Team Manager (SGO & Assessments) na London Borough of Lambeth BU

Team Manager – Kinship Assessment Team 

Children’s Social Care, Fostering and Permanency Service

PO6: £56,436 rising in annual increments to £59,574 pa incl. LW

Plus £4,700 pa Market Supplement 

Hybrid working / Permanent

In Lambeth we put children and their families at the heart of our practice, and practice at the heart of all that we do. Our new Borough Plan has social justice at the centre and a clear vision for improving outcomes for our children and families.

You will be joining an ambitious, passionate, and committed leadership team. We are working at pace to create the conditions for effective social work to flourish and for all our children to receive a good service. We are clear on the challenges we face and have the courage and vision to deliver improvements. Following our inspection in 2022 Ofsted recognised the momentum and investment in Children’s Services. We are now seeking to complete our transformational leadership team at a Team Manager level.

About the Role:
Lambeth is looking for a highly motivated Team Manager to manage a fast-paced Kinship Assessment Team within our Fostering and Permanency Service. As Team Manager you will help us to deliver high quality assessments to kinship carers to achieve our vision of making Lambeth one of the best places in the world for children and young people to grow up. In this role, you will play a key leadership role in the delivery of high-quality social care practice to ensure that these outcomes are realised.

You will manage a team of 5 permanent social workers and 1 compliance officer.

We work hard to achieve positive and sustainable changes in children’s lives and support our kinship carers to a very high standard. As the Team Manager, you will ensure delivery of high quality, inclusive services, responsive to the needs of young people and the wider community, address the safeguarding needs of children and young people, and promote corporate parenting principles across the council.

About You:
You will need to be social work qualified with significant experience in fostering, kinship or special guardianship assessment teams. You will have extensive knowledge of the Children Act and other areas of social work legislation including a sound understanding and working knowledge of the fostering regulations and standards. You will also need to have experience of managing others within a fostering service.

You will need to have a passion to lead and motivate staff to demonstrate best practice. You will have the ability to manage risk and use of multidisciplinary working with partner agencies is essential. You will be expected to ensure a high level of compliance with the statutory and regulatory requirements of the service. Our ambition is to become an outstanding provider. We are keen to hear from you if you have strong leadership skills and a passion for continuous improvements. 

You will be experienced in supporting social workers to be the agents of change and to empower and enable them to spend their time doing good quality, meaningful social work, coproduced and tailored around the needs and issues of each family they work with.

You will need strong interpersonal skills, and the ability to work effectively within a performance framework to ensure high quality social work. You will ensure performance indicators are met as well as taking budget responsibility.

You are expected to demonstrate and role model responses and decisions in the best interests of children, young people, and families by using ‘role generosity’ when considering service / team / practitioner remits.
Lambeth promotes Systemic approaches to working with families and communities. By embedding systemic values in our innovative ‘Children at the Heart of Practice’ framework, we are inspiring, resourcing and enabling social workers to undertake impactful relationship-based practice.

Find out more about our approach by clicking here to visit our jobsite.

Why Lambeth:
•    Fantastic, modern working environment in the award-winning  Lambeth Town Hall and Civic Centre buildings
•    Competitive Salaries
•    Up to 35 days annual leave, dependent upon continuous service
•    5 Minutes from  London Underground and excellent transport links into the  centre of London London
•    Hybrid/Flexible working
•    Cycle to Work Scheme (including City Bike Hire scheme)
•    Attractive Local Government Pension Scheme

We are a Stonewall diversity champion; a Living Wage Employer and we guarantee to interview all disabled candidates who meet the minimum criteria of the role. Please click here for a full list of our accreditations.

If you have any queries in relation to this vacancy, please contact Olaitan (Ola) Aregbesola on Tel. 020 7926 2677 or Email: [email protected]

Successful candidates will be asked to apply for an Enhanced Certificate from the Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS). Further information about the DBS can be found at www.homeoffice.gov.uk/agencies-public-bodies/dbs.

Please note we operate an anonymised application process. If you are uploading your CV or a personal statement, please remove your personal details and replace these with your unique candidate application number.

Interested?
Click the 'Apply' button and complete an online application form explicitly evidencing in the Supporting Statement field how you meet the criteria marked with an ‘A’ at shortlist stage, along with uploading your CV.

JD and Person Specification 

Closing Date: Sunday 30th November 2025 at midnight