Senior advice worker jobs in Birmingham
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About Kinship
We are Kinship. The leading kinship care charity in England and Wales. We’re here for kinship carers – friends or family who step up to raise a child when their parents aren’t able to.
Together, let’s commit to change for kinship families.
Purpose of the role:
As a Kinship Family Worker for Kinship Reach, you will deliver this online programme to families in your commissioned area. You will provide virtual one-to-one support to kinship carers and their families to help them become resilient and informed, with a strong support network to help them care for the children in their care.
Key responsibilities:
One-to-one support
Provide up to 6 one-to-one support sessions bespoke to the kinship carers and their families over a three-month intervention, working within the Kinship Reach delivery model. This may include, but is not limited to:
- Signposting or referring to relevant national and local services.
- Providing practical and emotional support to kinship carers.
- Liaising with other professionals and organisations.
- Making referrals to other Kinship services such as Advice, Someone Like Me, Peer-to-Peer.
- Providing support for carers to secure grants from local and national funders.
- Set goals for change following Kinship Reach processes, in partnership with the kinship carer.
- Monitor, review and revise these goals to ensure carers are on track and goals remain relevant.
Peer group facilitation and management
Kinship delivers virtual peer support groups which carers from Kinship’s programmes can access, coordinated by Senior Kinship Family Worker(s). This role could include:
- Developing existing groups and setting up new groups as required.
- Working closely with Kinship’s peer-to-peer service where appropriate.
- Collaborating with kinship carers, the local authority, and community partners to set up virtual and in-person peer support groups.
- Planning, preparing, facilitating virtual and in-person peer support groups.
- Promoting groups in the area you are delivering in to kinship carers and organisations who work with them, including contributing to the creation of promotional materials.
Participation
- Recruit kinship carers as volunteers to lead and support the development of virtual peer support groups.
- Work proactively to enable kinship carers to influence the design and delivery of the peer support groups delivered in their area (such as topics, time / date).
- Support Kinship’s communications and engagement strategy, such as helping to provide case studies and sourcing images for newsletters and local media to promote the programme and recruit participants.
Safeguarding and risk management
Kinship has a robust safeguarding structure. You will be supported by a Designated Safeguarding Lead (DSL) and Designated Deputy Safeguarding Leads (DDSL).
- Recognise and respond appropriately to signs of abuse or neglect, following national legislation and procedures and Kinship’s own safeguarding procedures.
- Liaise with your line manager and safeguarding lead regarding safeguarding concerns, following Kinship’s policies and processes.
- Provide reports and information for managers about cases of concern.
- Ensure you are aware of and follow safeguarding policies and procedures risk of harm protocol.
- Complete risk assessments for events or groups with families in line with Kinship’s policies and processes to be signed off by a DSL or DDSL.
- Follow Kinship’s health and safety policies to keep yourself and your clients safe, such as Lone Working Policy, Home Visit Policy, risk assessment, events.
Monitoring and Evaluation
- Record attendance at virtual support groups and ensure this is reported on the Salesforce database.
- Ensure casework, feedback, and other data related to service delivery are regularly and accurately recorded on our Salesforce database in line with Kinship’s policy and best practice.
- Ensure completion of carer registration forms, review forms, and closure forms, taking details that will be used to evidence impact.
- Collect case studies from your kinship carers to help demonstrate impact.
- Contribute to any reports for local authority partners as required in terms of data and case studies as required.
- Attend monitoring meetings as required.
- Engage in quality assurance processes in line with Kinship processes and policies.
Relationship and stakeholder management
- In partnership with the senior Kinship Family Worker, enable local authorities to understand the programme and pathways for how to make referrals.
- Support practitioners' meetings with local authorities to encourage referrals, discuss cases, and ensure local authority confidence in the programme.
- Where applicable, work with local authorities to raise awareness of kinship care and to reach and support kinship carers through the programme.
- Where possible and relevant, represent Kinship at external events and meetings to raise awareness of the programme and to influence other organisations.
- Where applicable, work with local authorities and voluntary and community groups supporting kinship families.
• Make sure you’ve read the job description and the essential requirements – make sure your application reflects those points in the requirements very clearly.
• Tell us why you want to work for Kinship. We’re interested in working with people who share our values. You can read about our values above.
• Keep your response clear – use bullets points and short paragraphs if that helps. It will help the recruitment team to focus on your knowledge, skills and experience.
• Don’t go over 2 pages on your covering letter.
• Please do not use AI tools like ChatGPT to produce your answers. We use software to check, and your application will be rejected if you do.
Registered Charity
21 - 50
We support kinship carers in their homes and communities, giving advice and helping them work through problems to find the best way forward.
The client requests no contact from agencies or media sales.
Thank you!
Purpose of the Role
As the Policy and Campaigns Officer for Scotland, you will be the driving force behind our policy development, political monitoring, and strategic advocacy in Scotland. Your work will champion the strategic interests of dietitians as both a professional membership body and a registered trade union. Alongside core policy work, you will take direct ownership of designing and delivering a high-profile national campaign which is delivered across the UK. This allocated campaign will focus on a critical theme impacting both public health and our workforce.
The role sits within the BDA’s policy and public affairs function, and you will be part of a small team of policy officers and a public affairs officer who work across the other home countries and the UK. You will have access to an established Scotland board, a colleague who covers trade union representation in Scotland and a supportive professional practice, communications and leadership team based at our Birmingham head office.
Key Areas of Responsibility
The post holder will deliver on the following key responsibilities:
Policy development and advocacy (55%)
- Monitoring the political environment in Scotland in our key areas of interest, providing briefs and advice to the Scotland board and BDA senior leadership team on developments within Holyrood, NHS Scotland, STUC and local government.
- Policy development including work with relevant committees and BDA staff in the development of key policy documents and position statements with particular responsibility for policy positions in Scotland which balance clinical standards with social impact, workforce and employment rights.
- Co-ordinate and draft robust, evidence-based responses to consultations from Scottish government, public bodies and parliamentary committees. May also respond to UK consultations where appropriate for a campaign theme.
- In conjunction with the BDA public affairs officer, advocacy for the dietetic profession and the BDA in Scotland by maintaining a network of contacts across the Scottish political spectrum including MSPs, government officials, health board executives, and policy influencers.
- Translate political updates and complex policy changes into clear accessible updates and guidance for BDA members via newsletters, webinars and the website.
- Represent the BDA with internal and external stakeholders including BDA Specialist Groups, AHP policy officer and working groups/networks and other alliances.
- Represent the BDA at Allied Health Professions Federation Scotland (AHPFS) working groups and events, building relationships, contributing dietetic priorities and ensuring the profession’s interests are reflected in shared policy discussions and collaborative activity.
Campaign co-ordination (30%)
- Completion of campaign workplan/s template with the campaign working group/s.
- Co-ordinate campaigns in conjunction with working group/s.
- Monitoring the landscape with regards to allocated campaigns. Provide advice when relevant issues are trending or becoming topical.
- Build appropriate alliances with third-sector organisations, networks and charities, food policy alliances and other health unions to amplify the campaign’s impact.
- Working with colleagues in communications, design and public affairs to create compelling campaigning materials, digital content, and toolkits to mobilise members, the public, and parliamentarians to lobby for legislative and budgetary changes that support dietetic services and interests.
- Establish clear KPIs for the campaign/s, monitoring progress, media coverage, member engagement, and policy shifts, and reporting these to senior leadership.
Cross BDA engagement and communications (15%)
- Help and deliver the BDA’s participation in profile raising events in Scotland, such as NHS Confederation.
- Regular engagement with the Chair of the Scotland Board on policy, political and government matters, resulting in input to Board agendas and support for political engagement.
- Provide expert advice and briefings to senior leadership ahead of high-level meetings or media appearances in Scotland.
- Be a valuable member of the BDA policy and public affairs function, contributing to the evolution of the policy function and contributing to the wider work and objectives of the Trade Union team
Person Specification
Knowledge
- Degree educated.
- Campaign/project management.
- Health policy development.
- Equality, diversity and inclusion.
- Public policy making process, particularly within Scotland.
- Knowledge of the Health and Social Care policy landscape in Scotland and the devolved nature of public services.
- It is also desirable if you have an understanding of the trade union movement in Scotland.
Experience
- Experience of working in a policy, public affairs or research role in healthcare, membership, charity, public sector, or trade union.
- Experience of lone working and being part of a small field-based team.
- Working within a health professional body or trust/board.
- Working in a political environment.
It is also desirable if you have worked as a dietitian or dietetic support worker.
Ideally you should be confident working independently in a small field-based team, able to build relationships and translate complex policy into clear advice, with desirable experience in a professional body, trade union, or dietetic setting.
The client requests no contact from agencies or media sales.