Birmingham Children's Trust is going from strength to strength. We are the largest provider of family support and social care services for children, young people and families in the country. Our goal is to become a centre of excellence in both social care and family support. By choosing to work for us, you will be part of a supportive, dynamic service contributing to our improvement journey towards Outstanding.
We are proud to be an Equal Opportunities Employer. We celebrate diversity and are committed to creating an inclusive environment for all employees; a place where we can all be ourselves and succeed on merit.
We actively deliver services that are culturally responsive to the needs of the children, parents and carers we work with, ensuring equality, diversity and inclusion are at the heart of everything we do.
About the Role
We have an exciting full-time opportunity within the Fostering Assessment Service, part of our Business Support Service, for a self-motivated and organised Business Support Administrator to provide essential administrative support to our Social Work teams.
The Fostering Assessment Team plays a vital role in recruiting and assessing prospective foster carers, ensuring that children and young people have access to safe, stable, and nurturing family-based placements. The Business Support Team is integral to this process, providing high-quality administrative support throughout the foster carer assessment journey.
As a Business Support Administrator, you will provide efficient end-to-end support to the fostering Business Support team; with focus on Fostering Assessment, ensuring that all administrative processes are completed accurately and within required timescales. This includes supporting foster carer applications, coordinating key stages of the assessment process, arranging meetings, maintaining records and ensuring documentation is prepared and processed in a timely manner.
You will work closely with Social Workers, Team Managers, applicants, and partner agencies to support the delivery of an effective fostering assessment service.
Key Responsibilities
- Providing administrative support throughout the fostering assessment process.
- Coordinating and monitoring prospective foster carer applications from initial enquiry through to completion of assessment.
- Maintaining accurate and up-to-date records on the Trust's case management systems.
- Preparing, collating and distributing documents, midpoint reviews, reports and correspondence.
- Scheduling meetings, interviews and appointments for applicants and practitioners.
- Liaising professionally with prospective foster carers, Social Workers and partner agencies.
- Monitoring workflow processes and ensuring actions are completed within statutory and service timescales.
- Supporting the team with data management, reporting requirements and performance information.
- Providing excellent customer service and responding to enquiries in a timely and professional manner.
As part of a centralised and flexible support service, maintaining critical services for children and families, you may occasionally be required to provide support across other areas of the Fostering Service as business needs require.
About You
We are looking for a motivated and proactive individual who is passionate about delivering high-quality business support and customer service. You will be highly organised, able to manage competing priorities, and demonstrate excellent attention to detail.
You will be able to work effectively as part of a team whilst also using your initiative to manage your own workload and meet deadlines.
Key Skills and Experience
In your personal statement, please demonstrate how you meet the following criteria:
- Experience of providing high-quality administrative support within a busy environment.
- Strong organisational skills and the ability to manage multiple tasks and priorities.
- Excellent written and verbal communication skills.
- Experience using Microsoft Office applications including Word, Excel, Outlook and Teams.
- The ability to maintain accurate records and manage confidential information appropriately.
- Strong attention to detail and the ability to produce accurate work to tight deadlines.
- The ability to build positive working relationships with colleagues, applicants and stakeholders at all levels.
- The ability to interpret information, identify issues and contribute to solutions.
- A customer-focused approach with a commitment to delivering excellent service.
We have been rated as ‘Good’ by Ofsted, following a 2023 inspection. This is a fantastic achievement for Birmingham Children's Trust, with many positive highlights focusing on areas including the quality of staff leadership, partnership working, safeguarding and corporate parenting.
The role will be based at Lifford House and One Avenue Road, with hybrid working arrangements in place. Attendance at other Trust locations may be required to support service delivery and business needs. You must have the correct right-to-work documents to work in the UK. Sadly, we do not support those who require sponsorship or on a VISA.
Additional Information
Please provide a CV and supporting statement which demonstrates how you meet the requirements for this role.
Onboarding Process: Please note as part of our onboarding process, the successful candidate will be required undergo a series of background checks with Experian including Experian Right to Work, and Digital ID verification. These are essential pre-employment requirements.
Our Benefits:
- A generous annual leave package of 30 days annual leave, plus bank holidays, rising to 33 days after 5 years of service and 35 days after 10 years of service.
- Free on-site parking at our offices on One Avenue Road (Aston) and Lifford House (Stirchley). We also provide onsite electric car charging ports which are free to use!
- Full access to our amazing internal employee benefits scheme including, Occupational Health services, Rewards Schemes, Benefits discounts (including the Blue Light Card), Health & Fitness and Personal Wellbeing support and much more!
- Flexible and hybrid working policy - we are well adapted to a hybrid model of working which includes a combination of time spent in the office and at home and we offer a variety of working patterns.
- Pension Scheme - You will receive a generous local government career average pension scheme in line with the local government pension scheme.
Please note that we reserve the right to close the job early should we reach the required number of applications, therefore please ensure you submit your application and supporting statement early to avoid any disappointment.