Somerset Council
Advanced Practitioner - Social Worker - Health Interface Service (Taunton) (Adults)
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Closing date: 6 August 2026
Transform lives, champion rights & support adults to achieve their full potential.
Location: Taunton
Starting salary £41,771 rising annually, currently up to £46,142
Full time, 37 hours per week
Ideal opportunity for an experienced practitioner looking for their next step
30 days annual leave entitlement
Role Purpose
As an Advanced Practitioner Social Worker within the Hospital Interface Service (HIS), you will provide high-quality professional leadership within a fast-paced hospital environment, ensuring excellent, strengths-based social work practice across Adult Social Care.
You will play a pivotal role supporting adults with complex needs during hospital admission, stay and discharge, championing a Home First and hopeful social work approach. Working closely with health partners, you will help people return home safely wherever possible, reduce unnecessary admissions, and support timely, person-centred discharge planning.
This is an ideal opportunity for an experienced and confident social worker ready to take the next step into advanced practice, leadership and service development.
Key Responsibilities
- Provide professional leadership and advanced practice within the Hospital Interface Service.
- Hold oversight of complex cases, offering expert advice, joint working and decision-making where required.
- Support safe, timely hospital discharge and admission avoidance using strengths-based and asset-focused approaches.
- Lead and support safeguarding practice, including complex risk management and mental capacity decision-making.
- Provide high-quality reflective supervision and professional guidance to social workers within the service.
- Work collaboratively with health colleagues across acute hospitals, intermediate care and community services.
- Contribute to the development, monitoring and quality assurance of service performance and practice standards.
- Act as a source of expert knowledge in legislation, policy and best practice, including the Care Act, Mental Capacity Act and safeguarding duties.
What We’re Looking For – Essential Skills/Experience
- Qualified Social Worker with current registration with Social Work England.
- Extensive post-qualifying experience within Adult Social Care, ideally including hospital-based practice.
- Strong working knowledge of the Hospital discharge and community support guidance, Care Act 2014, Mental Capacity Act 2005, safeguarding legislation and associated guidance.
- Proven ability to manage complexity, risk and ethical decision-making in fast-moving environments.
- Experience of supporting and supervising practitioners, promoting reflective and strengths-based practice.
- Excellent communication, leadership and partnership-working skills.
About the Team/Service
The Hospital Interface Service (HIS) is a vital part of Somerset’s integrated health and social care system. Based within acute hospitals, the service focuses on supporting people to return home safely, avoid unnecessary admissions, and regain independence following a hospital stay.
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Guided by the principles of hopeful social work, HIS practitioners work alongside health colleagues to challenge pessimism, promote possibility and keep people connected to their communities. The team plays a key role across admission avoidance, discharge planning, intermediate care pathways and safeguarding adults in hospital settings.
Joining HIS means being part of a motivated, skilled and values-driven team making a tangible difference every day.
Additional Information
Please Note: We may consider offering Skilled Worker visa sponsorship to suitably qualified overseas social workers who are already residing in the UK. To be eligible, applicants must hold a recognised social work qualification and be registered with Social Work England. Sponsorship will be assessed as part of the recruitment process. This is only available to candidates currently living in the UK, as unfortunately we are unable to provide resettlement support.
Due to the nature of the role and the geographical area of the service across Somerset, which is a largely rural county, with limitations around public transport the ability to be able to travel to any location is essential. Therefore, applicants must have full access to a vehicle that can be used for work purposes.
We recognise and welcome applications from disabled individuals who may require reasonable adjustments to meet this requirement, and we’re happy to discuss this from the first point of contact with the recruitment team.
For an informal chat about the role, you can contact Helen Readdy, Recruitment and Engagement Officer – Adults, helen.readdy@somerset.gov.uk
Please note we reserve the right to close the advert early if we have received a sufficient number of applications, so don’t delay, apply today!
A full job description can be found here: Advanced Practitioner Social Worker - Job Description - SCG1433
Person Specification
| Criteria | Essential | Desirable |
|---|---|---|
| Social Work qualification. | ✓ | |
| Current and valid registration with Social Work England. | ✓ | |
| Evidence of Continued Professional Development. | ✓ | |
| Holding or working towards Post Qualifying Professional Standard | ✓ | |
| Extensive knowledge of social work practice, with an emphasis on risk management, with adults of any age who have physical, sensory, learning disability, dementia, or other long-term conditions | ✓ | |
| Extensive experience in supporting staff with complex case casework, including chairing relevant meetings, following agreed procedures, and resulting in robust action plans with defined timescales. | ✓ | |
| Good understanding of the practical application of all relevant Social Care legislation and proven track record of supporting staff with statutory requirements. | ✓ | |
| Understanding of system thinking, used to reduce demand and costs. | ✓ | |
| Experience of operating within a budgetary framework and an understanding of the relationship between this and managing demand. | ✓ | |
| Model and promote confident and critical application of professional ethics to decision-making, using a legal and human rights framework, and support others to do so | ✓ | |
| Model and promote a culture which encourages reflection on the influence and impact of own values on professional practice | ✓ | |
| Demonstrate confident leadership, management and arbitration of ethical dilemmas, providing guidance and opportunities for the professional development of others | ✓ | |
| Promote people’s rights to autonomy and self-determination, supporting, challenging and guiding others as appropriate | ✓ | |
| Provide critical reflection, challenge and evidence-informed decision-making in complex situations | ✓ | |
| Routinely provide professional social work opinion, based on clear rationale and advanced professional knowledge. | ✓ | |
| Demonstrate knowledge of appropriate legal and policy frameworks, case law and the application to social work practice. Seek appropriate legal advice and apply legal reasoning, using professional expertise. | ✓ | |
| Demonstrate and apply to practice a working knowledge of human growth and development throughout the life span recognising the impact of relationships, psychological, socio-economic, environmental and physiological factors on people’s lives, taking into account age and development, and how this informs practice | ✓ | |
| Work autonomously and as part of a team, understanding and appropriately developing the scope of professional practice to create new ways of working for the benefit of those who access services, their families, and their carers. | ✓ | |
| Recognise how systemic approaches can be used to understand the person in the environment and inform practice. | ✓ | |
| Exercise professional judgement to manage risk, including positive risk-taking, especially in complex and unpredictable situations, and support others to do so. | ✓ | |
| Demonstrate a critical knowledge of the range of theories and models of intervention for individuals, families, children, groups and communities | ✓ | |
| Awareness of changing contexts at local, national and organisational level and the implications for practice | ✓ | |
| Promote, articulate and support a positive social work identity, promoting strategies for collaboration and a supportive team culture | ✓ | |
| Anticipate and begin to contribute to change management in the social work context | ✓ | |
| Demonstrate personal and professional resilience showing confidence about your role in the team, work positively with others and contribute to team working by developing a learning environment for self, teams and colleagues | ✓ | |
| Able to demonstrate awareness of own professional limitations, personal values and knowledge gaps, to critically reflect on the influence and impact on professional practice and engage in regular supervision to improve practice and career development | ✓ | |
| Advocate for, and facilitate the creation of, a culture in which everyone is encouraged to reflect and learn (including from mistakes), to receive and give constructive feedback and to learn from and with each other. | ✓ |
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