Practice Manager Foster Care

**Practice Manager
- Practice Manager Foster Care**

As a Practice Manager (Fostering) at Community Foster Care you will be driven to promote the Child or Young Person’s ambitions and dreams, offering support to your team of Social Workers and reporting to the Registered Manager. You will do this by recruiting,enabling and enhancing foster families to provide safe, stable, loving, nurturing family homes. Children and Young People seeking to live within these families will have often experienced significant trauma and abuse. Enabling Children and Young people tothrive in our foster families will therefore require a number of special ingredients, which you will need to develop and nurture.

**Role Requirements**

**Qualifications**:

- CQSW, Diploma in Social Work.
- BA in Social Work.
- Relevant post qualification awards.
- Practice Educator Certificate.
- Business /Management Qualification.

Experience/Skills
- Extensive experience of working with children and families.
- Five years post qualifying experience to include: Experience of enabling reflective supervision of line reports and effective management of staff performance.
- Experience of working with Local Authority childcare teams.
- Experience of successful management of complaints and/or serious allegations.
- The skill to analyse information and formulate outcome focused services/care plans, risk assessments and assessments.

Miscellaneous
- Ability to work flexible hours including evening and weekends.
- Ability to participate in a Telephone Out of Hours support rota for Foster Carers and

Social Workers.
- Ability to travel freely mainly in the region, but occasionally on a national basis.
- Full current driving licence.

**Role Responsibilities (not limited to)**
- Manage operational effectiveness of the team, Supervising Social Workers, allocating and prioritising workloads and taking responsibility for ensuring all cases are safely managed. In some circumstances manage a case directly to ensure safe resolution.
- Ensure that social work case records, assessments, plans and documentation for all children and young people for whom the team is responsible are effectively maintained in line with practice standards and organisational policy and procedure.
- Chair meetings as required, such as carer reviews, end of placement reviews, stability meetings and Standards of Care meetings etc.
- To establish and maintain effective working relationships with Local Authorities and other key agencies to achieve best outcomes for young people and to represent the agency in external forums.
- Work with colleagues within Community Foster Care to promote the retention of Foster Carers, by ensuring that there are effective partnership relationships between the agency and the Foster Carers. To ensure that Foster Carers’ issues are understood, andproblems resolved.
- Work with tenacity and courage in line with best practice to safeguard all children.
- Facilitate and arrange learning and development opportunities for Foster Carers.
- To engage in monthly supervision with your designated line manager.
- To identify own training needs and to attend training courses in order to improve practice and in accordance with Social Work England requirements.

**Company**

We create bright futures by connecting children with foster carers.

We provide the tools, support and community to enable foster carers to create better futures for the children in their care.

**Why should you apply?**
- The chance to join a fantastic company.
- To become part of a hardworking, dedicated team.
- To showcase your current knowledge and skill set in the field.
- To be a proactive member of the company.

**Application deadline is Friday 1st April with interviews on 5th April.