide strategic direction for the service. This will include leadership of a multidisciplinary team who commission and deliver homelessness prevention services, outreach rough sleeping management and contracts to meet our statutory homelessness requirements. You will also take the lead in building and managing new partnerships to deliver frontline support services and accommodation, which meet our aims of prevention, intervention and recovery.

As a member of the council’s senior leadership team, you will provide expert input on housing issues for members and other stakeholders, and play a high-profile role in influencing policy development and informing best practice at a national level.

Please refer to the **Job Description** for more information.

**About You**:
You’ll bring substantial experience of the housing or homelessness sector, gained within a local authority, charity or other relevant organisation. A supportive and empowering leader, you’ll be used to managing performance to help teams and individuals deliver their best. In addition, you’ll lead by example through your own commitment to learning and ongoing self-development.

Financially astute, you’re able to create productive working relationships with service providers and other external partners. Meanwhile, your well-developed leadership skills will ensure you are confident about driving change and taking services to the next level. A track-record of successfully managing large budgets and delivering on business plans is essential.

The Council and its partners are committed to achieving diverse shortlists for all vacancies at Band 4 or above to support our desire to increase the number of staff from underrepresented groups in our workforce. As part of this ambition, if you are from a Black, Asian and Multiple Ethnic backgrounds (B.A.ME.) you can self-declare this to the hiring manager as part of our positive action commitments.

**What We Offer**:
Westminster is an amazing place. There are 250,000 diverse residents, over 50,000 vibrant and vital businesses and three-quarters-of-a-million people working here every day. Our mission is to create a city for all. We’re an organisation that wants the very best for our residents: a supportive and safe environment, the chance to grow and learn throughout their lives, to build fantastic careers in world-leading industries, to have access to high-quality, affordable housing and to retire into the community with dignity and pride.

We want Westminster to be a place where you can make the most of your talents and thrive as an individual. That’s why we’re proud to have won Best Health & Wellbeing Initiative in the 2020/21 Business Culture Awards. By being the best you can be, you’ll help us adapt to the changing needs of our organisation and communities.

At Westminster City Council, we are passionate about our aim to be an inclusive workplace for all that reflects the communities we serve, and we believe everyone is valued. We particularly welcome applicants from underrepresented backgrounds, including B.A.ME (Black, Asian and Multiple Ethnic backgrounds), LGBTQ+ and those with hidden or visible disabilities. We’re committed to ensuring all our staff - regardless of gender, age, religion, sexuality, ethnicity or disability - can succeed. We value diversity and appreciate that people work in different ways. So, as a Timewise employer we work to provide flexible working arrangements and an empowering environment that enables you to be your best, that is the Westminster Way.