About the team we are recruiting to

We value diverse perspectives and experiences and are striving to create a workplace culture that is inclusive, is accepting of all and is free from discrimination and bias.

In Coventry, we are working hard to build something special. Children and families are at the heart of everything we do, and we believe they deserve the best outcomes. Children’s Services provides a wide range of statutory and non-statutory duties, from Early Help Services, through to children who are looked after.

The service reflects and responds to the changing needs of children and their families. It works to enable a reflective and flexible approach, with a strong Early Help offer and a real focus on Relationship Based Practice and Signs of Safety, which focuses on intervention and keeping families together.

Children’s Services is proud of its achievements to date and is continuing to ensure children and families remain at the heart of all it does. We will provide you with an environment where social work can flourish, with high support, high challenge and manageable caseloads. Children’s Services is proud of its workforce, who are committed, dedicated, and work to a high standard. We are seeking other like minded practitioners who would like to join us. We pride ourselves on building relationships with families and partners and hold respectful practice at the centre of all we do.

The Commissioning and Partnership Service ensures that good quality, value-for-money services are in place for children and families that meet their needs wherever possible close to home, school, family and friends. The service leads on the development of strong and effective partnership working across agencies, working collaboratively with the health sector and with other Children’s Services and Trusts across the region.

What is the job role?

Coventry Children's Services has been successful is securing Department for Education funding up to March 2025 to develop their Family Hubs and early help offer to children and families.

To support this work, we are creating a new post for a Senior Commissioning Officer who will provide commissioning expertise to the project, contributing to needs analysis, developing service specifications, carrying out procurement activity to award contracts, service monitoring and evaluation.

The successful candidate will need to work across Council services, working with managers and colleagues in Early Help, Public Health, Joint Commissioning, Procurement/Legal, Education as well as external partners in Health, different service providers and critically, children and families to develop provision to meet their needs.

This is an exciting opportunity to develop good commissioning practice in Early Help services and contribute to this family support and early years work at the forefront of the Government agenda and to make a real difference in the lives of children and families in Coventry.

This post is exempted under the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974 and as such appointment to this post will be conditional upon the receipt of a satisfactory response to a check of police records via Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS).

Who are we looking for?

You will be experienced in commissioning services, preferably in a local authority context and understand the steps required to put contractual arrangements in place, to monitor and evaluate outcomes with providers and partner agencies.

You will have skills in building positive working relationships with a variety of stakeholders, able to offer high support as well as high challenge to get services that are value for money and good quality.

You will have good organisational skills to manage priorities flexibly, working to different managers in different parts of the service e.g. reporting progress to the project manager and Early Help lead manager responsible for the project. Data analysis, report writing, budget management and financial planning skills are essential.

You will be enthusiastic about working to ensure the right services are available at the right time for the children and families in Coventry who need them.

As this is a fixed term post, requests for secondment from partner agencies will be considered with the support from the employer.

For a confidential discussion about the role, please contact Bridget Atkins - bridget.atkins@coventry.gov.uk

For full details on the application process please read the attached document on our jobs page labelled 'Coventry City Council Application Process'

Interview date(s): week commencing 5th June

About Coventry

Coventry has a proud, innovative and creative spirit that throughout its history has seen communities come together to tackle problems and bring about real social change.

We are cutting-edge, challenging, youthful, vibrant and diverse.

At Coventry we are committed to excellence in everything we do. With around 4800 staff from a range of different backgrounds, our aim is to recruit and develop talented people who will focus on our customers, take responsibility, work together and find better ways of doing things.

To deliver the best services to our residents, we need the best people working for us to make a difference to our communities.

If you join us, we will provide a fantastic rewards and benefits package - to find out more please visit https://www.coventry.gov.uk/council-vacancies

Our Values

It’s great to know that you are interested in working with us at Coventry City Council. As a prospective employee, it is important that everyone who works for us is committed to our One Coventry values and shares our commitment to becoming a more diverse and inclusive organisation.

Our Values are: