High Intensity Support Worker

Together Women is looking for an outstanding High Intensity Support Worker to be part of our Housing Team.

The High Intensity Support Worker will engage with women and provide intensive support, to help them to access safe, secure, high-quality and long-term housing via Leeds Housing Options. The successful candidate will work with women across a range of areas, including: accommodation, finance, emotional wellbeing, family and significant others, lifestyle and associates, education and employment, dependency and recovery, and social inclusion.

Join Our Team

• Are you driven and passionate about working within a women-centred support service?
• Are you looking for a dynamic and rewarding role working for an organisation that delivers specialist gender specific support to women and girls?
• Do you believe in our values; to listen and support, to empower and respect, collaborate, innovate and take accountability?

The role is only open to women, in accordance with the sex-based exemptions of the Equality Act 2010 pursuant to Schedule 9, Part 1.

High Intensity Support Worker (Leeds)

Salary: £27,443

Location: Leeds

Hours: 37 hours full-time.

Closing Date: 12:00 PM, 5th July 2024

Interview Date: 8th July 2024

What we can offer you - Employee Benefits:

• 25 days holiday increasing by one day per year to a max of 30 days, plus public holidays
• Pension scheme with 5% employer contribution
• Annual cost of living increase up to 4%
• Enhanced Training and Induction programme covering all areas of Together Women’s work
• Access to our Employee Assistance Programme with discount offers and free telephone counselling service
• Access to our online wellbeing platform
• Employee eye-care scheme and free eye tests
• Organisation wide away days
• Career development pathways

Role Summary

As a High Intensity Support Worker, working on the Somewhere Safe to Live contract, you will work with LCC Housing Options, Foundation Housing and other partners in Leeds, to support women into safe, secure, high-quality and long-term housing via Leeds Housing Options.

You will hold a small case load of no more than 10, and provide intensive and holistic support delivered in the SSTL properties, the SSTS hub and at Together Women’s Leeds Centre. Our gender-specific, trauma-informed service delivery model is tailored to the individual and includes supporting the women on a 1:1 and group basis, to:

• Develop their ability to independently manage and sustain a tenancy
• Access dependency and recovery services
• Access harm reduction services relating to self-harm
• Stay safe from Domestic Violence and Abuse
• Access health care services
• Access and navigate the benefits and welfare system
• Access finance, benefits and debt services
• Develop their financial skills
• Improve their emotional wellbeing
• Access Education, Training and Employment services
• Access services which prevent reoffending
• Take part in Social Inclusion activities
• Engage with family and community networks

Key Accountabilities

Responsible for a caseload of clients to whom you will provide high quality trauma informed and person-centred support via the following:

• Promoting, receiving and processing referrals in line with current practice guidelines.
• Safeguarding vulnerable women from self-neglect, abuse and harm by acting in accordance to Together Women’s Safeguarding Policies and Government Legislation
• Identifying and assessing individuals’ support needs, including a risk assessment informed by relevant background information. Continuously reviewing these needs and delivering a service that is responsive.
• Building effective relationships with women; encouraging them to identify and prioritise their needs, interests and areas for personal development; and to provide guidance and support to enable them to deal with a wide range of issues affecting their lives.
• Work with other practitioners within the Partnership to assess women’s accommodation needs and support them into secure, appropriate and safe accommodation
• Support women referred to Somewhere Safe to Live to integrate into their communities, ensuring that their housing, finance, benefit and debt related support needs are met and helping them to achieve independent living
• Encouraging women who use the service to provide honest and open feedback in order to promote quality assurance.
• Supporting women referred to Somewhere Safe to Live to integrate into their communities, ensuring that their accommodation; social inclusion; finance, benefits and debts; emotional wellbeing; dependency and recovery; employment, education and training; lifestyle and associates and families and relationships needs are being met, either by yourself or by referring and signposting to specialist support agencies.
• Encouraging and supporting women to access support and treatment by identifying and removing any barriers to their engagement, where needed.
• Contributing to measuring and monitoring systems as required by the Contract.
• Using evaluation, learning and feedback from the women to support service development.
• Managing and updating own skills base to ensure quality service delivery and personal development in role.
• Developing effective working relationships with staff of Together Women, Leeds Housing Options and Foundation Housing and with other voluntary and statutory agencies in Leeds
• Attending multi-agency meetings with Leeds Housing Options, Foundation Housing and SSTS Commissioners and effectively advocate for women and to review and monitor women’s progress against agreed support plans
• Working within and alongside an integrated model of care involving Health, Criminal Justice System
• Identify and support access to community resources to support a successful exit from the programme.
• Be self-starting and responsible for maintaining effective day-to-day running of Together Women’s Centre
• Ensure all necessary records are properly maintained in line with Data Protection and Confidentiality organisational policies and government legislation
• Supporting and embodying the mission, ethos and values of Together Women
• Supporting and promote inclusion, diversity and equality of opportunity in the workplace and with the women
• Be flexible and carry out other associated duties as may arise, develop or be assigned in line with the broad remit of the position

Role Requirements

Essential Criteria:

• Strong IT skills (PC literate and competent in using MS Office)
• GCSE (or equivalent) in Maths & English - Grade C or above
• Experience of the delivery of frontline services
• Experience of working with women within a support role
• Experience of case management and recording
• Experience of building positive partnerships with other agencies
• Knowledge and understanding of the issues faced by women
• Satisfactory enhanced DBS check and prison vetting

Desirable Requirements:

• Experience & competence in report writing
• Experience of outreach work
• Knowledge of child protection issues
• Experience of running training sessions and workshops
• Knowledge and experience of the Leeds housing sector and the statutory and non-statutory organisations working within it
• An understanding of the main issues affecting homelessness in relation to women with multiple and complex needs
• Knowledge and/or experience of housing law and debt advice

Our competency framework: qualities we are looking for in candidates

Client focus

Service Provision

• Commitment and enthusiasm for working with our customer group
• Empathy with client group
• Manages caseload and delivers support as per the requirements of the service contract and the internal quality audit framework requirements

Recording & monitoring

• Maintain case files and administrative/monitoring systems effectively

Interpersonal Skills

Working with others:

• Builds and maintains effective working relationships, with customers and stakeholders; within the organisation and external to it
• Manage and ensure that clear professional and emotional boundaries are established
• Demonstrates a keen understanding of the ability to adapt one’s approach when working with different groups (e.g. customers, partner agencies, stakeholders and colleagues)

Communication

• Presents spoken and written information clearly and appropriately and to a high standard

Diversity

• Builds trust and demonstrates respect for others, showing an awareness of the impact on own behaviour on others
• Treats everyone fairly and consistently
• Demonstrates an open and non-judgemental approach, seeking to understand others’ experiences and perspectives.
• Demonstrates efforts to provide inclusive environments, culturally specific support, and promotes a feeling of psychological safety for all women.

Personal effectiveness

Risk management

• Works in line with policy and procedure
• Applies and promotes risk management
• Aware of the need for confidentiality in dealing with information; of when confidentiality should be preserved and of the circumstances when it is right to reveal confidential information and to whom to is right to do so

Approach to work

• Willing to learn and develop
• Plans, organises and implements work, on own initiative with minimum direct supervision
• Flexible and creative approach at work; able to adapt to the changing needs of the program
• Ability to manage time, prioritise and meet deadlines
• Organised approach, with keen admin skills and attention to detail
• Makes clear decisions and deal positively with challenges

We actively encourage applications from women from a variety of backgrounds, and with a range of skills and experiences. We are particularly interested to hear from Black, Asian and minority ethnic women and women who have personal experience of the criminal justice system. This post is open to female applicants only as being female is deemed to be a genuine occupational requirement under Schedule 9, Paragraph 1 of the Equality Act 2010.