Job responsibilities

Job Purpose

The principal purpose of the job is to improve the
psychological health & wellbeing of people with eating disorders, their
families and carers.

This will be achieved in this post through undertaking the
following areas of responsibility:

1. To ensure the systematic provision of a
   high-quality psychological service in Eating Disorders Services across Devon
2. Providing clinical leadership and
   supervision for less experienced staff, trainees and volunteers employed by or
   attached to the psychology service and the Eating Disorders Community Service
3. Carrying a specialist caseload of clients
   and providing advice and consultancy to patients and professionals.
4. To work autonomously within
   professional guidelines and exercise responsibility for the systematic
   governance of psychological practice within professional and
   Trust guidelines.
5. The post holder with receive regular
   professional and clinical supervision in accordance with Trust policy and to
   Professional Practice Guidelines set out by the British Psychological Society
   or appropriate designated Professional Body.
6. Observe,
   and abide by all relevant Professional Codes of Conduct and Practice including
   the British Psychological Society. The post holder will be fully
   registered with the Health Care Professions Council as a condition of
   employment

Duties and
Responsibilities

Communication
and Working Relationships

• Clients, family and carers: To communicate in a highly skilled
  and sensitive manner with clients who may have specific difficulties in
  understand and/or communicating and who may be hostile, antagonistic or
  highly emotionally disturbed.
• Multidisciplinary team colleagues: To work closely with colleagues in
  the multi-professional integrated mental health and wellbeing service on a
  day to day basis.
• Health & social care staff: To communicate with a wide range of
  health & social care staff in hospital and in community settings in a
  highly skilled and sensitive manner, complex and sensitive information
  concerning the assessment, formulation and treatment plans of clients under
  the services care. To provide support & guidance in the application of
  psychological principles and techniques, and to foster reflective practice.
• Senior managers & professional
  staff: To
  maintain and build good working relationships with senior professional staff
  and managers across the Trust. to foster a positive approach to the
  integrated mental health and wellbeing service and to enable effective
  negotiation.

Planning
and Organisation

• The psychology service: To plan and organise own work within the service setting
  and to contribute to the development and improvement of provision of
  psychological services within Community Eating Disorders Team to best meet
  the organisations strategy and priorities.
• The multidisciplinary service: To provide psychology/therapy supervision
  to the multi-professional planning, development and marketing of the eating
  disorders service
• Responsibility
  for Judgement and Analysis
• To
  provide specialist clinical psychology/therapy expertise and advice.
• To
  provide psychological therapies, developing specialist psychological
  formulations and assessments of clients, formulating plans for their
  psychological treatment and implementing specialist psychological
  interventions for individuals, carers, families and groups. Proficiency in in
  both family, individual and group therapy approaches is desirable.
• To support the Professional Lead, General Manager for CEDS, Practice
  and Strategic Development Leads by undertaking service development and
  redesign projects and coordinating the resulting work within the team.
• To provide complex assessment of specialist
  conditions

Responsibility for Patient/Client Care, Treatment
and Therapy

• Assessment & intervention: To provide expert psychological
  therapies in eating disorders, developing
  specialist psychological formulations and assessments of clients, formulating
  plans for their psychological treatment and implementing specialist
  psychological interventions for individuals, carers, families and groups, and
  to demonstrate awareness of diversity issues.
• Consultation & guidance: To provide advice, guidance and
  consultation on psychological aspects of patient care to colleagues, other
  service providers, patients, supporters and families.

Policy,
Service, Research, Innovation and Improvement

• The post holder is accountable for their own professional
  actions, acting within Trust policies and procedures and Professional
  Practice Guidelines.
• Policy & service: To implement policies and procedures for the provision of
  psychology and therapy services within own service and other services within
  the Trust.
• R & D: To support the R&D activities of the psychology and psychological
  therapy service.

Responsibility
for Finance, Equipment and Other Resources

• To be responsible for the safe keeping of equipment under
  own use.

Responsibility for Supervision, Leadership and
Management

• Leadership & supervision: To lead and professionally supervise
  less experienced psychology/therapy staff, trainees and volunteers.
• To provide placement responsibilities for trainee staff.
• To contribute to the provision of therapy supervision for
  non psychology/therapy staff providing psychological therapies
• To support placements for trainee staff in line with
  professional guidelines

Information
Resources and Administrative Duties

• To maintain accurate records, compliant with Trust
  Practice Standards.
• To be responsible for using an email account to generate,
  monitor, and respond to the e-mail traffic by which the Trust conducts much
  of its internal communication.

Responsibility
for Research and Development

• To utilise theory, evidence-based literature and research
  to support evidence based practice in individual work within the community
  eating disorders services.
• To conduct project work including specific areas of audit,
  research or service evaluation
• As a
  clinician to be responsible for collecting clinical practice and outcome data
  that contributes to building practice based evidence and service evaluation.
  To participate in service audits and relevant research projects.

Freedom
to Act

• The post holder is accountable for
  their own professional actions, acting within Trust policies and procedures
  and Professional Practice Guidelines
• To work autonomously within clinical professional guidelines and
  exercise responsibility for the governance of psychological practice within
  the locality/specialty. Interpretation of professional and Trust guidelines, and implementing
  policies in conjunction with peers, Head of Profession and General Manager.
• To provide expert and specialist
  clinical psychology/therapy expertise and advice
  guidance and consultation on psychological aspects of patient care to
  colleagues, other service providers, patients, supporters and families.

Any
Other Specific Tasks Required

• To ensure all clinical care and treatment provided by
  psychologists/psychotherapists/therapists working in the Community Eating
  Disorder Team is carried out under appropriate supervision and leadership.
• To ensure that all relevant staff groups continuously
  update the skills and techniques relevant to their clinical work.

Review of this Job Description

This job description is intended as an outline indicator
of general areas of activity and will be amended in the light of changing
service needs. This job description is to be reviewed in conjunction with the
post holder on an annual basis.

Experience

Essential

• Experience in working with people with severe and complex mental health problems



• Experience of teaching, training and/or supervision.



• Experience in undertaking leadership roles within clinical psychology/psychotherapy services in the NHS and in contributing to the development, implementation and evaluation of strategies and clinical policies in multi-disciplinary, multi-agency contexts. Experience, and/or training in diversity awareness and social inequality.

Desirable

• Experience of working with Eating Disorders in either Community or in-patient services.



• Experience of service development.

Knowledge and Skills

Essential

• Broad knowledge of specialist services and of the services in the NHS where psychology and psychotherapy/other therapy is commonly applied.



• Extensive knowledge of the skills, practice and knowledge base of Clinical Psychology/Psychotherapy



• Knowledge of the policy context of specialist psychological services within the organisation and of clinical leadership arrangements in this setting



• Advanced psychological assessment and formulation skills including risk assessment

Desirable

• Specialist knowledge of Psychological Therapy interventions with Eating Disorders



• Highly skilled in specialist interventions with the client group.

Communication and Working Relationship Skills

Essential

• Essential



• Communication Skills



• Excellent verbal, nonverbal and written communication skills.



• Strong leadership qualities, resilience, and ability to handle ambiguity and uncertainly.



• Skills in managing conflict, negotiation and achieving consensus in complex situations in the pursuit of agreed strategic aims.



• Ability to work flexibly and as part of a team.

Physical Skills

Essential

• Clear telephone voice



• Calm, methodical approach, friendly but concise.



• Good communication skills when presenting/facilitating to varying groups of people.

Planning and Organisational Skills

Essential

• Proven organisational, planning and time management skills.



• Ability to work under pressure and cope with deadlines.

Desirable

• Project management skills/experience

Qualifications

Essential

• Clinical or Counselling Psychologist with Doctoral level qualification registered with HCPC OR Psychological Therapist (masters level or above) or equivalent recognised by the appropriate clinical body e.g. BABCP

Desirable

• Further training in related area



• Further training in at least one other psychological therapy.



• Successful completion of a post-graduate supervision training.

Disclosure and Barring Service Check

This post is subject to the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act (Exceptions Order) 1975 and as such it will be necessary for a submission for Disclosure to be made to the Disclosure and Barring Service (formerly known as CRB) to check for any previous criminal convictions.

UK Registration

Applicants must have current UK professional registration. For further information please see
NHS Careers website (opens in a new window).