Job overview

BAND 6 SPECIALIST PSYCHOLOGICAL PRACTITIONER (12-month Fixed Term position) on Laurel Personality Focused Recovery Service, Tamarind Medium Secure Service

 We are recruiting for a fixed term position on Laurel: a 12 bedded ward for men with a diagnosis of Personality Disorder.  The specialist service offers a range of psychological individual and group interventions to help the men to gain insight into their difficulties and their offending behaviour with the overall aims of alleviating distress for the individual, improving emotional regulation, improving pro-social interactions, and reducing levels of risk’ both to self and others.

Laurel is one of seven wards at The Tamarind Centre, which is an 89-bedded medium-secure service.  The psychology team work across all wards and consist of a range of experienced Practitioner Psychologists, Art Therapist, and Assistant Psychologists.

 We welcome applications from people interested in working with complex presentations, balancing clinical need with risk management.  A core part will be working alongside multi-disciplinary colleagues sharing psychological knowledge and consistently improving the psychological mindedness of the service.  We are looking for people from a range of diverse backgrounds with an interest in working with and enhancing the lives of people who have experienced adverse life experiences and offending behaviour. 

Main duties of the job

Post holders, under the supervision of a qualified psychologist, will assist in delivering a range of individual and group interventions addressing emotional, behavioural, and relational factors to improve service users’ recovery and wellbeing. The post holders will support the direct assessment, formulation, and delivery of interventions to address the full range of complex forensic mental health problems. They will also contribute to the production of risk assessments and be key in providing psychologically informed advice and support for those directly involved in the care of the individual. They would also support training, supervision, and evaluation of the delivery of individual behavioural management plans, risk management activity and service user involvement.

We are looking for an enthusiastic, robust, resilient, creative, and innovative Specialist Psychological Practitioner interested in working with people with complex presentations, encompassing risk, personality difficulties, and mental health. The service has identified resources for continuing professional development, and excellent multi-model supervision structures. Ideally post holders to have a background in some of the following: teaching, counselling, social work, family work, nursing, registered therapists (CBT, DBT or MBT).

Working for our organisation

Welcome to Birmingham and Solihull Mental Health NHS Foundation Trust.  Our 4000 clinical and support staff help us to improve mental health wellbeing and meet the needs of the 70,000 people we serve each year.  We provide a range of mental healthcare services across Birmingham and Solihull, as well as specialised services nationally. We also offer medical, nursing and psychology training and are proud of our international reputation for both research and innovation.

Our population is culturally diverse, characterised in places by high levels of deprivation which create an increasing demand for our services and a necessity for us to make sure everyone can access the help they need. We are a team of compassionate, inclusive and committed people working together to provide excellent care to support our community.  If you are looking for a place to belong, where you can make a real difference to people’s lives, join our team where our warm welcome is waiting for you.