Quality Assurance Lead (Children's Social Care)

This is an exciting and fast paced role to support the strategic aims of Staffordshire County Council Children's Social Care.  You will  help enable practice excellence and practice evaluation to support effective learning and creating a culture of innovation.

If you have the drive and commitment to support this exciting journey we look forward to your application. 

This role is a full time, 2 year fixed term role ending 31 December 2026 and is a hybrid role. There is expectation that part of your week will be office based. 

Main Responsibilities

You will work as part of the Practice Excellence Team to and be expected:

• to lead in providing expert quality assurance analysis reports, guidance and support to staff to improve auditing across Children's Social Care includung:
  • quality assurance activity, quality assurance analysis, development and implementation of improvement plans following analysis.
  •  Improvement (process & change management within social work practice)
  • Practice improvement across all levels of social work practice
  • Co-production, staff engagement and training, to improve practice and develop professional social work skills.
• to support the implementation of continuous improvement activity across Children’s Social Care relating to Social Work Practice.
• to promote and lead in line with our Children and Families vision, working in a relational and restorative way.   
• to engage all stakeholders to develop, review and implement innovative and effective quality assurance analysis and planning as as a relational leader 
• to develop in-house auditing experts and support in promoting learning, practice improvement and staff development based upon audit analysis alongside the workforce development team. 
• be confident in audit analysis and practice improvement to enable us to further build on a culture of learning.
• critically challenge social work practice and work with colleagues to effect change, improving standards of practice for children and families.
• work closely with colleagues across Children’s Social Care, and within the Intelligence, Performance and Engagement Team (IPET). 

The Ideal Candidate

You will have :

• substantial social work post qualifying experience
• Knowledge of current best practice in social work and learning and development.
• Up to date knowledge of social work training and practice
• Understanding of auditing methodology including how to capture and report on learning, understanding operational and strategic requirements.
• Experience of overseeing, directing and evaluating social work practice, with an awareness of what excellent social work practice looks like.
• Experience of delivering a range of learning methods such as group training, coaching, mentoring and one to one support
• Experience of working within a team to provide an excellent service

Interviews will be held on Monday 16th December 2024

Don’t feel you meet all the requirements? We value transferable skills and experiences so consider applying anyway or for an informal chat about the role please contact Jennie Arries, Head of Practice Excellence & Principal Social Worker. Jennifer.Arries@Staffordshire.gov.uk 

“We’re happy to talk flexible working” 

Our Recruitment Process: We anonymise applications during shortlisting to ensure only relevant information is considered. Please complete your application fully, especially the supporting statement, to highlight what you’ll bring to the role.

About Staffordshire County Council

We are no ordinary county council:

Our Values:

The core of who we are as an organisation. Just like we all have personal values that shape our thoughts and behaviour, organisational values drive how we think and act collectively.

Our values were created and shaped by colleague feedback and national best practice and they sit at the heart of People Strategy:

We have a real sense of community spirit that brings our people together. This feeling of belonging means we are all connected to what we do and take pride in the difference we make every day for Staffordshire people. We are ambitious and our sights are set firmly on a better future.

We look forward and race ahead - that goes for your career too. 

Our benefits:

We recognise that it is our employees that are central to everything we do. We aim to create a supportive working environment where employees can achieve their full potential and achieve a healthy work-life balance. 

In addition to your salary, as a member of staff, you will have access to Our rewards and benefits - Careers at Staffordshire

Our recruitment process:

As an Authority we are committed to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children and young people/vulnerable adults and expect all staff and volunteers to share this commitment.

Staffordshire County Council is an equal opportunities organisation and Disability Confident employer. We encourage applications from all background and communities

As part of our commitment as a Disability Confident employer, a Gold Award Armed Forces employer and our commitment to supporting care leavers - we offer a guaranteed interview as long as your application meets the minimum criteria for the post. 

As you’ll know safeguarding and promoting the welfare of our children and young people/vulnerable adults is important to us and that’s why this position is subject to a criminal record check from the Disclosure and Barring Service. If applicable you should disclose details of unspent and unfiltered spent reprimands, formal warnings, cautions and convictions in your application form.