This is an exciting opportunity to lead and shape practice and improve outcome for our children and families based on the national reforms and other government initiatives. We are looking for a committed and compassionate leader who has substantial experience of working in Children Social Care to apply for our Assistant Director of Family Help and Prevention post.
About us
Our ambition is for Newham to be a place where every child and young person enjoys the best possible opportunities in life – through outstanding education; first-rate youth services; exceptional family support and social care services that ensure no child is left behind.
Newham is a unique place. The youngest and most diverse borough in London – with almost a quarter of residents aged under-18 and more than 100 languages spoken – it is an exciting and challenging place to work with children. Despite its extraordinary potential, this is a borough that experiences huge socio-economic challenges, deprivation and unemployment; with more than half of children living in poverty and stark inequalities.
You will provide strategic leadership across shaping our Family Help offer in Newham including the ongoing development of Family Hubs. You will oversee the Family Help, MASH, EDT and the NRPF Teams. You will lead on the development of strategic plans and implementation of new statutory legislations or guidance linked to the national reforms. You will oversee Newham’s development of Best Start Family Hubs, as part of the government’s ambitious plan to give every child the best start in life.
You will work collaboratively with partners, residents and colleagues across the Council to deliver our key priorities based on the national reforms, statutory guidance relating to Family Hubs, leading by example and demonstrating the positive values and behaviours necessary to achieve the Department and the Council’s vision. The job description is attached for your information.
How to Apply
If you are interested in applying for this post, please submit your CV and supporting statement with no more than 2 A4 sides explaining what experience, knowledge and skills equip you for the role, including the key objectives listed above and how you would be successful in the role. Consider the core essential criteria for the role and identify how you meet this.
If you are interested in this role and would like an informal conversation with our Director of Early Help and Safeguarding, please email Mahfuzul Khan at mahfuzul.khan@newham.gov.uk
The closing date is Sunday 09/11/25
We’re a vibrant, dynamic, culturally rich London Borough with a young population and limitless potential. We’re a challenging yet rewarding place for social work practise to flourish and we are steadfastly committed to our workforce being representative of the families that we work with. We are taking coordinated, meaningful and focused action to develop an inclusive culture because we believe this is at the heart of enabling diversity in all respects, including diversity of thought. We are taking positive actions to challenge all forms of discrimination and injustice to help make Newham a fairer and more equitable place for children and families to live, learn and thrive.
We’re building a fairer Newham through investment, co-production and by continuously developing our 'Circles of Support' practice model; centring on systemic and restorative practice and a specialist support offer for our practitioners. Ofsted described Newham as having a positive culture of learning and development and we always try to develop talent in-house. We promoted 30 internal colleagues in 2023 alone, and have put more than 47 practitioners through further education since 2020. We value your development and at Newham career progression is a reality for many of our colleagues.
We understand that social work can be a challenging yet ultimately very rewarding profession that makes demands of you personally and professionally. In Newham we value your wellbeing and we aim to ensure that you have a better work/life balance through a remote working offer when you are not visiting children and families, a modern office space for when you’re on site, a flexible working policy where all requests are considered, and a clinical offer to support you to do your best work.
We’ve been working hard to make Newham a great place to practise social work:
