Practitioner

At Suffolk County Council Adult Social Care, we're passionate about helping people live fulfilling, independent lives in the places and communities they call home. As a Senior Practitioner in our Flexible Care and Support Team, you'll play a vital role in supporting adults, families and carers to achieve the outcomes that matter most to them.

Working alongside colleagues, health partners, community organisations and local networks, you'll help deliver high-quality, strengths-based support that promotes independence, wellbeing and choice. You'll combine expert social work practice with leadership, guiding colleagues, sharing professional expertise and helping to shape services that make a meaningful difference across Suffolk.

Your role and responsibilities

We are seeking an experienced, enthusiastic and forward-thinking Social Worker to join our Flexible Care and Support Team (West) as a Senior Practitioner.

This is an excellent opportunity to combine frontline practice with professional leadership, helping to shape high-quality Adult Social Care services that promote independence, wellbeing and positive outcomes for people across West Suffolk. Working alongside adults, families and carers, you will identify strengths, needs and aspirations, ensuring people receive timely, person-centred support that enables them to live fulfilling and independent lives.

As a Senior Practitioner, you will manage a small caseload of complex cases, providing expert assessment, decision-making and risk management where your expertise can have the greatest impact. You will also play a key role in supporting colleagues with complex casework, encouraging reflective practice and championing strengths-based, outcome-focused approaches across the team.

Working closely with the Team Manager, you will help maintain high standards of professional practice, contribute to service improvement and support the effective management of quality, performance and demand. You will build strong partnerships across health, social care, housing and voluntary sector organisations, helping to deliver integrated, responsive services that place people and their outcomes at the heart of everything we do., As a Senior Practitioner, you will provide professional leadership and support across locality-based Adult Social Care teams within West Suffolk, helping to shape and embed our evolving operating model and Integrated Neighbourhood Team approach.

Working closely with the Team Manager and wider leadership colleagues, you will provide expert guidance and advice to frontline professionals delivering social work, occupational therapy, reablement, adult mental health and learning disability services. You will play a key role in promoting high standards of practice, supporting complex decision-making and driving positive outcomes for the people we support.

To maintain your professional expertise and direct connection to practice, you will hold a small caseload of complex work, providing specialist assessment, intervention and risk management support where it is most needed.

Collaboration is central to this role. You will work closely with colleagues across Adult Social Care, health services and partner organisations, as well as Contract and Service Development Teams, to identify emerging trends, share good practice and influence the future design of services. Through this work, you will help ensure that learning from frontline practice informs commissioning decisions, service improvements and innovative ways of working that deliver better outcomes for communities across Suffolk., Step 3 - Upload a supporting statement indicating how you meet each of the criteria in the 'Person Profile' section of the JPP.

- You should use the Supporting Statement template (Word).

- Please use Arial font size 11 and keep your statement to a maximum of two sides of A4.

A recognised Social Work qualification and current registration with Social Work England.

- Significant experience working with adults with complex needs, including disability, mental health, dementia and long-term conditions.

- Strong knowledge of Adult Social Care legislation, including the Care Act, Mental Capacity Act and safeguarding responsibilities.

- Excellent assessment, analysis and decision-making skills, with a strengths-based and person-centred approach.

- Experience of leading complex casework, supporting colleagues and promoting high standards of practice.

- Strong communication and relationship-building skills, with the ability to work collaboratively across health, social care and partner organisations.

As a modern and effective council, we offer a wide variety of careers to suit people with a range of skills, abilities and ambitions. We offer working options that flex to reflect the way people work today and take the time to understand and support your individual needs. We're driven to make a positive difference to the world around us and encourage everyone with drive and focus to join us and build an influential and impactful career. Reimagine the possibilities.

In return, you'll enjoy:

up to 29 days annual leave entitlement (pro rata), plus UK bank holidays and two paid volunteering days

membership of a competitive Local Government Pension Scheme (LGPS)

travel, lifestyle, health and wellbeing benefits

performance-related annual pay progression, in addition to an annual cost-of-living pay increase

training and encouragement to expand your knowledge

a variety of career development opportunities across our organisation

diverse and active staff networks

flexible working options, with the right to request flexible working from your first day

Plus lots more!