Young carers support worker jobs in dudley, west midlands

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.

About the role

Our Participation and Involvement Manager will build on existing practice across the organisation and lead on the implementation and further development of a participation and involvement framework, enabling a large and diverse range of kinship carers to share their views and expertise meaningfully, safely and effectively to shape Kinship’s activity. It will also support our growing participation and involvement activity which involves children, young people and young adults with experience of growing up in kinship care.

You will work closely with kinship carers and colleagues across the organisation to understand the key challenges and opportunities with embedding participatory methods, including co-production and co-design, which improve Kinship’s work – right from the design and delivery of our advice and support services through to influencing policy and campaigning for change.

With support from colleagues, you will act as the key cross-organisational adviser on participation and involvement practice, supporting and empowering colleagues to develop the skills and knowledge they need to embed a consistent approach to the involvement of kinship carers to best suit the needs of their roles.

As an enthusiastic and engaging facilitator, and an advocate for participatory methods, you will sensitively and skillfully work alongside kinship carers and colleagues to deliver high quality involvement activity which supports the charity’s mission and aims. You will also be an experienced project manager, ensuring all activity is appropriately monitored and evaluated, and aligned with best practice around equality and diversity, remuneration, safeguarding and governance.

Key responsibilities include:

• Refine and further develop an existing organisational participation and involvement framework which supports staff to meaningfully, safely and effectively involve kinship carers in their work.
• Design and implement a plan to embed effective practice based on the framework across Kinship, building a positive organisational culture and providing appropriate training, upskilling and support to colleagues to ensure consistency of delivery and experience for kinship carers.
• Lead a cross-organisational working group of people with relevant lived, learned and professional experiences to support and advise on embedding high-quality participation and involvement activity.
• Work closely with colleagues across the whole organisation to understand their bespoke needs, strengths and requirements around implementing participatory methods in their day-to-day work, and develop strategic relationships with colleagues in areas with more extensive existing participatory or adjacent activity (e.g. research, volunteering).
• Develop and recruit a network of people with lived experience interested in being more intensively involved in participatory activities, with a focus on increasing the diversity of people working with us.

Essential experience includes:

• Experience managing and leading the delivery of participation or involvement activity with people with lived experience of social issues.
• A commitment to meaningful participation and involvement activity, including a nuanced understanding of the individual and organisational opportunities and challenges associated with this.
• Knowledge of models, methodologies and approaches used in high quality participation and involvement activity, and strong skills in creative facilitation – particularly with groups.
• An understanding of kinship care and how this may impact on kinship carers’ involvement with Kinship and our activity.
• Experience of effective project management with strong attention to detail and organisational skills.
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills

What we’ll offer you 

Kinship offers 30 days’ annual leave plus bank holidays (pro-rata for part-time) as well as a generous pension scheme. We have an excellent wellbeing offer including the Employee Assistance Programme and clinical supervision. We will invest in your professional development with training and career development opportunities.

Kinship is committed to championing equality, diversity and inclusion.  We believe our work is greatly enhanced by the varied backgrounds, experiences and views represented within our teams.  We aim to create inclusive teams, celebrate differences and encourage everyone to join us and be their true self at work. We therefore encourage applications from anyone who fits our values, whatever their religion or belief, sex, gender identity, race, age, sexuality or disability and are actively seeking candidates that can bring real innovation and commitment to us. 

This is a fantastic time to join a supportive and well-established team within an organisation with rapid growth ambitions. This role will be what you make it and we’re looking for someone to seize this opportunity!

How to apply

Please apply via Charity Job with your CV and a cover letter of no more than 2 pages for the attention of Sam Turner. Please include your notice period and earliest availability to start in your cover letter.

• Application deadline:      9.00am, Wednesday 25 June 2025
• First interview:                 Online, Monday 7 July 2025
• Second interview:          In-person (Vauxhall), Wednesday 16 July 2025

Kinship reserves the right to close applications early on receipt of sufficient applications. Apply early!