Kinship Family Worker (Surrey)

Purpose of the role

Kinship Connected is an evidence-informed 6-month intervention for kinship carers. It is delivered in the home and in the community. As a Kinship Family Worker for Kinship Connected, you will deliver our flagship programme to families in Surrey. You will provide intensive one-to-one support to kinship carers to empower them to become resilient, well informed and equipped with a strong support network to help them care for the children in their care. You will help them to navigate their local ecosystems and support them to unlock community assets and support.

Alongside this, you will play a key role in the delivery of Kinship’s Ready Programme in Surrey, ensuring kinship carers are supported to access and engage with workshops and wider kinship services that meet their needs. The Kinship Ready programme is designed to support prospective and new kinship carers understand their journey to becoming Special Guardians.

You will be committed to the work of Kinship, passionate about making a difference to the lives of vulnerable families, and you will have proven experience of working with families, particularly those in more disadvantaged circumstances.

You’ll bring excellent relationship building, communication and organisational skills, as well as the ability to work on your own initiative and collaboratively with partners, both externally and internally.

One-to-one support

You will provide intensive one-to-one support, directly to kinship carers for up to six-months working within the Kinship Connected delivery model. This may include, but is not limited to:

• 1:1 emotional support
• Advocacy support in meetings
• Supporting kinship carers to attend a peer support group
• Liaising with local organisations that can offer specialised support and training
• Liaising with schools or other organisations
• Supporting kinship carers with the behaviour of the child/ children in their care
• Signposting to other support services
• Grants – support with grant application for essential items and holiday breaks
• Setting up and facilitating a monthly support group within your commissioned area
• Signposting carers to Kinship training opportunities or organising targeted training workshops within your LA

Ready Programme delivery and coordination

As part of your role, you will support the effective delivery of Kinship’s Ready Workshops, working closely with the internal colleagues and the local authority. Responsibilities include:

• Booking kinship carers onto Ready workshops and supporting their engagement throughout the programme
• Registering carers via scheduled phone calls, ensuring they understand the programme and feel supported to attend
• Identifying and responding to any additional needs carers may have, including reasonable adjustments, access needs or emotional support, and signposting appropriately
• Referring carers to other Kinship services such as Kinship’s Advice service, Peer to Peer and Training and Support
• Occasionally assisting with the delivery of Ready Programme workshops online
• Completing administrative tasks related to the programme, including registering attendance, maintaining accurate participant records and updating internal systems
• Collating feedback, monitoring outcomes and gathering other relevant data to support evaluation, reporting and continuous improvement of the Ready Programme

Collaboration

• Working closely with other teams across the organisation, including, Comms and Campaigns, Peer Support, Training and Development, Advice, ensuring kinship carers are at the heart of everything we do.
• Support local authorities to understand the referral process and to make referrals to the programme
• Work with local authorities to raise awareness of kinship care
• Where possible and relevant, represent Kinship at external events and meetings

Safeguarding and risk management

Kinship has a robust safeguarding structure. You will be supported by a Designated Safeguarding Lead (DSL) and Designated Deputy Safeguarding Leads (DDSL).

In line with this policy, you will

• Recognise, report, record, respond and refer and safeguarding risks via our safeguarding process with the support for the safeguard team
• Complete risk assessments for events in-line with Kinships policy
• Follow the Kinship Health and Safety policy
• Use the StaySafe lone worker app

Monitoring and evaluation

• Ensure casework, home visit and meeting attendance, feedback, and other data related to service delivery are accurately recorded on our Salesforce database in line with Kinship’s policy and best practice.
• Ensure completion of carer needs Assessments with the setting of SMART goals, mid-term reviews and outcomes forms and processes are followed, recording data used to evidence impact.
• Collect case studies each quarter from carers and professional support in demonstrating impact.
• Complete monthly reports for your area and contribute quarterly reports for local authority partners
• Attend quarterly monitoring meetings
• Engage in quality assurance processes in line with ongoing programme development

General duties and tasks

• To attend and engage with Programmes team and all staff meetings
• To personally prepare for and attend case reviews, supervision and appraisals with your line manager.
• To act at all times in the best interest of Kinship.
• To participate in the induction of new staff members and volunteers.
• To work with line manager to identify own training needs and undertake training and development.
• To engage in reflective practice, using opportunities for supervision and professional development as appropriate.
• Participate in opportunities provided by Kinship to develop your skills and knowledge such as staff training, ‘Lunch and learn’ sessions.
• To carry out other related duties as may from time to time be required to fulfil the mission of the team and organisation.
• To develop Kinship Care Week in your local area.
• Be willing to travel across England as necessary to attend events and raise the profile of the service and kinship care.
• Attend staff Away Days

Experience and Knowledge

• Experience of family work and undertaking needs assessments both in person and remotely
• Experience of setting up and facilitating support groups on an in-person and remote basis.
• Experience of working with statutory, voluntary and community networks and the ability to represent the organisation to external stakeholders.
• Experience of dealing with safeguarding
• Experience of using a Customer Relations Management system (CRM)

Knowledge, skills and understanding

• Knowledge and understanding of kinship care and the ability to learn quickly about the regulations and guidance relating to special guardians.
• Excellent communication skills.
• Proven track record of high-level administrative work and experience of working with a case management system to record interventions.
• Excellent organisational skills
• The ability to maintain confidentiality, in line with Kinship policies and GDPR
• IT skills and experience, particularly in Work, Excel, and CRM’s such as Salesforce
• Ability to work on your own initiative and manage your diary
• The ability to manage a complex and varied workload to successfully meet project deadlines and KPI’s.
• Right to work in the UK and a Full, clean driver’s licence.

General attributes

• Positive and can-do attitude and ability manage challenging and sensitive issues with professionalism and empathy
• Commitment to the values, aims and objectives of Kinship, promoting these in all interactions, both internally and externally
• Ability to apply and champion principles of Equality, Diversity and Inclusion Principles in all aspects of work
• Flexibility to travel across London and to occasional meetings in other parts of England
• Strong interpersonal and communication skills, with the ability to build strong trusting relationships with diverse individuals and communities
• Self-motivated and well-organised, able to manage time and workload effectively while meeting deadlines and KPI’s

• Personal experience of kinship care
• Experience of writing copy, case studies and newsletter articles as well as shorter reports
• Experience of using Salesforce database or similar
• Knowledge and awareness of the National Kinship Care strategy for England 2024