Service Lead - Early Help

This is a Gloucestershire County Council job.
 

• Job Title:                           Service Lead - Early Help
• Job Location:                     Gloucestershire
• Salary:                              £53,937 - £57,844 per annun 
• Hours per Week:                37.00 
• Contract Type:                   Fixed Term 
• Duration:                          18 months
• Closing Date:                    14/09/2025 
• Job Requisition Number:    2013 
• This post is open to job share

We’re pleased to offer an exciting opportunity for a Service Manager to join our Early Help Hub team on a fixed-term basis for 18 months.

About us

For all your hard work, you will receive the following:

•              £53,937- £57,844 per annum, subject to experience

•              flexible and agile working opportunities

•              25.5 days annual leave rising to 30.5 days after 5 years continuous service

•              an option to purchase 10 days of additional leave per year

•              family friendly policies and benefits to help support you and your family

•              supportive and positive working environment with regular, robust supervision

•              Local Government Pension Scheme (LGPS)

•              access to our Employee Assistance Programme (EAP) that provides free, confidential, counselling and advice for employees, available 24 hours a day, online and by telephone.

•              an in-house Occupational Health service

•              employee discount scheme

•              cycle to work scheme

•              links to employee networks such as Prism (LGBT+) and the Young Employees Network

•              career development and qualification opportunities

 Right child, right support, right time, every time

In our recent inspection in June 2025, our Children’s Services have been officially judged as ‘Good’ with ‘Outstanding’ elements. Ofsted also said ‘Leaders have set out a clear vision for delivering success for children, by modelling values and creating a culture where the workforce, children and families feel valued and heard; risk is managed confidently with bottom lines clearly set out.’

This marks an important step in our journey to improve outcomes for our children and young people, and we remain focused on our mission: to continue building on this success and ensure that every child and young person in our county has the opportunity to thrive. 

Gloucestershire offers a range of opportunities to develop your career, supported by a phenomenal Social Work Academy offer, a developing systemic practice methodology, an ambitious leadership team and an award-winning workforce.

We are a local authority adopting, and training all colleagues in, systemic social work practice. If you would like to be part of an authority that takes a relational approach to working with families and focuses on what needs to change in the system around a child and family to enable children to thrive, then consider a role with GCC.

About Us

Gloucestershire County Council’s Early Help service provides support, advice and guidance to children and their families across the county. The service is integral in supporting children and their families to access the right support at the right time. We offer a number of different services under the umbrella of Early Help within the County Council including Family Support, Family Group Conferencing, Parenting and advice and guidance through Early Help Coordinators and Community Social Workers.  Our work is multi-agency,  with other professionals, to ensure that children are achieving the best possible outcomes. This role will oversee a number of teams within the service, reporting to the senior service manager, ensuring we offer a consistent impactful service for families.

About you

As well as your experience as a manager/leader you will need to have a solid understanding of the broad Early Help offer across the county and the role of the partnership in delivering this, alongside the offer from the services within the council. A clear knowledge of the functions of each service within the council’s offer will be key and an ability to advice and guide the current service managers in their role managing the team managers of these teams. You will have a quality assurance role and will need to be able to process and analyse team performance to ensure we are delivering the best service for families and communities. You will hold an academic qualification to degree level or equivalent professional qualification relevant to the field of Children, Young People and Families.

Minimum of 5 complete year’s relevant experience working in/across Children’s Social Care and Early Help delivering direct interventions to children and families.

A full driving licence and access to a car is essential.

For an informal chat about this role, please contact Sophia Jamal on Sophia.Jamal@gloucestershire.gov.uk

We reserve the right to close an advertisement earlier than the stated closing date if we receive a suitable amount of applications.

If you would like to find out more about our Children's Service please take a look here: Children's Social Care Careers | Gloucestershire County Council

* Please be advised that Gloucestershire County Council is unable to offer sponsorship for this position. Therefore, only candidates who already possess the legal right to work in the United Kingdom will be considered. This stipulation is outlined to ensure clarity and fairness throughout the recruitment process.

Additional Information

To access the Job Profile for this role, please follow the link below:-

Early Help Service Manager Role

This position is subject to a DBS check.

Gloucestershire County Council is committed to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children and young people or vulnerable adults and expects all staff and volunteers to share this commitment.

We want to be an employer of choice, attracting and retaining excellent people to work for us, so that we can best serve all of Gloucestershire’s diverse communities.  Our promise to you is that we will provide an inclusive and supportive working environment that enables you to bring your whole self to work and realise your full potential.

It is a legal requirement, under the Immigration Act 2016, that anyone appointed to a ‘customer facing role’ must be able to demonstrate an ability to fulfil all spoken aspects of the role with confidence in fluent English.

Hybrid working arrangements are available for the majority of our roles, giving teams the opportunity to work in a way that suits them, balancing service need and individual choice, with a mix of both remote and office working.