Personal Advisor Leaving Care Service Children in Care and Care Leavers Team

Are you passionate about making a lasting difference to the lives of care experienced young people?

An exciting opportunity has arisen to join Staffordshire County Council's Children in Care and Care Leavers Service as a Personal Advisor in Lichfield , supporting young people aged 16-25 as they transition from care into independent adulthood.

Based primarily from our Lichfield office , you will work closely with care leavers across the Lichfield and Cannock areas, providing practical support, guidance and challenge to help them achieve positive outcomes in education, employment, training, accommodation, health and emotional wellbeing.

This is a blended working role , with time divided between the office, home working, and visiting young people and families. The office remains an important base for collaboration, supervision, and peer support, while home working and community visits enable practitioners to deliver responsive, relationship-based support where it is most needed.

Main Responsibilities

As a Personal Advisor, you will:

• Build positive and trusting relationships with care experienced young people aged 16-25.
• Deliver statutory Leaving Care responsibilities and pathway planning.
• Support young people to develop the practical and emotional skills needed for independent living.
• Work alongside social workers, housing providers, education and employment services, health professionals and third-sector organisations.
• Advocate on behalf of young people to help them access services and opportunities.
• Support care leavers to secure and sustain suitable accommodation.
• Encourage participation in education, employment and training opportunities.
• Maintain accurate case recordings and contribute to reviews and pathway planning meetings.
• Promote resilience, independence and positive outcomes in line with Corporate Parenting Principles.

The Ideal Candidate

The minimum criteria that will be used to shortlist for this role will be:

• Has experience of working with young people, care leavers or vulnerable adults.
• Understands the challenges faced by care experienced young people.
• Has excellent communication, engagement and relationship-building skills.
• Can work independently whilst also contributing positively to a busy team environment.
• Has knowledge of safeguarding responsibilities and statutory guidance relating to care leavers.
• Is committed to promoting the voice and aspirations of young people.
• Hold a full UK driving licence and have access to a vehicle for work purposes.
• Be willing to travel throughout Staffordshire and across the UK at times to where young people live and be prepared, on occasion, to stay away from home overnight where this is required to support the needs of young people and service delivery.

An essential car user allowance and mileage payments will apply in accordance with Council policy.

Interview dates will be held week commencing 2nd November 2026

Our Recruitment Process: We anonymise applications during shortlisting to ensure only relevant information is considered. Please complete your application fully, especially the supporting statement, to highlight what you’ll bring to the role.

For information, please note that there is currently an ongoing review within Children and Families to realign individual teams and the wider team’s ways of working. As a result, this role may be affected by the review. For further information, please speak to the hiring manager.

Please note: The minimum criteria in the ideal candidate section detailed above will be used if you are applying under one of our Interview Guarantee Schemes detailed below.

About Staffordshire County Council

We are no ordinary county council:

Our Values:

The core of who we are as an organisation. Just like we all have personal values that shape our thoughts and behaviour, organisational values drive how we think and act collectively.

Our values were created and shaped by colleague feedback and national best practice and they sit at the heart of People Strategy:

We have a real sense of community spirit that brings our people together. This feeling of belonging means we are all connected to what we do and take pride in the difference we make every day for Staffordshire people. We are ambitious and our sights are set firmly on a better future.

We look forward and race ahead - that goes for your career too.

Our benefits:

We recognise that it is our employees that are central to everything we do. We aim to create a supportive working environment where employees can achieve their full potential and achieve a healthy work-life balance.

In addition to your salary, as a member of staff, you will have access Our rewards and benefits - Careers at Staffordshire

Our recruitment process:

As an Authority we are committed to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children and young people/vulnerable adults and expect all staff and volunteers to share this commitment.

Staffordshire County Council is an equal opportunities organisation and Disability Confident employer. We encourage applications from all background and communities

As part of our commitment as a Disability Confident employer , a Gold Award Armed Forces employer and our commitment to supporting care leavers - we offer a guaranteed interview as long as yourapplication meets the minimum criteria for the post.

As you’ll know safeguarding and promoting the welfare of our children and young people/vulnerable adults is important to us and that’s why this position is subject to a criminal record check from the Disclosure and Barring Service. If applicable you should disclose details of unspent and unfiltered spent reprimands, formal warnings, cautions and convictions in your application form.

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