Specialist Social Worker

We’re looking for a Specialist Social Worker with a passion for diversity and inclusion to join our team. Could that be you?

Who are we?

Deaf Action is a deaf-led charity, supporting and celebrating deaf people. We were established in 1835 and work with deaf people across Scotland and the South of England. Our work is geared towards empowering all deaf people to achieve their potential and fully participate in society, with equality of rights, access and opportunity.

You can find out more about us at www.deafaction.org.

About you

You will have excellent communication skills, able to prioritise your own workload and the ability to motivate and manage a small team. A means of communication will be through British Sign Language (BSL) therefore competency in BSL is desirable, for example, BSL level 3 (or working towards) however we will offer BSL training. You will have a strong grasp of current social work practice and issues with three years’ post qualifying social work practice within a local authority, third sector or Charity setting in adult or children’s services with knowledge of the deaf community and its culture.

The ideal candidates will be fully committed to our values, which can be found on our website.

The role

The Specialist Social Worker heads up the Social Care team which consists of a Social Worker and Community Care Assistants. The aim of the role is to build and maintain relationships within the deaf community while providing a high-quality social work service to deaf people, their families and carers within Edinburgh and the Lothians. This opportunity comes at an exciting time as currently we are developing a service for children under 10.

Key responsibilities of the role include:

• Undertake holistic assessments of deaf clients
• Maintain a schedule of initial/6 month/ annual reviews for all deaf clients
• Support clients from referral onwards supporting them through an appropriate pathway to support
• Manage the duty service offering support, information and advice within 48 hours of contact
• Provide long term support to clients as required
• Maintain case notes within Deaf Action and other local authority databases
• Maintain log of duty contacts, assessment, reviews and ongoing support for quarterly returns in line with Local Authority service level agreements
• Manage quarterly feedback for the service
• Undertake adult support and protection procedures and other statutory procedures alongside mainstream social work support
• Provide safeguarding advice to the agency
• To provide some advice and support to other agencies working with deaf people using or wanting to use services
• Engage with other services and forums to ensure Deaf Action services are linked into and support complementary services
• To help identify gaps in service provision and to identify ways in which these could be filled

What’s on offer?

• Occupational pension scheme with employer contributions of 6%.
• 32 days leave (inc bank holidays) pro rata for part time
• 24/7 access to an Employee Assistance Programme provided by Health Assured.
• In-house Mental Health First Aiders.
• Access to the Cycle to Work Scheme and IT Voucher Scheme.
• Ongoing support for learning and development through our PDR process
• Death in Service

To apply, please send your CV along with a covering letter or BSL video explaining in a couple of paragraphs why you are interested in the post and what experience you have that you will bring to the role to recruitment@deafaction.org

PVG checks will be requested. Applications welcome from all sections of the community