Marketing and Communication Worker

**The service**:
Foster4 is a sector-leading, pioneering foster carer recruitment service, a collaboration between three Local Authorities in Cheshire; Cheshire West & Chester, Halton and Warrington. The service was created with the aim of recruiting, retaining and supporting more Local Authority foster carers. By pooling resources and expertise, we have been able to significantly streamline the customer journey pipeline, strengthen the support offer to carers and become more commercially visible across the region. As a result, enquiries into fostering with us increased by over 40% in the first year.

Ultimately, by making the Local Authority the number one service of choice for anyone considering fostering in Cheshire, Foster4 is vital in ensuring that, where appropriate, local children and young people have the best possible chances of being cared for by local people, in their own local area. This can contribute significantly to children and young people having stable, happy childhoods, early permanence and positive futures.

We already have over 600 families who foster with us across the Foster4 LAs, who undertake an exceptional role in caring for our children and young people. We are ambitious to continue to develop a sector-leading service, further increasing our placement capacity, quality and stability.

Now live for nearly four years, it’s an exciting time to join our service and help us to continue to expand. Foster4 is well-established and wider development work is progressing rapidly. There are ambitions to further align the training, placement sufficiency and assessment functions across the three Local Authorities. A robust governance structure and work streams, made up of representatives from across the region, are driving this work forward to create an even better experience of foster care for children, young people and foster carers.

**The role**:
The Foster4 Board are now looking for an exceptional, experienced marketer with creative flair and commercial acumen, to act as the regional Marketing and Communication Manager. This role is part time, 18.5 hours per week.

The post-holder will be responsible for the marketing of the Foster4 service and driving the recruitment of foster carers across the three Cheshire Local Authorities, as well as undertaking further development work beyond the marketing and recruitment remit. The role will be based in Warrington, with regular travel across the region.

You will work alongside a 0.2FTE Marketing Assistant and a team of Fostering Support workers, who undertake the initial recruitment activity and work virtually across the three LAs. The FSWs are each based in the Warrington hub 2-4 days per week, and within their linked Local Authority on the remaining days.

As a collaboration of three LAs, Foster4 is also a major stakeholder in the wider, north-west-wide work undertaken by You Can Foster and Placements North West. Therefore, the post-holder will also be responsible for ensuring Foster4’s is acknowledged and for disseminating Foster4’s best practice on a regional level.

As the role will involve the transportation, erection and staffing of the service’s promotional stand, particularly during the summer outreach events programme, access to a car and a good level of physical fitness will be required. Flexibility to undertake planned evening and weekend work, regular evening and weekend welfare checks and out-of-hours social media monitoring will also be required.

**How to apply**:
**Key dates**:
DBS clearance is required.

The ability to converse at ease with customers and provide advice in accurate spoken English is essential for the post.

Warrington Borough Council is a Disability Confident employer