Senior Wellbeing Practitioner - MHST (Band 6) - Mental health - NELFT NHS Foundation Trust

Main area: Mental health

Grade Band: 6

Contract: Permanent

Hours:

• Full time
• Part time
• Job share
• Flexible working

37.5 hours per week (Monday to Friday 09:00-17:00)

Job ref: 395-EC073-25-A

Site: Mid Essex MHST (Covering the areas of Braintree, Chelmsford & Maldon)

Town: Chelmsford

Salary: £37,338 - £44,962 per annum (pro rata)

Salary period: Yearly

Closing: 11/04/2025 23:59

Joining #TeamNELFT means you’ll become part of a welcoming and supportive working environment. We’re CQC rated Good, and we want you to join us on the journey towards an Outstanding rating. NELFT has sites across North East London, Essex, Kent and Medway. We provide community and mental healthcare services to adults and children within these areas.

The Trust has award-winning equality and diversity initiatives and staff health and wellbeing activities. We invest heavily in your development because when you are valued and supported, we provide the best care to our patients. We are a Level 3 Disability Confident Leader, have been featured in the Working Families Top 10 Employers benchmark for three consecutive years, and we have achieved a Carers UK Level 1 Accreditation. Along with our staff networks and training opportunities, we work hard to embed a just and compassionate culture here at NELFT.

Job overview

NELFT is the largest provider of Mental Health Support Teams (MHSTs) in England. Our Southend, Essex and Thurrock services cover 144 schools currently. We currently cover 48% of secondary and primary school within Southend, Essex and Thurrock.

The MHST delivers evidence-based individual and group interventions in educational settings for children experiencing mild to moderate mental health difficulties aged 4 to 18 years old. The teams also have a strong focus on whole school approaches to improve mental health outcomes for children and young people.

The MHSTs build on the support already in place from school counsellors, nurses, educational psychologists and the voluntary sector to support those with mild to moderate mental health issues in school and will help children and young people with more severe needs to access the right support and provide a link to the CAMHS services.

The post-holder will be a graduate qualified health care professional (e.g. nurse, social worker, occupational therapist), or have completed Education Mental Health Practitioner (EMHP)/Children Wellbeing Practitioner (CWP) qualification and will be fully registered with the appropriate professional or regulatory body (e.g. HCPC, NMC, BPS, BABCP). They will have extensive clinical experience working with Children and Young People (CYP) with emotional wellbeing and mental health difficulties.

Main duties of the job

The post holder will be responsible for delivering interventions within MHSTs in and around schools and colleges whilst receiving clinical supervision.

• Act as an autonomous, registered (where appropriate) practitioner who is legally and professionally accountable for own unsupervised actions guided by the professional code of conduct and Trust guidelines and protocols.
• Initiate referrals to other health professional specialist services and agencies.
• Provide expert emotional wellbeing and mental health support as part of plans to transform CYPs mental health through the NHS Long-Term Plan.
• Undertake school based and community-based assessments, risk assessments, care plans and deliver a range of early interventions to CYP with a range of emotional and behavioural difficulties.
• Responsible and accountable for service delivery to clients/patients, via NICE compliant pathways and in accordance with the crisis care concordat.
• Provide leadership and promote initiative, creativity and motivation in the MHSTs.
• Routinely measure clinical outcomes and deliver evidence-based interventions.
• Communicate complex patient related information facilitating positive outcomes and ensuring collaborative working.
• Support peers and team leader and be an effective team member whilst working on their own initiative. Commit to collaborative working and actively support and liaise with other health and social care professionals and agencies.

Working for our organisation

Starting with NELFT

NELFT places a great deal of importance on new starters being properly welcomed and inducted into the Trust. All new starters will join the Trust on the first Monday of each month and undertake a comprehensive induction of up to two weeks which will include mandatory training, systems training and the allocation of equipment. As part of the process, new starters will have the opportunity to also meet the executive team, senior managers and attend a number of drop-in sessions focusing on engagement, health and wellbeing and key processes. The induction will be held at our head office in Rainham, Essex.

Probationary Period

This post will be subject to a probationary period. Internal applicants are exempt from the probationary period (unless you are an internal applicant currently part way through a probationary period or currently a bank member of staff).

Detailed job description and main responsibilities

The Mid Essex Mental Health Support Team (MHST) covers a large geographical area incorporating the districts of Braintree, Chelmsford and Maldon. We are an early intervention and prevention evidence-based service and as a team we are supportive and passionate in what we deliver. We are a friendly team of professionals who come from multidisciplinary backgrounds. We recognise the need for a healthy work-life balance, and we will consider flexible working applications in line with the trust policies and process. We encourage Continual Professional Development (CPD) and are keen to support our staff to grow and progress.

The successful post holders will have completed or be supported to complete the Senior Wellbeing Practitioner (SWP) course or CYP IAPT Low Intensity Supervisor course.

Please see person specification and job description for full details.

Person specification

Qualifications

• Successful completion of a graduate training (e.g. nursing, social work, occupational therapy) or have completed a low intensity EMHP/CWP Qualification.
• Registration as a full member of the appropriate professional body (e.g. HCPC, NMC) or successful CYP- IAPT Low Intensity CBT training (CWP/EMHP) with substantial post-qualified experience and CPD alongside BPS or BABCP registration.
• Attended/willing to attend SWP course or CYP IAPT Supervisor training.

Skills

• Capacity to work alone, involving colleagues and manager as relevant.
• Ability to communicate clearly and effectively highly complex and sensitive matters to patients, which give rise to psychological distress.
• Ability to tolerate anxiety without recourse to premature action whilst appreciating the role of the supervisor.

Knowledge

• High-level knowledge of the theory and practice of short-term and long-term clinical interventions in Children and Young people's Mental Health Services.
• An awareness of NHS priorities.
• Knowledge of risk management and ability to monitor and assess risk and act accordingly to ensure safety.
• Knowledge of electronic record systems, i.e. Systmone.
• Substantial experience in delivering low intensity CBT treatments with children, young people and parents.
• Experience of working with difficult, disturbed or challenging children/young people requiring skilled and complex interventions.
• Experience of assessment carried out autonomously in order to determine the most appropriate treatment plan from a range of options for the child/young person.
• A minimum of 2 years post qualification experience within mental health services.

We believe in bringing your authentic and best self to work, in order to deliver the best care to our patients. We are committed to supporting our employees holistically. Here is a snapshot of what is on offer at NELFT:

• A long-standing and award-winning approach to equality and diversity with supportive networks for ethnic minority staff, staff with disabilities or long term/chronic conditions and LGBT staff.
• A commitment to supporting colleagues to achieve a work-life balance, through flexible working opportunities and our efforts to support our working parents and carers. This has resulted in us being recognised as a ‘Top 10 Family Friendly Employer’ from the Working Families Charity.
• Proactive health and wellbeing support, including access to our employee assistance programme, staff psychological support, individual wellbeing conversations and a network of health and wellbeing ambassadors.

As a flexible working friendly organisation, we want to be sure that you can work in a way that is best for us and for our patients, and for you. Speak to us about how we might be able to accommodate a flexible working arrangement whether that’s a job share, part-time hours or another flexible pattern.

We recognise the valuable contribution that the Armed Forces community makes to our organisation. We have signed the Armed Forces Covenant and achieved Gold Award under the Armed Forces Employer Recognition Scheme. We have supportive policies, guaranteed interview schemes for veterans, reservists and military spouses and give additional leave to our Reservists so that they can attend their annual camp.

Equal opportunities employer

We are committed to equal opportunities and diversity and positively encourage applications from all sections of the community regardless of any protected characteristic.

We are a Disability Confident employer and have made the pledge to commit to employing more people with disabilities. If you require this application in another format i.e. Braille or audio tape please contact the recruitment team on 0300 300 1530 or email recruitment@nelft.nhs.uk.

Correspondence with us

You are advised to regularly check your emails (including any junk mail/spam folders) for correspondence related to this post.

As part of our recruitment process, we may be required to share information you provide on the application form with NHS Counter Fraud Authority (NHSCFA) and/or other organisations for the purpose of the prevention, detection, investigation and prosecution of fraud or any other unlawful activity affecting the NHS. We also use third-party providers to check and verify your qualifications who may be contacting you on our behalf to verify the same.

This post is subject to the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974 (Exceptions) Order 1975 (Amendment) (England and Wales) Order 2020 and it will be necessary for a submission for Disclosure to be made to the Disclosure and Barring Service.