About Gateshead Council
At Gateshead, our vision is that all children and families, regardless of their background, are at the heart of everything we do – ensuring all children can thrive and meet their full potential.
Our plans for 2024 reflect this vision and ambition! We will have an even greater focus on embedding trauma informed approaches and inclusive practice, across all of our services as we believe that this delivers the best outcomes for children and young people. We are committed to continuing to develop services which are integrated and joined up through our family hubs and that we maintain our focus on supporting the most vulnerable children on the edge of care to support them to remain safely living within their family networks.
In 2023 we were recognised nationally for the great work we are doing. Our Kinship team won the CYPS award for the team making the biggest impact, our Social Work Academy received a commendation and came second in the CYPS biggest impact award, and one of our NQSW was shortlisted in the best newcomer award.
We also won the Gold award for ‘Digital Transformation in Social Work Award’ based on the Digital Me films that were made by young people in both the Domestic abuse and Youth justice services. These really are excellent and are a testament to our young people and the teams who work with them and support them.
Plus, two of our foster carers won the CYPS foster carer award supported by their Fostering Social Work Practitioner.
During 2023 we were also successful in bidding for and achieving a number of grants to develop new services for children and young people which includes piloting the new national DFE Family Network pilot; Turnaround funding to support young people at risk of entering the criminal justice system; and the Family Links programme for children in care.
Do you want to come and be part of our award winning, ambitious and innovative teams?
The Children’s Social Care and Lifelong Learning Service are looking to appoint a full time Business Support Assistant.
You will be based within a busy team providing effective administrative support to our children’s social care teams. The ability to manage and prioritise workloads is essential to the service.
Your main duties will include:
1. Answering incoming telephone calls and dealing with customer enquiries/taking accurate messages.
2. Office duties, including meeting and greeting visitors, dealing with incoming mail and preparing outgoing mail.
3. Providing a typing service, which will include copy/audio typing and document formatting.
4. Organising meetings and taking notes at meetings either via team or face to face.
5. Inputting and retrieving information from our case management system.
6. Making payments via a pre-payment card.
7. Creating purchase orders and paying invoices using our financial management system.
8. Photocopying and scanning documents and other duties in line with the grade of the post.
You will have 5 GCSE’s (Grade A-C or 9-4 in Maths and English) and hold an NVQ Level 3 in Business Administration or equivalent.
You must be able to work independently and as part of a team as and when required to ensure the duties of the role are fulfilled.
You should also have strong IT skills, including Microsoft Office packages, together with a clear understanding of the need for confidentiality. You will be well organised, with good attention to detail and can manage priorities.
We welcome and encourage job applications from candidates regardless of their age, disability, gender identity, sexual orientation, religion, belief or race, and background.
What can a career with Gateshead offer?
By pursuing your career with Gateshead, we can guarantee you will have:
1. A stable senior leadership team that listens and cares about you and your work.
2. A culture which takes pride in and actively celebrates social work.
3. You will be based in the same building as all Business Support teams, allowing support not just from your allocated team but all services.
4. Hybrid working – both working from the office base and home working.
5. A protected time employee induction scheme.
As well as an attractive and competitive salary, as an employee of Gateshead Council you will also benefit from:
1. A generous annual leave package of 28 days (2 of which are fixed), increasing to 30 days (plus 2 fixed) following 5 years’ service. You will also have the opportunity to purchase up to 10 days extra leave via our Annual Leave Salary Sacrifice Scheme.
2. Access to the flexi scheme which allows for working 9 days over 10.
3. Excellent training and development opportunities.
4. Great transport links with the use of reliable and frequent public transport and have access to a discounted Annual Pass. You will also have use of Co-wheel pool cars and access to the Cycle to Work salary sacrifice scheme.
5. Being a member of the Local Government Pension Scheme (LGPS).
6. Eligibility to access a range of other staff offers and discounts via our employee discount portal.
During the selection process candidates will be assessed against the essential criteria as set out in the job profile.
For further information regarding what Gateshead can offer you please log onto Careers in children's social work - Gateshead Council.
For a chat about the role and to learn more please call Lisa Phillippo on 0191 433 3260 or email LisaPhillippo@Gateshead.Gov.UK.
Closing date: 27.10.24
Short listing: TBC
Interviews/selection process: TBC
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