Family Support Worker HOTH
Gloucestershire
This is a Gloucestershire County Council job.
- Job Title: Family Support Worker HOTH
- Job Location: Shire Hall
- Salary: £34,237 - £37,563 per annum
- Hours per Week: 18.5
- Contract Type: Permanent
- Closing Date: 29/11/2026
- Job Requisition Number: 15183
- This post is not open to job share
We are currently recruiting for a part-time Family Support Worker to join our HOTH team (Harm Outside The Home) on a permanent basis.
Reward and Support
For all your hard work, you will receive the following:
- between £34,237 - £37,563 per annum subject to experience (pro rata for part-time staff)
- flexible and agile working opportunities
- 25.5 days annual leave rising to 30.5 days after 5 years continuous service (pro rata for part-time staff)
- option to purchase 10 days of additional leave per year (pro rata for part-time staff)
- family friendly policies and benefits to help support you and your family
- supportive and positive working environment with regular, robust supervision
- Local Government Pension Scheme (LGPS)
- access to our Employee Assistance Programme (EAP) that provides free, confidential, counselling and advice for employees, available 24 hours a day, online and by telephone
- an in-house Occupational Health service
- employee discount scheme
- links to employee networks such as Prism (LGBT+) and the Young Employees Network
- career development and qualification opportunities
- access to our Social Work Academy
- Cycle to Work scheme (eligibility criteria and t&cs apply)
- Green Car Salary Sacrifice Scheme (eligibility criteria and t&cs apply)
- our frontline staff have access to Magic Notes to support their work as well as all staff having Copilot licences
Right child, right support, right time, every time
In our recent inspection in June 2025, our Children’s Services have been officially judged as ‘Good’ with ‘Outstanding’ elements. Ofsted also said ‘Leaders have set out a clear vision for delivering success for children, by modelling values and creating a culture where the workforce, children and families feel valued and heard; risk is managed confidently with bottom lines clearly set out.’
This marks an important step in our journey to improve outcomes for our children and young people, and we remain focused on our mission: to continue building on this success and ensure that every child and young person in our county has the opportunity to thrive.
Gloucestershire offers a range of opportunities to develop your career, supported by a phenomenal Social Work Academy offer, a developing systemic practice methodology, an ambitious leadership team and an award-winning workforce.
We are a local authority adopting, and training all colleagues in, systemic social work practice. If you would like to be part of an authority that takes a relational approach to working with families and focuses on what needs to change in the system around a child and family to enable children to thrive, then consider a role with GCC.
About the team
The Harm Outside the Home Safety and Support Hub supports children and young people who are experiencing, or at risk of, harm outside the home (HOTH), alongside their families. Working closely with the HOTH Insight & Coordination Hub, we provide targeted, holistic and trauma-informed interventions in partnership with social care, police, youth justice, health, education and community organisations. Our approach is grounded in understanding each young person’s lived experience, their wider relationships and the places linked to harm, so we can strengthen safety and support positive change.
About the role
As a HOTH Family Support Worker, you will provide targeted one-to-one and group support to children, young people, parents and carers where there is a moderate or significant risk of harm outside the home. Working alongside families and the wider professional network, you will help increase safety, strengthen children’s sense of self and support networks, and encourage participation in positive experiences, including education, hobbies and interests.
You will build trusted relationships with children and families to understand their strengths and unmet needs, and how these may shape their experiences and responses to harm. You will deliver purposeful interventions shaped by the voices of children, young people, parents and carers. Working closely with the lead practitioner and wider professional network, you will ensure support is coordinated and tailored to each child’s circumstances and needs.
You will also:
- deliver trauma-informed, relationship-based interventions
- develop and review clear, outcome-focused plans
- use contextual safeguarding approaches to understand and respond to harm and safety
- work creatively and persistently to overcome barriers to engagement
- maintain clear, accurate and up to date case records
- build effective relationships with partner organisations
About You
We are looking for someone who is passionate about supporting children, young people and families, with experience of working directly with them, particularly those who may have experienced harm outside the home. You will bring strong communication skills, the ability to build positive, trusting relationships and a collaborative approach to working with multi-agency partners.
You will bring:
- experience of delivering targeted support to children, young people and families
- an understanding of exploitation and how contextual safeguarding approaches help address harm outside the home
- an understanding of practice that recognises trauma, builds on strengths and places trusted relationships at its heart
- experience of working collaboratively with partner agencies
- good communication and organisational skills, with the ability to keep clear, accurate records
- the ability to balance competing priorities and adapt flexibly to changing demands
- a commitment to equality, diversity and using evidence to inform your practice
If you share our commitment to safeguarding children and young people and would like to be part of the team, we would love to hear from you.
As well as your experience, there are some things we require of you to be successfully appointed to this post:
- a Level 3 qualification, or equivalent, relevant to working with children and families;
- ability to drive or travel across the county in line with service need
- an enhanced Adults and Children’s DBS clearance;
You must be able to travel throughout Gloucestershire and occasionally work outside normal office hours, including evenings or weekends, to meet the needs of children, young people and their families.
How to apply
For an informal chat about this role, please contact Sarah.Penny@gloucestershire.gov.uk.
We reserve the right to close an advertisement earlier than the stated closing date if we receive a suitable number of applications.
Interviews are due to take place in person w/c 7th December 2026
If you would like to find out more about our Children's Service please take a look here: Children's Social Care Careers | Careers hub
The council is not currently able to offer sponsorship in this role. Candidates will need to have right to work that enables them to commit to at least 6 months employment. Right to work is not transferable from a sponsored role held with another employer.
Under the terms of our Safer Recruitment Policy, if you are invited to interview, we will take up safeguarding references prior to your interview to understand your suitability to work with vulnerable children. These references will then be discussed in your interview. Please give details of at least two referees, one of whom must be your present and/or last employer and the other from a previous employer(s). These will need to cover the last three years of employment/education. In the case of applicants leaving full time education or not having worked since doing so, the Head of School, College or University should be one of the named referees. We do not accept references from friends or family members or workplace colleagues (who are not more senior). To ensure we process your application in a speedy and efficient way, we will contact your referees by DocuSign. Where appropriate, please inform them of your application.
Additional Information
To access the Job Profile for this role, please follow the link below:-
Applications from any Gloucestershire County Council's employees who are currently on the redeployment register or at risk of redundancy will be considered first at shortlisting stage.
Gloucestershire County Council is committed to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children and young people or vulnerable adults and expects all staff and volunteers to share this commitment. This position is subject to a DBS check.
It is a legal requirement, under the Immigration Act 2016, that anyone appointed to a ‘customer facing role’ must be able to demonstrate an ability to fulfil all spoken aspects of the role with confidence in fluent English.
We want to be an employer of choice, attracting and retaining excellent people to work for us, so that we can best serve all of Gloucestershire’s diverse communities. Our promise to you is that we will provide an inclusive and supportive working environment that enables you to bring your whole self to work and realise your full potential.