Director of Children & Families
Salary: £140,000 - £150,000 per annum pro rata
Closing date: midnight on Sunday 2nd June 2024
Please note to apply for this role please visit www.shapingcentralbeds.co.uk
Take our Children’s Services from good to great
Central Bedfordshire Council has been on an incredible journey since its formation in 2009. Alongside enviable service improvements we have become a leaner and more efficient organisation, with an agile and empowered workforce. We’ve built and grown sustainably and put the Council on a firm and stable footing, which will allow our communities, businesses, and people to thrive. Our strategic plan reaffirms our values and focus, and we are now seeking three inspirational leaders who share our ambition.
There has never been a greater need for us to work corporately across the council, with other local authorities, wider partnerships, and with our communities. Our children’s services are performing well, and as a wider council we are implementing a bold plan to reset how we operate internally and how we engage with our customers, making the best use of technology to free up our skilled workforce to focus on what they do best; making a real difference. We’ve also made a lot of exciting capital investments, and been very successful in bringing external funding which is opening up a diverse set of opportunities and which will help to define our future growth.
About the role
We’re incredibly proud of our children’s services here in Central Bedfordshire. Our latest Ofsted ILACS rating was ‘Good’ across the board, and we have had a very positive focussed visit earlier this year.
As statutory DCS, your key priorities will be to build on our good practice to deliver outstanding outcomes for our children and young people – ensuring we keep them safe and helping them to thrive. We have similar challenges to most local authorities around our children’s services budget, so there will be a focus on ensuring services are high performing whilst also sustainable. Other priorities include delivering the programme of change from 3 tier schools to 2 tier, and managing the demand for SEND services through investment, innovation, and policy development. To achieve this, you’ll work collaboratively with corporate colleagues, partners, and our children, young people and their families. It is crucial that we maintain our child and family centred services, with the voice of children at the very centre of everything we do.
About you
We’re looking for a Director of Children and Families to build on the strong foundations in place to take us from good to great. A Director who empowers the workforce to achieve the very best for all children, young people, and their families in Central Bedfordshire.
You will be joining an ambitious council, with a friendly and collegiate culture, who have been successful in delivering innovation and different ways of working. If you share our ambition to truly put Central Bedfordshire on the map, then we would love to hear from you.
To find out more and to apply, visit www.shapingcentralbeds.co.uk or, for a confidential conversation, call our retained consultants at Tile Hill, Anita Denton on 07725 554802 or Chris Barrow on 07437 839048.