Working in Medway

Letter from Ian Sutherland

Thank you for your interest in working in Medway Children’s Services. I am proud to be the Director of Children and Adult Services in a place which strives to put children at the centre of everything we do. We have faced some difficult challenges over the past six months and were very disappointed in our Ofsted ruling following our inspection in July 2019. We are determined to improve our services and we have the support of our Council to do this quickly – we have already taken positive steps with additional resources to help us to reduce our workloads and improve our practice.

We have a great team of staff who were commended by Ofsted for their dedication and commitment and we will continue to support them to do a good job.

We passionately believe in supporting children to remain in their families wherever possible. We have a commitment to work alongside children and their families and know that building relationships are the key to achieving positive change.

Medway is an exciting place to work and will offer you a range of challenges and experiences, which will develop your career. We know that good support, training and development opportunities, along with manageable workloads are what motivates practitioners.

We are fully committed to work with our frontline staff to help to influence, shape and develop our improvement journey.

If you want to make a positive difference to children and families, please come and be part of our team.  Together, we can help to deliver the Council priority of ‘Supporting Medway’s people to realise their potential’.

Ian Sutherland, Director of People (Children and Adults)

Related links

Council plan 2016 – 2021

Medway Children and Young People’s Plan 2019-2024

An independent report and recommendations from the Commissioner for Children’s Services in Medway.

Our Vision

Our services will support children and young people in Medway to feel safe and secure, and any decision we make will be in their best interests and made in collaboration with them and their families. We want children and families to be able to access the right services at the right time to meet their needs, from robust early help services through to intensive and purposeful interventions to support children in need of protection and their families, with a focus on achieving a permanent family for children in care.

We will achieve this by building strong relationships and working with children and families, recruiting a skilled and permanent workforce, and establishing strong networks with our partners to maximise the use of all available resources.

We want to create a culture of ambition, professional respect and commitment to deliver quality services which achieve positive change for families.

Supervision and Management Oversight

Our firstline leaders are known as Team Managers. Each Team Manager is responsible for the supervision of 6 Social Workers.

We expect our firstline leaders to provide robust oversight and management grip on case work so that social workers are fully supported in their practice.Supervision and Management Oversight.

Our Practice Model

Medway are introducing the Signs of Safety practice model which will be launched in Spring 2020 and supported by a programme of training for all staff and partners across our services.

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Our Service

Our delivery of children’s services is informed by our vision of achieving positive change for families we work with so that children are safe, services are effective, and families feel supported and enabled to care for their children.

We have established small area-based social work teams, each with one team manager and six social workers. These work with children and families, following assessment, throughout their engagement with statutory social work.

We are committed to a model of practice based on the principles of a relationship and strengths-based approach.  To support this approach we are rolling out ‘Signs of Safety’ training for all our practitioners. This is aimed at building stronger, more resilient families that can safely care for children and young people.

Early help service

Early Help offers effective targeted help to families to promote their wellbeing and resilience using a signs of safety practice framework. Early Help workers work with families and wider partners in the community, including health, schools, parenting, voluntary agencies, housing and where relevant the Police in order to create a holistic family plan, which will build on the family strengths and support with areas of concerns.  

Early Help is in an area-based model ensuring we are closer to the families, communities and partnerships that we support across Medway.  

Early Help work together with families for up to 6 months, or where appropriate 9 months, in order to support families to build on their own resilience and to support the family to reach positive outcomes.  Early Help engage families, both children and parents, with direct work and programmes both within Early Help and with wider partners. Early Help also support partner agencies to be the lead agency of support for a family, as families and partners find benefit in having a supported and coordinated plan to recognise achievement and prevent delay and drift.  

Early Help embrace the core objectives of the Troubled Families Agenda, and work with both internal council services and partners, to safeguard children and young people at risk (Level 3). Early Help is also integrated in the Adolescent Service, specialising in targeted work with young people and their parent/ carer, to work through contextual safeguarding issues and work closely with the Youth Service to encourage young people to join positive activities and achieve.

Children’s Social Work Teams

Social Work for vulnerable children in need, children in need of protection and including those subject to Public Law Outline (PLO) is provided through area-based Children Social Work Teams who are aligned to four areas of Medway.

This means that we work closely with the home community of the family supporting children to remain within their families and keeping in touch with them when being looked after is the right decision.

Our area-based teams are led by a Team Manager with six qualified social workers one of whom may be newly qualified, plus dedicated administrative support.

Practitioners work with children through child in need and child protection plans including sometimes care proceedings where the court deems that the children don’t need to be separated from their parents at immediately.

Social workers have a varied caseload that allows them the opportunity to work with a variety of children in the social care system and develop a wide range of knowledge and expertise. Through our established partnerships with schools, Early Help and universal services once our work with families is done, we ensure that support continues.

Medway uses use the Signs of Safety Model to organise and describe our work with children and families throughout our case records; the model is used in our child protection conferences. Specific models of assessment and intervention are used for identified needs such as the Graded Care Profile or Parenting Assessments and Direct work with Children. Our professional development offer includes training in all these areas and also the Practice Education of social work students.

0-25 Disability Service

The 0-25 disability team provide specialist services to a defined group of children, young people and adults under the age of 25. Medway’s local offer is published on Medway Council’s website.

The service is accessible to people living in Medway who have a substantial and long term disability and meet the threshold of the eligibility criteria for services and support provided by the 0-25 Disability Team.

The team

The team is led by an area social work manager and is primarily made up of experienced social work practitioners, occupational therapists and family workers. They work in close partnership with education, health, housing and voluntary organisations to ensure that children, young people and adults who access support receive a good standard of service. The social workers are passionate about making a difference and are committed to ensuring all of the young people have a smooth transition to adulthood and are signposted to services within the community.

Quality Assurance and associated services

This service is responsible for embedding a Quality Assurance Framework that is focussed on the lived experience of the child, young person and family based on an assessment of need and risk.  That all children, young people and families receive focused, purposeful and evidence based interventions for which this service has a quality assurance function. This Service also sits alongside the Medway Safeguarding Children Partnership (MSCP).

We also have responsibility for the quality assurance and audit of social work practice, as a critical friend, to assist with improvements in practice and service delivery.   This function is largely carried out by the Quality Assurance Team.

Medway has a Principal Social Worker and four Advanced Practitioners who take the professional lead across children’s services, supporting and advising on the quality of practice.

The Local Authority Designated Officer (LADO) team oversee and co-ordinate the management of allegations made against professionals who work with children.  LADO is a small team consisting of two LADOs and a Senior LADO responsible for all allegation management, offering advice and guidance to all Medway organisations that provide a service to children, including the voluntary sector.

The Independent Reviewing Officer (IRO) team consists of one Manager and seven IRO’s, whose statutory duties include chairing the child’s review and monitoring the child’s case on an ongoing basis.

We have a Child Protection (CP) Conferencing Chair team which consists of one Manager and eight CP Chairs, who are responsible for specialising in the facilitation of CP Conferences and reviewing CP plans.

The Subject Access Request (SAR) team consists of two social workers who carefully manage all children’s services SARs holding expertise under the Data Protection Act 1998.

Children in Care

The Children in Care Service provides ongoing support and services to all children for whom there is no viable plan to return home.  The Children in Care Service also receives referrals for separate unaccompanied asylum-seeking children and provides the planning and support service for those children.

The Children in Care Service provide a 0-16 years old service for children and young people who have been looked after before the age of 16.  Young people will transfer to the 16+ Leaving Care specialist team when they reach 16 years unless there is a clear rationale for them to remain with their Children in Care social worker e.g. good relationship with social worker, and a change of worker during GCSEs would not be in child’s interest.

A Leaving Care Personal Advisor will be allocated alongside the Social Worker from the age of 16, who will then remain the allocated Personal Advisor after the young person reaches 18 and beyond.  The Children in Care Teams and the Leaving Care service will link and work closely with the Adolescent Service.

Children in Care Service will be responsible for court proceedings for children following an Interim Care Order being granted, provision of services to children in Section 20 care who have no plan to return home, formation and implementation of the permanency plans for children and professional abuse and complex abuse investigations, for children allocated in the team.

Leaving Care 16 plus team

The leaving care team support young people aged 16 to 25 who have left the care of Medway Council but remain entitled to leaving care support.  This includes support with housing applications, access to education, employment and benefits as well as emotional health and wellbeing.

Fostering Service

The fostering service consist of two teams; one team are responsible for recruitment, assessment, ongoing support and supervision of foster carers, supporting lodging providers and assessment and support of private fostering arrangements. The other team are responsible for the assessment of all proposed connected carers and viability to special guardianship assessments.

Adoption Service

The adoption team finds permanent new families for children who can no longer live with their birth parents.  Adoption staff recruit, assess and prepare adopters, support adopted children and special guardians, their families, birth families and adopted adults.

Medway Virtual School (MVS)

The Medway Virtual School is led by the Virtual Headteacher, who acts as a local authority champion to promote the educational achievement of Looked After Children and Young Care Leavers, working with schools, carers and social workers to help these pupils achieve educational outcomes comparable to their peers.  When our children and young care leavers receive a high quality education there is a strong foundation for widening and improving their opportunities in life.

Parklands

Parklands is a residential multi-agency respite centre for children with a disability which also provides day care facilities.

Our Service

Our delivery of children’s services is informed by our vision of achieving positive change for families we work with so that children are safe, services are effective, and families feel supported and enabled to care for their children.

We have established small area-based social work teams, each with one team manager and six social workers. These work with children and families, following assessment, throughout their engagement with statutory social work.

We are committed to a model of practice based on the principles of a relationship and strengths-based approach.  To support this approach we are rolling out ‘Signs of Safety’ training for all our practitioners. This is aimed at building stronger, more resilient families that can safely care for children and young people.

Early help service

Early Help offers effective targeted help to families to promote their wellbeing and resilience using a signs of safety practice framework. Early Help workers work with families and wider partners in the community, including health, schools, parenting, voluntary agencies, housing and where relevant the Police in order to create a holistic family plan, which will build on the family strengths and support with areas of concerns.  

Early Help is in an area-based model ensuring we are closer to the families, communities and partnerships that we support across Medway.  

Early Help work together with families for up to 6 months, or where appropriate 9 months, in order to support families to build on their own resilience and to support the family to reach positive outcomes.  Early Help engage families, both children and parents, with direct work and programmes both within Early Help and with wider partners. Early Help also support partner agencies to be the lead agency of support for a family, as families and partners find benefit in having a supported and coordinated plan to recognise achievement and prevent delay and drift.  

Early Help embrace the core objectives of the Troubled Families Agenda, and work with both internal council services and partners, to safeguard children and young people at risk (Level 3). Early Help is also integrated in the Adolescent Service, specialising in targeted work with young people and their parent/ carer, to work through contextual safeguarding issues and work closely with the Youth Service to encourage young people to join positive activities and achieve.

Children’s Social Work Teams

Social Work for vulnerable children in need, children in need of protection and including those subject to Public Law Outline (PLO) is provided through area-based Children Social Work Teams who are aligned to four areas of Medway.

This means that we work closely with the home community of the family supporting children to remain within their families and keeping in touch with them when being looked after is the right decision.

Our area-based teams are led by a Team Manager with six qualified social workers one of whom may be newly qualified, plus dedicated administrative support.

Practitioners work with children through child in need and child protection plans including sometimes care proceedings where the court deems that the children don’t need to be separated from their parents at immediately.

Social workers have a varied caseload that allows them the opportunity to work with a variety of children in the social care system and develop a wide range of knowledge and expertise. Through our established partnerships with schools, Early Help and universal services once our work with families is done, we ensure that support continues.

Medway uses use the Signs of Safety Model to organise and describe our work with children and families throughout our case records; the model is used in our child protection conferences. Specific models of assessment and intervention are used for identified needs such as the Graded Care Profile or Parenting Assessments and Direct work with Children. Our professional development offer includes training in all these areas and also the Practice Education of social work students.

0-25 Disability Service

The 0-25 disability team provide specialist services to a defined group of children, young people and adults under the age of 25. Medway’s local offer is published on Medway Council’s website.

The service is accessible to people living in Medway who have a substantial and long term disability and meet the threshold of the eligibility criteria for services and support provided by the 0-25 Disability Team.

The team

The team is led by an area social work manager and is primarily made up of experienced social work practitioners, occupational therapists and family workers. They work in close partnership with education, health, housing and voluntary organisations to ensure that children, young people and adults who access support receive a good standard of service. The social workers are passionate about making a difference and are committed to ensuring all of the young people have a smooth transition to adulthood and are signposted to services within the community.

Quality Assurance and associated services

This service is responsible for embedding a Quality Assurance Framework that is focussed on the lived experience of the child, young person and family based on an assessment of need and risk.  That all children, young people and families receive focused, purposeful and evidence based interventions for which this service has a quality assurance function. This Service also sits alongside the Medway Safeguarding Children Partnership (MSCP).

We also have responsibility for the quality assurance and audit of social work practice, as a critical friend, to assist with improvements in practice and service delivery.   This function is largely carried out by the Quality Assurance Team.

Medway has a Principal Social Worker and four Advanced Practitioners who take the professional lead across children’s services, supporting and advising on the quality of practice.

The Local Authority Designated Officer (LADO) team oversee and co-ordinate the management of allegations made against professionals who work with children.  LADO is a small team consisting of two LADOs and a Senior LADO responsible for all allegation management, offering advice and guidance to all Medway organisations that provide a service to children, including the voluntary sector.

The Independent Reviewing Officer (IRO) team consists of one Manager and seven IRO’s, whose statutory duties include chairing the child’s review and monitoring the child’s case on an ongoing basis.

We have a Child Protection (CP) Conferencing Chair team which consists of one Manager and eight CP Chairs, who are responsible for specialising in the facilitation of CP Conferences and reviewing CP plans.

The Subject Access Request (SAR) team consists of two social workers who carefully manage all children’s services SARs holding expertise under the Data Protection Act 1998.

Children in Care

The Children in Care Service provides ongoing support and services to all children for whom there is no viable plan to return home.  The Children in Care Service also receives referrals for separate unaccompanied asylum-seeking children and provides the planning and support service for those children.

The Children in Care Service provide a 0-16 years old service for children and young people who have been looked after before the age of 16.  Young people will transfer to the 16+ Leaving Care specialist team when they reach 16 years unless there is a clear rationale for them to remain with their Children in Care social worker e.g. good relationship with social worker, and a change of worker during GCSEs would not be in child’s interest.

A Leaving Care Personal Advisor will be allocated alongside the Social Worker from the age of 16, who will then remain the allocated Personal Advisor after the young person reaches 18 and beyond.  The Children in Care Teams and the Leaving Care service will link and work closely with the Adolescent Service.

Children in Care Service will be responsible for court proceedings for children following an Interim Care Order being granted, provision of services to children in Section 20 care who have no plan to return home, formation and implementation of the permanency plans for children and professional abuse and complex abuse investigations, for children allocated in the team.

Leaving Care 16 plus team

The leaving care team support young people aged 16 to 25 who have left the care of Medway Council but remain entitled to leaving care support.  This includes support with housing applications, access to education, employment and benefits as well as emotional health and wellbeing.

Fostering Service

The fostering service consist of two teams; one team are responsible for recruitment, assessment, ongoing support and supervision of foster carers, supporting lodging providers and assessment and support of private fostering arrangements. The other team are responsible for the assessment of all proposed connected carers and viability to special guardianship assessments.

Adoption Service

The adoption team finds permanent new families for children who can no longer live with their birth parents.  Adoption staff recruit, assess and prepare adopters, support adopted children and special guardians, their families, birth families and adopted adults.

Medway Virtual School (MVS)

The Medway Virtual School is led by the Virtual Headteacher, who acts as a local authority champion to promote the educational achievement of Looked After Children and Young Care Leavers, working with schools, carers and social workers to help these pupils achieve educational outcomes comparable to their peers.  When our children and young care leavers receive a high quality education there is a strong foundation for widening and improving their opportunities in life.

Parklands

Parklands is a residential multi-agency respite centre for children with a disability which also provides day care facilities.

Download team structure chart
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Our Staff Say

Professional Development

Professional Support

We are committed to establishing a skilled, permanent social care workforce. Medway Social Work Academy has a programme of training and support for NQSWs, qualified and experienced practitioners and managers. The Academy has strong links with local universities and leading London universities, who are Social Work educators.

We are implementing Signs of Safety as our practice model which will be supported by an extensive programme of training.  This will be enhanced by a core offer of skills and knowledge-based training programme relevant to the individual worker and service needs.

Practice Educating is encouraged to support the learning culture and to assist with bringing new talent into the organisation. Medway Council run a Practice Educator Professional Standards (PEPS) stage 1 and stage 2 course annually to ensure that staff have an opportunity to undertake the qualification within their employment if they wish to.

Leadership programmes are available as we are focused on developing leadership in our first line managers.

In addition to the above, there are monthly workshops delivered by our very own internal experts to enhance the skills and knowledge of our Social Workers. The topics are determined by regular internal audits and quality assurance of work being undertaken so the sessions can be tailored for the current gaps in knowledge and skills.

Legal Practice Development workshops are also developed and delivered on a regular basis to ensure that our Social Workers have up to date knowledge on laws and legislation that relate to Social Work.

Medway Council also have an award-winning Apprenticeship Academy which offers a wide range of qualifications.

Additionally, to the above CPD offers, The Medway Safeguarding Children Partnership offer an extensive eLearning suite which has been put together to provide fundamental learning that a Social Worker may need whilst practising.

Career Progression Pathway

Our career progression scheme was re-launched in April 2020.

The aims of the scheme are

• To support social workers to develop skills, expertise and professional confidence at every stage of their career;

• To provide social workers with opportunities to agree a learning and development plan linked to their annual Performance Development Review, which recognizes and rewards the acquisition and application of additional “specialist” knowledge and skills;

• To enable social workers to progress in their career within Medway, using their knowledge and experience to make a difference for children and families in Medway;

• To enable Social Workers to the meet Social Work England Professional Standards to maintain their registration.

• To support recruitment and retention.

Progression between Levels

Progression from Social Worker to Experienced Social Worker will be dependent on the employee submitting a portfolio of evidence.

Progression to the role of Senior Practitioner is through a portfolio and interview process.

Progression to the roles of Team Manager and Group Manager are through an interview and presentation.

Professional Development

Professional Support

We are committed to establishing a skilled, permanent social care workforce. Medway Social Work Academy has a programme of training and support for NQSWs, qualified and experienced practitioners and managers. The Academy has strong links with local universities and leading London universities, who are Social Work educators.

We are implementing Signs of Safety as our practice model which will be supported by an extensive programme of training.  This will be enhanced by a core offer of skills and knowledge-based training programme relevant to the individual worker and service needs.

Practice Educating is encouraged to support the learning culture and to assist with bringing new talent into the organisation. Medway Council run a Practice Educator Professional Standards (PEPS) stage 1 and stage 2 course annually to ensure that staff have an opportunity to undertake the qualification within their employment if they wish to.

Leadership programmes are available as we are focused on developing leadership in our first line managers.

In addition to the above, there are monthly workshops delivered by our very own internal experts to enhance the skills and knowledge of our Social Workers. The topics are determined by regular internal audits and quality assurance of work being undertaken so the sessions can be tailored for the current gaps in knowledge and skills.

Legal Practice Development workshops are also developed and delivered on a regular basis to ensure that our Social Workers have up to date knowledge on laws and legislation that relate to Social Work.

Medway Council also have an award-winning Apprenticeship Academy which offers a wide range of qualifications.

Additionally, to the above CPD offers, The Medway Safeguarding Children Partnership offer an extensive eLearning suite which has been put together to provide fundamental learning that a Social Worker may need whilst practising.

Career Progression Pathway

Our career progression scheme was re-launched in April 2020.

The aims of the scheme are

• To support social workers to develop skills, expertise and professional confidence at every stage of their career;

• To provide social workers with opportunities to agree a learning and development plan linked to their annual Performance Development Review, which recognizes and rewards the acquisition and application of additional “specialist” knowledge and skills;

• To enable social workers to progress in their career within Medway, using their knowledge and experience to make a difference for children and families in Medway;

• To enable Social Workers to the meet Social Work England Professional Standards to maintain their registration.

• To support recruitment and retention.

Progression between Levels

Progression from Social Worker to Experienced Social Worker will be dependent on the employee submitting a portfolio of evidence.

Progression to the role of Senior Practitioner is through a portfolio and interview process.

Progression to the roles of Team Manager and Group Manager are through an interview and presentation.

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