Service Manager for Family Support, Child Protection & Court

Posted 31st Jul, 2025
Location
Brent
Salary/rate
£66,305 – £74,213
Working pattern
Full-time – 36 hours per week
Working arrangements
Blended
Contract type
Permanent
Closing date
17th Aug, 2025
About the role

Your Opportunity to Lead Brent’s Family Support Transformation

We are seeking an experienced, passionate and committed Service Manager to lead and oversee these multi-disciplinary teams. You will play a crucial role in delivering high-quality, timely support to children and families, ensuring that our services meet and exceed the expectations set out in the Families First agenda.

As Service Manager, you will:

  • Provide strategic and operational leadership across two Family Support teams and three Child Protection and Court teams, ensuring consistent delivery of excellent social work practice.
  • Oversee assessments and interventions, ensuring they are timely, thorough, and informed by the latest research and best practice.
  • Lead service development by embedding the redesigned multi-agency approach, fostering innovation, and strengthening collaboration with key partners such as health services, education, the police, and voluntary sector organisations.
  • Ensure compliance and performance management, meeting key performance indicators and regulatory requirements while managing budgets effectively to deliver services within agreed financial limits.
  • Chair and contribute to key decision-making forums, including the Entry to Care Panel, providing leadership and oversight on critical cases and safeguarding concerns.
  • Support your teams’ professional development through excellent supervision and performance management, motivating staff to achieve their best.
  • Promote equality, diversity, and inclusion in all aspects of service delivery, ensuring that our families receive fair and equitable support.
  • Deputise for the Head of Service as needed, representing the service in senior meetings and across the council.

Ready to Lead the Future of Family Support?

If you are a skilled, visionary leader who wants to make a tangible difference in the lives of Brent’s children and families, we want to hear from you. Interview & Assessments are expected to take place: W/C 1st September 2025.

For an informal discussion about the role, please contact Amanda Jales, Resourcing Business Partner 📧 amanda.jales@brent.gov.uk

Apply now to join Brent Council and be a key part of our Families First vision. Your leadership will help transform lives!

About you

In addition to being committed to providing the best possible outcomes for our young people and their families, you will have:

  • Significant post-qualifying experience with a proven track record in social work management, preferably within child and family services.
  • Strong leadership skills, capable of managing multiple teams and complex caseloads under pressure.
  • Excellent communication and interpersonal skills to build supportive, positive cultures within your teams and foster collaborative relationships with external partners.
  • Effective performance management abilities, with experience in supervision, appraisal, and addressing performance issues constructively.
  • Sound financial management skills to oversee budgets and ensure cost-effective service delivery.
  • A commitment to the principles of the Families First agenda and a clear vision for multi-agency working to improve outcomes for children and families.
  • Resilience, adaptability, and a problem-solving mindset in a fast-paced, demanding environment.
About Brent

Brent is a tremendously vibrant London borough where the iconic arch of Wembley Stadium dominates the skyline. Spanning both inner and outer London, it is a borough of huge contrasts in terms of its economic, environmental, ethnic and social make up. Learn more about Brent and our communities by watching this video:

Brent Children and Young People Services boasts a bright and buzzy atmosphere where colleagues are friendly, supportive and get stuck in. Brent is the 2020 London Borough of Culture(s) where people are proud of their culture and background – and we are proud of our diverse workforce. Working in a well-connected borough, in state-of-the-art buildings, you’ll be surrounded by restaurants, coffee shops and facilities if you to choose to work in Brent.

We have a great rewards packages for social workers up to senior team managers. We provide a welcome and retention payment when you join, which includes: 

  • Key worker rental housing in Wembley for permanent social workers (subject to availability)

  • Golden hello and relocation packages (for hard to recruit to roles)

  • Annual retention payment for all social work qualified staff. 

You will also receive:

  • A commitment to manageable caseloads across all teams.

  • The Social Work progression framework, enabling you to move to senior social worker and beyond when you’re ready. We are committed to retaining the best staff and providing you with the support and opportunities to achieve that.

  • Group and 1-2-1 supervision.

  • A small team model, supported by practice consultants with training in systemic and reflective practice.

  • A culture of highly effective flexible working, supported with some of the best IT in local government.

  • A very generous Local Government Pension Scheme.

  • A host of other rewards and benefits such as reduced cost gym membership, London Designer Outlet privilege card, Wembley Boxpark privilege card plus many more. 

If you’d like to know more about Brent and working in children and young people’s services, please visit our website. If you are interested in having an informal discussion about working in children's social care in Brent please contact: