Job Introduction
The Service
The Children and Families Services helps, supports, and protects Portsmouth's most vulnerable children and young people, enabling them to lead safer, healthier, and more fulfilling lives. It also acts as the corporate parent for the city's Looked After Children.
Going forward, the service and its Business Support function will embrace change, have a strong and sharp focus on exceptional customer care, and will respond flexibly and effectively to transformational developments.
The Role
You will provide high quality administrative Business Support within Fostering Team, initially office based during training and progressing to hybrid working. The Fostering teams recruit new foster carers and provide ongoing Support to existing foster carers.
The role plays a vital part in the Business Support Administrative functions to ensure the smooth-running of business processes. Most work involves both written and oral communication to provide high quality customer care and towards the production of accurate and professional records, as well as the ability to multi-task and work well under pressure.
Your duties will include many or all of the following:
- Minute taking at meetings: Workshops/Partnership meetings/Mockingbird meetings, Panel meetings often of a sensitive and/or confidential nature.
- Entering data into service information and caseload systems.
- Dealing with telephone, email and face-to-face enquiries.
- Facilitating a workflow for placing orders for goods and services and co-ordinating the payment of invoices.
- Providing administrative support for training courses/events/conferences/meetings etc.
- Maintaining files and documentation, carrying out all necessary word processing, spreadsheets, database and presentation duties.
- Ordering equipment and travel requirements for Foster Carers.
- Providing Panel Administrator function for Fostering panels in compliance with statutory requirements, including the collation, checking, distribution of all Panel documentation and providing administrative support to Panel members.
The ideal candidate
You will need to have/be
- Strong administrative skills with experience of working in an administrative/customer focused role. Experience of working in Children and Families Services.
- Excellent telephone, written and face to face communication skills to be able to deal with a variety of wide range of callers which is essential to the post.
- A good listener as you will need to get the right information from a caller in order to put them in touch with the right people in the office and an awareness of sensitive issues when dealing with service users.
- The ability to develop a good professional rapport with a variety of people.
- Be an exemplar and at the forefront of ensuring high standards of customer care and customer service. Empathy for others as you will be dealing with some difficult and upsetting situations
- Excellent organisational skills and the ability to prioritise workload, good attention to detail and level of accuracy
- Strong literacy and numeracy skills to respond to internal/external correspondence/email and to be able to take detailed complex minutes
- A good working knowledge of using databases and Microsoft Office, including Word, Excel, PowerPoint and Outlook
- A good awareness of Data Protection, Information Governance and Safeguarding Issues
- The ability to work flexibly to meet the requirements of the team and wider service
- To be a good team player, also able to work on own initiative.
Please see the Job profile for the full details and expectations of this role
Application process
We anonymise applications during application & shortlisting to ensure only relevant information is considered.
As part of your application we ask that you complete a personal statement, this statement is crucial and is where you must demonstrate how you meet the requirements of the job against each of the points described in the 'Who is the Person' points on the Job Profile using examples from your experience or transferable skills. This might be through qualifications or descriptive examples from your work / personal experience.
We are a disability confident employer and Armed Forces Covenant gold standard. More information can be found at Equality, diversity and inclusion - Careers portal
You will need to demonstrate that you have the Right to Work in the UK. No post will be offered without it.
We are committed to our values of respect, integrity, collaboration, inclusivity and being people-focussed. These values set out how we can contribute to the success of the council and our own success as individuals. Learn more about our values and behaviours.
About Portsmouth City Council
What we can offer you:
Portsmouth City Council is a unique organisation, committed to making a difference, and is guided by core values that set who we are as people, what we stand for, and how we act.
Read more about working at Portsmouth City Council and our benefits on our careers portal homepage: Careers Portal - Find jobs with Portsmouth City Council
Portsmouth City Council is committed to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children, and young people, and expects all staff and volunteers to share this commitment.
DBS Disclosure at Enhanced level will be required prior to any offer of employment and this post is exempt from the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974.
Every post is subject to PCC and Portsmouth Safeguarding Children Partnership safer recruitment procedures.
Should you require any support in completing the application form please contact recruit@portsmouthcc.gov.uk. or call the recruitment team on 023 92 616800
