Family Support Worker

**About Us**:
At Purple Elephant in the Room, we work with vulnerable families in **Swindon,**
**Gloucestershire, Somerset and Devon**.

Often the families we work with are experiencing a time of crisis. Our aim, where possible is to keep families together and to ensure children can be looked after in their own home or community.

We are looking for Family Support Workers to join our Outreach Team of permanent and bank workers. We provide a 24/7 family support service. The hours for this role will vary depending on each family’s needs.

If you would like to help families where possible stay together, this could the job for you.

We require staff who can work early shifts, day shifts, late shifts, night shifts and weekends. **You will be required to work a combination of shifts including nights and weekends.**

The primary role of the Family Support Worker is to ensure safety for the child.
You will work in the community alongside parents, supporting them to care safely for their child. We also offer bespoke individual and groupwork to parents.

The family may be experiencing difficulties for variety of reasons, this may include:

- Domestic abuse
- Poor parental mental health
- Substance Misuse
- Exploitation
- Experience of Childhood Trauma
- A history of abuse and neglectful parenting;
- Learning Difficulties and Learning Disabilities;
**Role and responsibilities**
- Your main responsibility will be ensuring the safety and wellbeing of the child, parent and other staff;
- You will develop positive relationships with families, but your role remains focussed on the needs of the child and how these needs will be met;
- You will be responsible for the care and support of the child if the parents experience difficulties for any reason;
- The level of observation required will vary and you will know your individual responsibility to ensure this is met;
- The purpose of the plan you will help the team to deliver will vary depending on the needs of each family and each plan is tailored to that child and parent’s needs. You will know what to do based on the Assessing Social Worker’s needs and risk assessment and care plans;
- The plan of support may involve encouraging, teaching, modelling and supporting the parents in a number of specific parenting tasks such as managing challenging behaviour, developing understanding of health needs, basic care, ensuring their child’s safety at home and in the community, sharing knowledge around domestic abuse, and learning how to budget and undertake daily household tasks;
- Recording factual information based on your conversations and observations
- You will be able to share your recordings effectively with parents and discuss feedback confidently with the parents to support their development;
- You will work collaboratively with a multi-disciplinary team of social workers, health professionals and therapists to ensure that the child and family’s needs are best to achieve a set of holistic outcomes.

We therefore need **Bank and Permanent **Family Support Workers who can work day and night shifts, both in the week and at weekends.

This position requires the applicant to have clean enhanced Disclosure and Barring Service Check. Purple Elephant in the Room will meet of the cost of obtaining this check.

**Our Family Support Workers have**:

- The ability to communicate respectfully, sensitively and empathetically with children and adults
- The ability to work within guidance and safety plans to ensure the correct level of observation is afforded to the child
- The ability to build good working relationships with families who may find it difficult to accept support from professionals
- The ability to de-escalate challenging behaviours
- The ability to work collaboratively with Social Workers, Health Visitors and therapeutic professionals within the team, as well as other professionals in the family’s network
- Practical knowledge and understanding of child development and the needs of children across the lifespan
- The ability to observe and assist parents with their future ability to manage their home and budgeting
- The ability to be entirely non-judgemental and committed to supporting people in difficult circumstances
- The ability to record accurate and objective, factual information based on your conversations and observations
- The ability to challenge where appropriate and to be professionally curious about a child’s lived experience
- Positive listening skills and be committed to developing a professional relationship with children and their families
- The ability to stay calm under pressure and manage crisis with the support of managers
- Good organisational skills
- The ability to work both independently and as part of a team
- Good IT skills

**What you need**:

- Working with children or families: 1 year (Essential)
- UK driving licence and access to a vehicle (Essential)
- Ability to work a combination of days, nights and weekends (Essential)
- Childca