Director of Children's Services
Job Title: Director of Children's Services
Salary: £77,326 per annum (£75,076 per annum salary + £1,500 per annum Out of Hours Rota Allowance + £750 per annum Homeworking Allowance)
Hours & Contract: 35 Hours per week - Permanent Role
Location: Homebased - This post holder will be responsible for London and the South of England - travel to area teams will be required (East London, South London, South Coast, Kent, South West, Bristol)
As a ‘not for profit’ organisation, TACT puts the needs of our children and carers first and look to appoint individuals who are as passionate about fostering as we are. We are a homeworking organisation, and we pride ourselves on our flexible working opportunities, available from day one, an extensive wellbeing programme and our benefits package, all curated to nurture a healthy work life balance for all our employees so they can give an excellent service to our carers and the young people and children we care for.
As a foster care charity, TACT invests all surplus income into services, staff, carers, and child development. This means that we have been able to invest unique projects like TACT Connect, our unique and ground-breaking scheme for TACT care experienced young people and adults, as well as our expanding TACT Education Service and our new Health Service. All our activities are built on our commitment to becoming a fully trauma informed organisation, in line with our key values and ethos.
TACT achieved 16th place in the UK Best Companies Work For survey results in 2023, with 91% of employees acknowledging that the organisation is run on strong values and principles and 94% stating they feel proud to work for this organisation.
This is an exciting opportunity to join TACT, at Director level. Managing operational Area Managers and Specialist Team Leads, the post-holder will lead the provision of excellent services and set the direction for future developments across the organisation, including service improvement and growth initiatives. The role is underpinned by a confident social worker with senior management experience who can work collaboratively with teams to achieve successful outcomes and high quality impact. This operational Director will work with a team of Directors to ensure TACT meets it's strategic goals and will have a particular focus on TACT's participation and children's rights strategy and responsibility for our TACT Connect Scheme.
Overall Duties of the Director of Children's Services will include:
- Lead on activity to achieve outstanding outcomes for children.
- Hold accountability and responsibility for the delivery of key areas of focus from TACT’s strategic plan.
- Setting direction to equip line reports to deliver and achieve TACT’s strategic direction.
- Represent the charity with Governments of the UK and other external stakeholders, including regulatory bodies.
- Hold overall responsibility for safeguarding and regulatory reporting requirements within assigned areas of control.
- Support and work alongside the Agency Decision Maker and policy lead to develop and implement operational policies and procedures.
TACT offer an excellent employee benefits package including:
- 31 days paid holiday plus bank holidays.
- Flexible working arrangements (including compressed hours, flexibility around core hours, volunteer days policy).
- Family friendly policies.
- Homeworking ‘bundle’ including annual allowance, IT equipment and a loan for home office set up.
- Perkbox – retail discount scheme.
- Stakeholder pension scheme (salary sacrifice).
- Fantastic learning and development opportunities.
- Employee Assistance Programme (including CBT counselling, remote GP appointments, physiotherapy, mental health support and second opinions).
The Director of Children's Services will be homebased will be required to travel to face-to-face meetings across the organisation and on other occasions for training and team wellbeing events.
An Enhanced DBS clearance is required for this role and will be processed by TACT on your behalf.
Please see the Job Information Pack, Job Description and TACT website at tactcare.org.uk for more detailed information.
- Closing Date: Wednesday 6th March 2024
- Interview Dates: Monday 18th March and and Wednesday 20th March 2024 (via Microsoft Teams)
- There will be a two stage interview process starting with a panel interview on 18th March 2024. The second stage interview for successful candidates will take place on the evening of 20th March 2024 and will be a group session led by our TACT Connect Community.
Safeguarding is everyone’s business and TACT believes that only the people with the right skills and values should work in social work. As part of TACT’s commitment to safeguarding, we properly examine the skills, experience, qualifications, and values of potential staff in relation to our work with vulnerable young children. We use rigorous and consistent recruitment approaches to help safeguard TACT’s young people. All our staff are expected to work in line with TACT’s safeguarding policies.
We reserve the right to close a vacancy earlier than advertised if the volume of applications is excessive, you are therefore advised to apply at your earliest convenience.
TACT does not accept unsolicited CVs from external recruitment agencies, nor the fees associated with them.