Are you looking for an exciting opportunity to help drive change and be part of a professional, dynamic and friendly team that provides excellent support to the children and families in Dorset? If you are, then an opportunity has arisen to join the Children’s Services Business Support Central Team. The position of Team Administrator will be supporting the Fostering, Kinship and Supported Lodgings Service, with the responsibility of delivering high quality business support for Kinship carers.
The post will be 37 hours per week on a fixed term basis for 18 months, based at County Hall, Dorchester but with the option to work from home on some days.
What you will be doing
The main function will be supporting the Fostering, Kinship and Supported Lodgings Team, in particular with the assessment and support of Kinship carers.
Tasks will include:
- Processing correspondence.
- Management of the generic inbox
- Carrying out statutory checks and DBS checks for pre and post approval Foster Carers and Kinship Carers.
- Requesting, following up and accurately recording references and medical checks for new carers.
- Setting up and maintaining tools for tracking progress of new and existing providers, such as Planner
- Supporting and updating digital sites
- General administrative tasks, including data entry and dealing with correspondence.
- Processing invoices and reclaiming amounts as applicable.
- Recording and monitoring spend against the Adoption & Special Guardianship Support Fund
- Maintenance of the Adoption & Special Guardianship Support Fund Portal
- Working closely with other business support colleagues to ensure a consistent approach and service delivery model is maintained across the business support teams.
- There will be a requirement to work with confidential and sensitive information.
Reporting to a Team Leader, the role will be varied and interesting and the post holder will need to be motivated and flexible in their approach to work, confident in using their initiative and able to prioritise and allocate a demanding workload to tight deadlines. They will need to embrace new digital ways of working and work collaboratively with a range of colleagues. We work in a hybrid working model, with your working week split between the office and working remotely from home once training is completed. Your work pattern would be shaped around the business/service needs.
About you
The experience, knowledge and skills required for this post are specified in detail in the Person Specification and Job Description. In summary we are seeking individuals who are organised, able to meet the demands of a busy work schedule and ensure deadlines are met. You will have an eye for detail and ability to work on your own initiative as well as being an effective team member with a 'can do' attitude. There will be an element of financial work involved with this post, so good mathematical and logical thinking skills will be required.
IT systems used include Microsoft packages, Teams and service specific systems such as Mosaic. Training for service based systems will be provided, however a good working knowledge of IT including the use of Outlook, Word and Excel is essential. The role involves keyboard/computer work, but the variety of tasks supported will ensure regular opportunities for breaks away from the computer screen. Our services are customer focused and the post holder will be communicating with a wide range of stakeholders including partner agencies, families and professionals and we are looking for individuals with excellent customer service skills.
The working environment is busy and dynamic subject to interruptions to deal with queries from operational managers and staff and will involve taking telephone calls and dealing with visitors. There will occasionally be work content of a sensitive/distressing nature, particularly in teams involving direct contact with children and families. This will require resilience and confidentiality.