Black Country Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust provides specialist mental health, learning disability, and community healthcare services for the population of the Black Country.

Across the whole of the region we provide:

• Adult and older adult mental health services
• Specialist learning disability services
• Mental health services for children and young people
• Community healthcare services for children, young people and families in Dudley

Black Country Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust was formed on 1 April 2020, with the merger of Black Country Partnership NHS Foundation Trust and Dudley and Walsall Mental Health Partnership NHS Trust. Combining resources, strategies and talented workforce enables us to deliver a wider variety of outstanding services that are based on best practice and are continually improving.

We currently employ over 3,500 people and just like the population we serve, we are made up of diverse cultures and backgrounds. Whatever your role, working in a NHS Foundation Trust, like ours, is a demanding and extremely rewarding experience. Knowing that every day you can help to make a positive difference to someone’s life is a very powerful feeling. We know that our Trust runs on this desire to help and support people, and our Trust vision expresses this. Our vision is to improve health and wellbeing for everyone, especially our colleagues to achieve the best possible work/life balance.

We proudly offer supportive, inclusive and family friendly employment and flexible working policies. We have a wide range of professional services and employee networks to help our colleagues be at their best - and find support if they need it. To find more about our staff benefits, please visit our website: blackcountryhealthcare.nhs.uk. 

Don’t meet every single requirement? Studies have shown that women and ethnic minority candidates are less likely to apply to jobs unless they meet every single qualification. At Black Country Healthcare we recognise and value all forms of knowledge and expertise, so if you’re excited about this role but your past experience doesn’t align perfectly with every qualification or criteria in the job description/person specification, we encourage you to apply anyway. You may be just the right candidate for this or other roles.

For further supporting information to help you apply for this role please see documents attached under ‘Additional documents’.

Job overview

To act in a lead role for the development and provision of Psychological Therapies within the Early Intervention in Psychosis Services; providing professional management, guidance, and clinical supervision to Psychologists (at Band 8a below); and clinical supervision to Psychological Therapists, and taking a lead role for the recruitment of psychology staff .

To promote psychological thinking and working within the team by offering psychologically informed perspectives on client care and consultancy.  To contribute towards staff/team development of skills and knowledge through offering teaching and training.  Conducting or supporting research, audit and service development activities within the service, taking a lead role where this is appropriate.  

To provide specialist and highly skilled psychological assessments, formulations, interventions and evaluations of outcome for clients with complex mental health issues, social and emotional difficulties, their carers and/or families, and groups, with the aim of maximising well-being, social, emotional and occupational functioning, to improve relationships with self and others, and reduce risk to self and/or others.

Main duties of the job

The post holder will take a lead role for Psychology within the Early Intervention in Psychosis Services, working to develop psychological provision for clients under the care of the service, through service development and the recruitment of psychology staff, and to provide professional management, support, guidance and clinical supervision to psychology staff within the service; as well as supporting the psychological thinking and interventions of non-psychology staff.

The post-holder will be an integral part of the Early Intervention in Psychosis Service, who work with clients with a diagnosis of, or who may be developing, a First Episode of Psychosis, and who often present with complex mental health, social and relational difficulties.  The post holder will be expected to contribute fully, as an autonomous clinician, offering highly specialist psychological assessment, formulation, intervention and evaluation to individuals, families, and groups, as well as offering specialist advice and consultation to the team and other professionals.  They will be responsible for maintaining accurate and up to date records of their clinical activity and for collecting statistics relating to their work; and taking a lead role in developing audits, research and service evaluation activity. 

Working for our organisation

Employees, workers, and / or contractors will be expected to uphold the values of the Trust and exhibit the expected Trust behaviours aligned to the Trust’s values.  Individuals have a responsibility to ensure that they display the Trust values and behaviours in carrying out their job and that individuals feel able to challenge (or raise a challenge) when other colleagues’ behaviours breach the spirit of Trust values.

BCHFT are committed to investment in our Psychology staff so you will have access to a psychology specific dedicated CPD budget to support your professional growth. This includes postgraduate diploma training in Cognitive Behavioural Therapy for Psychosis (CBTp).

Detailed job description and main responsibilities

For a full list of responsibilities, please refer to Principal Clinical Psychologist job description.

Person specification

Education

Essential criteria

• Honours degree in psychology (at level of 2:1 or above) with eligibility for Graduate Membership of BPS.
• Post-graduate doctorate in clinical psychology (or equivalent for those trained prior to 1996) as accredited by the BPS; including highly developed knowledge of models of psychopathology, clinical psychometrics, life span developmental psychology and two or more distinct psychological therapies (one of which must be Cognitive Behavioural Therapy) and doctoral level research design and methodology.
• Post-doctoral training in the supervision of Trainee Clinical Psychologists and sufficient experience to be recognised by the Division of Clinical Psychology as able to offer training placements to Trainee Clinical Psychologists undertaking doctoral training.

Desirable criteria

• Experience of working in an Early Intervention in Psychosis service
• Training in Cognitive Behavioural Therapy in Psychosis (CBTp)

** Please Note that Internal at Risk Employees will be given preference for this position**

We reserve the right to bring the closing date forward for this vacancy at any time should we receive an overwhelming response of applications. We therefore encourage applicants to apply early if you wish to be considered for this post.

If you do not hear from the recruitment 4 weeks within the advertised closing date please assume that you have been unsuccessful at the shortlisting stage. Please ensure that you check your emails on a regular basis for any recruitment updates regarding this vacancy. If you are not successful at the shortlisting stage and would like feedback, please contact the Recruitment Team directly for feedback. 

The salary range quoted is as per NHS Agenda for Change pay structures. This is based on the number of years’ working directly within the NHS at the advertised pay band. Experience gained with other NHS Trusts will apply, but candidates without prior experience working direct for the NHS would normally be appointed at the lowest point unless they can demonstrate the equivalent experience and then be eligible for incremental increases in future years.

Successful applicants for clinical posts up to and including Band 4 are expected to hold the national Care Certificate qualification and will be supported to attain this once in post.

The Trust is committed to equal opportunities, providing opportunities for flexible working and is a non-smoking organisation.

As a Trust we are passionate about Anti-Racism, Disability Inclusion, and LGBTQ+ Equality, and are committed to diversifying our staff team in all areas and at all levels of seniority to better reflect the diverse communities we serve. Therefore, we particularly welcome and encourage applications from people who belong to a minority or marginalised community, including from Black and Asian, Disabled (including hidden disabilities such as Neurodiversity, Mental Health, etc), or Lesbian, Gay, Bi, Trans or Queer (LGBTQ+) people.    

Furthermore, Disabled applicants have the option of requesting that their application is considered under our Guaranteed Interview Scheme (GIS). Please indicate your intention to apply under the GIS in the relevant section of your application. Regardless of whether you participate in the scheme or have shared a disability, you will be provided the opportunity to request reasonable adjustments to the interview process at each stage of the recruitment process.

Due to the nature of the work some posts may be subject to a Standard Enhanced Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) check, through the Disclosure and Barring Service as stipulated under part V of the Police Act 1997. Having a criminal record will not necessarily bar you from working with us; this will depend on the nature of the position and the circumstances of your offences.