Community Wellbeing Mentor

Community Wellbeing Mentor (17432)

Contract type: Permanent

Hours: 37

Salary: £23,400-£25,134 per annum (full time equivalent)

Closing Date: 22 November 2023

Interview Date: 29/30th November

Can you help us develop an outstanding service for young people in Waverley, Woking, Surrey Heath and Spelthorne in Surrey?

Do you have a passion to support young people's emotional health and wellbeing?

The Surrey Wellbeing Partnership is a group of twelve charities, including Barnardo's, working together to meet the emotional needs of children and young people in Surrey. The Surrey Wellbeing Partnership aims to provide outstanding services for children and young people in need of emotional support and care.

Barnardo's are seeking to recruit 1 full time (37 hours a week which does include a minimum of 1 evening and some weekends) Wellbeing Mentor who shares our commitment and vision to develop an outstanding service and embed Barnardo's basis and values in all we do. This position sits within the Community Wellbeing Team whose office base is in Leatherhead. In light of the travelling that will be required for this position, access to a personal vehicle with business insurance and valid drivers licence is essential.

Wellbeing Mentors hold a caseload of children and young people (aged 6-18 years old) either on a 1:1 or group work method and will provide early intervention to those who are experiencing poor emotional health and wellbeing. This may present itself in many different ways such as feeling lonely, isolated, unhappy, or anxious, having low mood or experiencing stress and can come from multiple causes.

Wellbeing Mentors provide direct or virtual support, working collaboratively and with a strengths-based approach to support children and young people to improve their emotional wellbeing and resilience.

The Community Wellbeing Team operates within the iThrive Framework where choice and shared decision making is led by the child or young person. This position is a relational model, and we build and maintain non-judgmental and trusting relationship between the wellbeing mentor, children, young people and parents as crucial to their ongoing wellbeing. You will receive training on the iThrive model at the start of your employment.

Barnardo's is a busy and positive place to work. Every day is different and Wellbeing Mentors have a critical role within our team.

To be successful in this role you will:

• Have knowledge of emotional health and wellbeing and experience of supporting children and young people to implement strategies to manage this.
• Have a range of project work skills and abilities supporting children and young people;
• Demonstrate the ability to engage and communicate with both children, young people and their families;
• Have good organisational, numeracy, and literacy skills;
• Demonstrate empathy, patience and an open and flexible approach to working with children and young people;
• Have experience of delivering one-to-one and group work with children and young people, and take a strengths-based and trauma-informed approach to your work;
• Demonstrate a clear understanding of safeguarding procedures;
• Enjoy the challenges and rewards of working within a service for children, young people, and their families;
• Share our commitment to providing an outstanding service and embedding Barnardo's basis and values within all we do.
• Have experience of working within a team and independently.  

Please note due to the high volume of applications for some posts, this advert might close before the displayed closing date. We recommend that you apply for this role as soon as possible.

Benefits

Workplace Offer: What it means for you

The world of work has changed. We are understanding of what works best for our colleagues both current and future as we look to embrace this new way of working. Our hybrid working initiative is based on trust, flexibility and empowerment. We understand our workplace offer means different things to different people, and we encourage those conversations. This may mean working at one of our stores, services, working at home, at one of our Collaboration Hubs or any combination of these.

• Barnardo's believe in creating equality of opportunity in the workplace and supporting people to manage their work-life balance; we are therefore open to offering flexible working arrangements.
• 26 days annual leave plus bank holidays, increasing after 5 years service
• The ability to buy up to another 5 days annual leave via our HolidayPlus scheme
• A host of family friendly leave options including company Maternity Paternity and Adoption pay; together with all family additional leave options
• Service related sick pay from day 1
• Access to a Group Personal Pension with a matched 4% or 6% contribution from Barnardo's. Ability to pay via salary sacrifice to garner both tax and NI savings on your own contribution
• Death in service cover of 4x annual earnings for all staff contributing to our Group Personal Pension
• Cycle2work scheme
• Interest free season ticket loans
• Discounts and cashback from at high street shops including major supermarkets, cinemas, gyms, leisure/theme parks, holidays and much more via our Benefit Portal
• 20% discount at Barnardo's stores
• Opportunity to purchase a health cash plan to claim towards dental, glasses, therapy etc
• Free access to round the clock employee assistance program for advice and support
• Access to Barnardo's Learning and Development offer

*T&C's apply based on contract

About Barnardo's

At Barnardo's we believe in children – no matter who they are, what they have done or what they have been through. Please read about our basis and values following the link below. You will be asked questions relating to them as part of the recruitment process for this role.

Our commitment to Equality, Diversity and Inclusion (EDI) is reflected in our values and our practice, and we have invested in this area of our work to ensure that we can deliver on our commitments to be an inclusive employer. EDI is a key enabler of our purpose as a charity and we want to ensure that the diversity of our teams is reflective of the communities we serve and that we continue to learn and develop our work with a focus on inclusion. We particularly encourage applications from candidates from Black, Asian and  Minoritised Ethnic Communities, candidates who are LGBT+ and Disabled candidates. 

Our basis and values