Member Job Opportunity: Barnardo's - Advocate (Fixed Term)

Location: Lancashire Locality
Salary: £24,723 - £34,095 (FTE)​
Contract type: Fixed term
End date: 31 December 2023
Hours: 35
Closing Date: 20 March 2023
Interview Date: w/c 27th March 2023

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Barnardo's Include me 2
History of Service
The service has historically offered a wide range services short breaks  services to children and young people aged 0-18 who have a wide range of special educational needs and disabilities. The service offers both a short break to parents and quality play and leisure activities to children and young people with activities for a mixture of pre-school, primary and secondary.

The service also delivers an Advocacy, Independent Visitors and Mentoring service in Blackburn with Darwen. Providing support to young people needing independent guidance, advice or support ensuring their voice is heard.

Objectives of role
The post will be predominantly to act as an advocate for young people providing support to children in need, children in care and care leavers. You will be required to work very much on your own initiative to manage a caseload and engage volunteers to be independent visitors and mentors and ensure positive outcomes for each child or young person in regards to a plan that will clearly meet their individual needs and identify and respond to any issues. The post holder with be expected to flexibly across services and will also include some time working in the short breaks service, this aspect of the role will include some evenings and  weekends  supporting the direct delivery of group work sessions for children and young people with SEND. The post holder will also need to take responsibility for leading events and delegating to other staff or volunteers.

Initial Specific Responsibilities

• Carry an individual case load of children and young people requiring advocacy
• Work some evenings or weekends to be on hand for advice or support if needed and undertake direct work
• Record and ensure that all recordings are completed in a timely and appropriate way also monitoring the recording of volunteers.
• Promote the services on offer by visiting schools, social work teams, health professionals and foster carer group
• Liaise with other professionals during referral and to resolve issues
• Supervise staff and volunteers as required
• Support volunteers through the recruitment process and training to become independent visitors or mentors.
• Keep up to date with local and national information in relation to both the role of the Advocate and legislation regarding the implementation of the Children and Families Act 2014 and other relevant policies and documents
• Feed back any key issues regarding the processes to line management
• Collate monitoring information to be presented on an on-going basis to the commissioners

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You will be employed to work in the Lancashire Locality and you be based in Include Me 2 base in Lostock Hall covering work in Blackburn with Darwen.

Please note the post holder will be required to support young people to attend meetings across Blackburn with Darwen and  Lancashire so will be required to hold a driving licence. 

Workplace Offer: What it means for you
The world of work has changed. We are understanding of what works best for our colleagues both current and future as we look to embrace this new way of working. Our hybrid working initiative is based on trust, flexibility and empowerment. We understand our workplace offer means different things to different people, and we encourage those conversations. This may mean working at one of our stores, services, working at home, at one of our Collaboration Hubs or any combination of these.

Benefits

• Barnardo's believe in creating equality of opportunity in the workplace and supporting people to manage their work-life balance; we are therefore open to offering flexible working arrangements.
• 26 days annual leave plus bank holidays, increasing after 5 years service
• The ability to buy up to another 5 days annual leave via our HolidayPlus scheme
• A host of family friendly leave options including company Maternity Paternity and Adoption pay; together with all family additional leave options
• Service related sick pay from day 1
• Access to a Group Personal Pension with a matched 4% or 6% contribution from Barnardo's. Ability to pay via salary sacrifice to garner both tax and NI savings on your own contribution
• Death in service cover of 4x annual earnings for all staff contributing to our Group Personal Pension
• Cycle2work scheme
• Interest free season ticket loans
• Discounts and cashback from at high street shops including major supermarkets, cinemas, gyms, leisure/theme parks, holidays and much more via our Benefit Portal
• Opportunity to purchase a health cash plan to claim towards dental, glasses, therapy etc
• Free access to round the clock employee assistance program for advice and support
• Access to Barnardo's Corporate University

*T&C's apply based on contract

We know that our colleagues go above and beyond in delivering our vital work, driven by their passion and commitment to Barnardo's values.  We also know that we can only realise our ambitions and achieve better outcomes for more children, thanks to the talent, hard work and creativity of our people.

For all these reasons, we are committed to a new approach to pay and reward, to ensure it is fair, attractive and progressive, which should be in place by 1st April 2023. This is a positive change for the charity, and a key pillar of our People & Culture Strategy. It will assist us in supporting colleagues to grow and develop in their career at Barnardo's.

Please note due to the high volume of applications for some posts, this advert might close before the displayed closing date. We recommend that you apply for this role as soon as possible.

About Barnardo's
At Barnardo's we believe in children – no matter who they are, what they have done or what they have been through. Please read about our basis and values following the link below. You will be asked questions relating to them as part of the recruitment process for this role.

Barnardo's is committed to having a diverse and inclusive workforce for staff and volunteers. We actively encourage applications from disabled, Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic candidates as they are under-represented within Barnardo's.

Full details and application documents here
https://jobs.barnardos.org.uk