Head of Psychology for Acute & Crisis Mental Health directorate | Oxleas NHS Foundation Trust

This highly influential role provides professional leadership to Psychological Therapies staff, as well as collaborating to set the approach for whole-team working across secondary acute and crisis Adult Mental Health services in Bromley, Bexley and Greenwich.

The role is for 2 days a week, for 6 months to cover a secondment.

The role would suit an experienced clinician who is able to innovate, inspire and lead the psychosocial and psychological therapy practices within ward and home treatment and crisis resolution teams. It is a particularly exciting time as there is significant scope and support for review and development of practice in the service. The role is well supported by both the operational director and other professional leads. We are particularly interested in trauma informed practices and creating continuity of experience for our service users from crisis services to other forms of support.

A key task is supporting a well-skilled, committed and varied workforce to deliver timely and effective psychological assessments, interventions and therapy to people experiencing serious mental health problems and/or dementia. This will include leading on workforce planning, managing recruitment so as to maximise staff and skill mix within budget and supporting existing staff to engage with appropriate learning and development. Alongside other leads and managers it will also include pathway review and development so that there is an effective and timely range of interventions available to all those within each service. To complement the professional leadership the postholder would have a small defined clinical role within one of the services within the directorate. In addition, this role contributes to the wider leadership of the directorate as part of the senior management team by for example, participating or leading on aspects of the quality agenda. Finally, the postholder would
contribute to the wider professional leadership of the Trust as part of the 'Trust Leads' group of Heads of Psychological Therapies.

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Oxleas offers a wide range of NHS healthcare services to people in community and secure environment settings. Our services include community health care such as district nursing and speech and language therapy, care for people with learning disabilities and mental health care such as psychiatry, nursing and therapies. Our multidisciplinary teams look after people of all ages and we work in close partnership with other parts of the NHS, local councils and the voluntary sector and through our new provider collaboratives. Our 4,300 members of staff work in many different settings including hospitals, clinics, prisons, secure hospitals, children's centres, schools and people's homes.

We have over 125 sites in a variety of locations in the South of England. In London we operate within the Boroughs of Bexley, Bromley Greenwich and into Kent. We manage hospital sites including Queen Mary's Hospital, Sidcup and Memorial Hospital, Woolwich, as well as the Bracton Centre, our medium secure unit for people with mental health needs. We are the largest NHS provider of prison health services providing healthcare to prisons within Devon, Dorset, Bristol, Wiltshire and Gloucestershire, Kent and South London. We are proud of the care we provide and our people.

Our purpose is to improve lives by providing the best possible care to our patients and their families. This is strengthened by our new values:

• We're Kind


• We're Fair


• We Listen


• We Care


This role would work in partnership with the Directorate Management Team led by a supportive Service Director. Psychological Therapies is well respected within Oxleas and there is a collaborative and supportive professional network. Oxleas has a clear commitment to support and develop staff in their roles and so training and development is generally well supported. It is also committed to the provision of Psychological Therapies with the Director of Therapies, Neil Springham, being an Art Therapist and holding a Board level decision-making role so that psychological therapies remain central to the Trust's work. The Clinical Director, Peter De Backer is a Psychologist.