Senior Social Worker - Adult Early Help

About the role

An exciting permanent opportunity has arisen to join the Prevention and Early Intervention Front Door Team as a Senior Social Worker within our Adult Early Help Service. This is a full-time position working 37 hours per week.

Adult Early Help supports adults and unpaid carers across Cambridgeshire to identify solutions that maintain independence, build on existing strengths and reduce reliance on formal services. Through person-centred conversations, the team connects people with community resources, voluntary organisations, assistive technology and practical support that can prevent, reduce or delay the need for longer-term care and support.

As our Senior Social Worker, you will be a key member of the leadership team, helping to shape practice and support the continued development of the service. You will provide professional expertise within a multidisciplinary team, promoting strengths-based practice, sound decision-making and proportionate approaches to risk and safeguarding.

The role combines practice leadership, supervision and service development, offering an excellent opportunity for an experienced Social Worker who is passionate about prevention, early intervention and supporting others to develop their skills and confidence.

As part of the wider Prevention and Early Intervention Service, you will work closely with colleagues across Adult Social Care and partner organisations to achieve positive outcomes for people and communities across Cambridgeshire.

Interviews will be held during the week commencing 16 November 2026.

For an informal discussion about the role, please contact Stuart Brown by email at stuart.brown@cambridgeshire.gov.uk to arrange a suitable time to talk.

Appointment to this post will be subject to the outcome of an Enhanced Disclosure obtained through the Disclosure and Barring Service. The Council is committed to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children and vulnerable adults and expects all staff and volunteers to share this commitment.

What will you be doing?

As a Senior Social Worker within Adult Early Help, you will play a key role in supporting the delivery of high-quality, strengths-based practice across the team. Working closely with the Team Manager, you will provide professional leadership, guidance and oversight to colleagues, helping to ensure that people receive timely, proportionate and preventative support that promotes independence and wellbeing.

You will act as a source of expertise on adult social care legislation, safeguarding and positive risk-taking, supporting practitioners to make confident and defensible decisions in complex situations. Through reflective supervision, case discussions and informal practice support, you will help develop the knowledge, skills and confidence of Adult Support Coordinators, Social Workers and other colleagues across the team.

A significant part of the role involves line management and staff development. You will support performance, wellbeing and learning, creating an environment where practitioners feel valued, challenged and supported to grow. You will contribute to the induction and development of new team members and help identify training and development opportunities that strengthen practice across the service.

Working alongside the Team Manager, you will contribute to quality assurance activities including case audits, practice reviews and the implementation of service improvements. You will use learning from audits, safeguarding activity and feedback from people accessing support to help drive continual improvement and maintain high standards of practice.

As part of the wider Prevention and Early Intervention service, you will work collaboratively with colleagues across Adult Social Care and partner organisations, sharing knowledge and expertise to promote prevention, wellbeing and community-based solutions. You will play an important role in shaping the continued development of the Adult Early Help team and ensuring it remains responsive to the changing needs of our communities.

About you

You must be a Qualified Social Worker with current Social Work England Registration, and post-qualifying experience within Social Care.

You will need a good working knowledge of the Care Act 2014 and Mental Capacity Act 2005. Experience of multi-disciplinary working to enable best outcomes for individuals is key.

It is imperative that you have strong communication skills, a confident telephone manner and can work on your own initiative. Good planning and organisation skills will be key, and you should be used to working under pressure to meet deadlines, allowing flexibility and resilience.

Experience of supporting the development of others is essential and of line manging staff desirable.

You will have the ability to lead with confidence and of sharing your knowledge to mentor and coach others. For a full list of the requirements of the role, please check out the Job Description & Person Specification.

Our benefits

We value our colleagues in Cambridgeshire County Council and have developed a number of benefits in addition to the basics like annual leave, sick pay, pension and mileage...

• A comprehensive wellbeing package to cover all aspects of wellbeing, both in and out of work, which can also be accessed by your family
• Buy up to 4 weeks additional annual leave (pro-rata) through our salary sacrifice scheme
• Take your bank holidays flexibly to better suit your personal circumstances
• Make Additional Voluntary Contributions (Shared AVCs) to your pension with tax and National Insurance savings
• Access to development opportunities, apprenticeships and qualified coaches to support your personal and professional growth
• 6 days of protected time each year to support in maintaining your Continuous Professional Development
• A pay progression scheme to enable you to accelerate through the pay grade as you gain experience and skills
• Paid volunteering hours each year so you can make a positive impact on our community during your normal working day
• Access to Peer Support Groups through our IDEAL staff equality, diversity and inclusion network
• Opportunities to nominate and receive Employee Recognition Awards
• An Our Cambs Rewards account, giving you access to in-store and online discounts as well as our Car Lease and Cycle to Work schemes

Take a look at our Employment Benefits Brochure attached to this advert to find out more.

About us

Cambridgeshire is a great place to work and live with a diverse population, an urban centre in Cambridge, historic Isle of Ely, Huntingdon and St Ives as well as more rural landscapes.

Our four values are central to our culture, driving everything we do.

We are proud to serve the diverse communities of Cambridgeshire and want our workforce to be reflective of this diversity, which we firmly believe benefits our colleagues, the organisation and our communities. If you don't meet every single requirement in the job role but think this could be you, please don't be put off. We are committed to building a workplace that is compassionate and inclusive as well as diverse, so if you think you could be a good candidate for this role please consider applying and speak to the recruiting manager if you have any questions.

Our Equality, Diversity and Inclusion Strategy, along with our employee network 'IDEAL' and self-organised peer support groups help us to foster an inclusive, supportive and safe working environment where people feel valued, respected, and empowered. We collect relevant diversity data for monitoring as part of the recruitment process to understand the diversity of our applicants and monitor any trends throughout the recruitment processes so that we can take meaningful action.

We are proud to be a Disability Confident Leader. We fully support providing reasonable adjustments throughout our recruitment process, as well as when you join us, and we encourage candidates to contact the Hiring Manager, whose details can be found in the advert, to discuss any adjustment needs. Through a Guaranteed Interview Scheme, we will offer an interview to all applicants who disclose a disability and meet the essential criteria for a job vacancy. On your application form you can indicate you are disabled. Some examples of reasonable adjustments during the recruitment process could include additional time to complete an assessment or printing a document on pastel coloured paper with larger font size and line spacing. We would value talking about what might be possible to enable you to join us and thrive, so if there is something that would help you to do your best during your journey with us, please get in touch.

Visit our jobs and careers section to find out more about our wide range of learning and development opportunities; apprenticeships; our wellbeing package; staff benefits; our commitment to equality, diversity and Inclusion.

https://www.cambridgeshire.gov.uk/council/jobs-and-careers

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Salary

£46956 - £50157

Working conditions

Contract: Full Time Permanent