At Sandwell Children's Trust, we firmly believe that the voice of the child should be at the centre of everything we do. We are on an ambitious journey to ensure that children and families in Sandwell are safe and empowered to thrive.
Our ‘Sandwell Deal’, brings together our new improved offering that make Sandwell Children’s Trust a great place to work; it also sets out our expectations of you as a member of staff.
What we can offer you:-
- Generous annual leave of up to 33 days, plus 5 additional days for long service recognition.
- Your birthday off paid in addition to annual leave entitlement and 8 Bank Holidays, plus a concessionary day at Christmas.
- You will receive a generous local government career average pension scheme with employer contributions of 21.6%.
- We recognise individual loyalty with service awards from 2, 5, 10 and every 5 years onwards.
- Flexible working patterns that suit you and all of our roles have well-defined career progression.
- We provide competitive expenses for both mileage (55p per mile) and subsistence, plus access to a comprehensive employee benefits scheme.
Please visit The Sandwell Deal via this hyperlink
https://sandwelldeal.co.uk/
Fixed Term until 31st March 2026
The Trusts Transformation Programme aims to improve how families are supported across the Trust, the Community and with our partners. There are 5 priorities and priority 4 is our ‘Integrated Approach to Care’. The purpose of Priority 4 is recognise and understand the needs of the children and young people we support by ensuring services are designed to best meet those needs, enabling children and young people to fulfil their potential. To support this, Sandwell Children's Trust are seeking an experienced and dynamic Interim Programme Manager to manage the planning, design and implementation phases of Priority 4.
Key responsibilities:
To ensure the delivery of the Trusts Priority 4 programme. By providing expertise, resilience and capacity and ensuring that risks and issues are identified, in a high-impact transformation programme ensuring alignment with the Trust’s vision and strategic objective.
This is a high-profile role requiring exceptional leadership, strategic oversight, and stakeholder engagement skills. To ensure the delivery of the Trusts Sufficiency Strategy and the strategic aims of priority 4
- Creating a strong link between care planning and financial decisions the Trust makes regarding care, so the Trust meets children’s needs and permanence plans that improve their outcomes
- Children live locally when they are unable to remain at home, with wraparound support from wider children’s and adult services
- Safe, effective and efficient services across the Trust
To develop, deliver and lead the Trust’s priority 4 programme objectives which are
- To secure homes that meet children’s individual needs, through effective care planning alongside our partners.
- To increase local capacity through meaningful engagement with providers so there are sufficient homes in Sandwell for our children.
- To monitor homes through regular compliance and QA activities to ensure that they are meeting our children’s needs.
- To create compelling marketing campaigns with our Fostering service and Communications team to attract and recruit skilled carers that reflect the diversity of our children.
To act as lead of the programme group / steering group and reporting within agreed parameters. Through the application of subject matter expertise to ensure project design and execution, ensuring relevance and impact and ensuring readiness for the future. To ensure that all projects within the Priority 4 programme or the wider Transformation Programme) are strategically aligned and integrated, maximising their collective impact and lead on the management of risks across the programme, ensuring prompt escalation and resolution.
To drive cost-effective solutions, identifying and delivering significant savings whilst making sure of high service standards. To work within the budget restraints as set out in the Trusts MTFP.
To work closely with the Executive Management Team, Head of Transformation, council and the wider partnership in establishing, agreeing, and monitoring targets for service delivery and management performance for the service.
Person requirements:
- Appropriate professional programme management qualification (such as Prince2, APM or MSP) or equivalent experience.
- Proven experience leading and implementing complex, multifaceted transformation programmes
- Substantial knowledge and expertise within Children Services or Social Care and understanding of DfE frameworks, compliance requirements and inspection readiness
- Comfortable working within a governance environment, regularly reporting on progress to senior executives and stakeholders and being subject to scrutiny.
When people join the team at Sandwell they say it feels like they become part of the family…they have #ComeHomeToSandwell. With the work that we have done so far and with the ambitions we have for the future, it’s a really exciting time to join Sandwell Children’s Trust and to become part of our Family.
So, if you think your future could lie with Sandwell Children’s Trust, then we’d love to hear from you.
Sandwell Children's Trust is committed to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of vulnerable groups including children and expects all staff and volunteers to share this commitment. An Enhanced DBS is required for this position.
To apply please click on the link below to complete an application form and view the Sandwell Deal:-
