Council jobs in Blandford Forum

Job Introduction

We have a fantastic opportunity to join our Children's Social Care Commissioning team!

This role sits in the Children's Social Care Commissioning team and works closely with social care colleagues. We are a small team responsible for commissioning the services required to support our families, and this is a new role in the team.

Hybrid working is supported in the team with attendance at Staffordshire Place One expected once a week. Flexible working hours are also supported and we are happy to discuss this with you.

We have a requirement to monitor our residential schools to ensure they are meeting the National Minimum Standards for Residential Education Settings. We undertake regular Quality Assurance visits to ensure needs are met in accordance with the care plan and contract. The residential education schools contract is 2 years until 31st August 2028 and you will support on a fixed term basis during the contract period.

Main Responsibilities

In this role you'll:

• QA (quality assure) residential schools against National Minimum Standards for Residential Education Settings, via regular Quality Assurance visits to ensure needs are met in accordance with the care plan and contract.
• Support the Commissioning Manager to ensure commissioned places are effective with high standards of care and compliant with council procedures and contracts.
• QA the commissioned centre based community support for children which is not covered by CQC or OFSTED. This gives the Local Authority and our families increased protection and oversight.
• Attend the Admissions and Review panels at each of our residential schools when students are being considered to access support at the residential settings.
• Review individual placement plans, progress and outcomes to ensure placements are supporting our children and young people to develop life skills, independence and prepare for adulthood, successfully accessing local community activities relevant to needs and preventing escalation.
• Attend the Children's Disability Resource Panel each fortnight, working closely with Social Care colleagues including raising any safeguarding concerns.
• Contribute to the development of children's services ensuring our children and families have the right support.

The Ideal Candidate

You're required to have the below essential minimum criteria:

• Educated to Degree level in a related field or equivalent experience in social care/health sector and/or commissioning
• Experience of working directly with children
• Experience in a children's social care setting or similar environment
• A demonstratable knowledge and experience of quality assurance systems
• Demonstratable effective continuous improvement in service delivery
• Understanding of relevant legislation and current challenges in this service area
• Effective communication skills with a range of audiences including children and young people

Interviews will be held on 29th July 2026 at Staffordshire Place 1, Tipping Street, Stafford.

Don’t feel you meet all the requirements? We value transferable skills, experiences, and qualifications so consider applying anyway or for an informal chat about the role please contact Lisa Mason, Commissioning Manager at: lisa.mason@staffordshire.gov.uk

Our Recruitment Process: We anonymise applications during shortlisting to ensure only relevant information is considered. Please complete your application fully, especially the supporting statement, to highlight what you’ll bring to the role. Please note: The minimum essential criteria in the ideal candidate section detailed above will be used if you are applying under one of our Interview Guarantee Schemes detailed below.

About Staffordshire County Council

We are no ordinary county council:

Our Values:

The core of who we are as an organisation. Just like we all have personal values that shape our thoughts and behaviour, organisational values drive how we think and act collectively.

Our values were created and shaped by colleague feedback and national best practice and they sit at the heart of People Strategy:

We have a real sense of community spirit that brings our people together. This feeling of belonging means we are all connected to what we do and take pride in the difference we make every day for Staffordshire people. We are ambitious and our sights are set firmly on a better future.

We look forward and race ahead - that goes for your career too.

Our benefits:

We recognise that it is our employees that are central to everything we do. We aim to create a supportive working environment where employees can achieve their full potential and achieve a healthy work-life balance.

In addition to your salary, as a member of staff, you will have access to Our rewards and benefits - Careers at Staffordshire

Our recruitment process:

As an Authority we are committed to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children and young people/vulnerable adults and expect all staff and volunteers to share this commitment.

Staffordshire County Council is an equal opportunities organisation and Disability Confident employer. We encourage applications from all background and communities

As part of our commitment as a Disability Confident employer, a Gold Award Armed Forces employer and our commitment to supporting care leavers - we offer a guaranteed interview as long as your application meets the minimum criteria for the post.

As you’ll know safeguarding and promoting the welfare of our children and young people/vulnerable adults is important to us and that’s why this position is subject to a criminal record check from the Disclosure and Barring Service. If applicable you should disclose details of unspent and unfiltered spent reprimands, formal warnings, cautions and convictions in your application form.