South Tees NHS has an exciting opportunity for a Director of Medical Psychology.

To act as the Chief Psychological Professions Officer (CPPO) for the Trust, liaising with the National Clinical Lead for the Psychological Professions at NHSE as required to keep up to date with developments in the profession and to support the Trust to implement national policies and programmes of work.

Please note that this vacancy will close when we receive sufficient completed applications.

Main duties of the job

To provide operational, clinical and professional leadership for Medical Psychology and the clinicians working within the service.

To provide assurance to the Trust that all professions working within Medical Psychology are registered with the relevant statutory / regulatory body and are compliant with the required standards of practice.

To provide assurance to the Trust that clinical interventions are delivered in line with national clinical guidelines and practice standards as defined by relevant professional bodies.

To assist the Trust in understanding the psychological needs of medical patients, to lead in the development of strategies and policies that meet those needs, and to develop business cases to provide psychological services to support those needs.

About us

South Tees Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust offers leadership and improvement training to all new staff to the Trust this training programme has been designed to support our leaders in developing their understanding of leadership and management skills. You will be expected to attend the leadership development programme, and the Quality Improvement Programme that the Trust delivers. This programme aims to:

• Explore leadership within the NHS
• Promote Trust Values and Behaviours
• Develop your Leadership effectiveness and skills
• Practitioner level in quality improvement, equipping you with the skills to champion, lead and complete quality improvement within your role

After you complete this four and a half days of training you will be able to explore further leadership and improvement training opportunities, we offer further in-house courses dependent upon your role and bitesize programmes and leadership apprenticeships at level 3,5 and 7.

Job description

Job responsibilities

Please see the full job description and person specification document(s) for main responsibilities of the role.

Person Specification

Knowledge & Skills

Essential

• Ability to demonstrate authentic, compassionate and effective leadership skills.
• Excellent verbal and written communication skills
• Advanced skills in the use of complex methods of psychological assessment, formulation, intervention and management, frequently requiring sustained and intense concentration.
• Understanding of how psychological factors affect health and delivery of health care services.
• Knowledge of relevant legislation relevant to client groups and the healthcare system.
• Ability to identify, and employ, as appropriate, clinical governance mechanisms for the safe delivery of clinical services.
• Skills in developing and critically evaluating services and implementing proposals to improve them both in terms of efficacy and cost effectiveness.
• Skills in providing consultation to other professional and non-professional groups.
• Knowledge of NHS financial processes and budget management.
• Well-developed knowledge of the theory and practice of specialised psychological therapies and assessment methodologies working with medical patients
• Evidence of continuing professional development as required by the BPS and HCPC (including accessing clinical supervision and maintaining knowledge and skills relevant to the role).
• Excellent interpersonal skills.
• Ability to develop and use complex multi-media materials for presentations in public, professional and academic settings.

Qualifications & training

Essential

• Minimum psychology degree 2:1
• Post-graduate doctoral level training in clinical or counselling psychology (or its equivalent for those trained prior to 1996) as accredited by the BPS, including specifically models of psychopathology, clinical psychometrics and neuropsychology, two or more distinct psychological therapies and lifespan developmental psychology.
• Registration with the HCPC as a clinical or counselling psychologist.
• Post-doctoral training and experience in the supervision of trainee clinical psychologists, counselling psychologists or health psychologists
• Further training in a specialised area of psychological practice relevant to working with medical patients, through formal post-doctoral training or a combination of specialist short courses (e.g. Acceptance and Commitment Therapy).
• Doctorate level knowledge of research methodology, research design and complex multivariate data analysis as practiced within the fields of applied psychology

Desirable

• Management training courses

Experience

Essential

• Experience of participating at a senior level in an NHS or health care organisation
• Understanding of NHS management processes/systems and substantial experience in taking a lead on projects/services within the NHS.
• Experience of service and quality improvement.
• Experience of operationally managing and delivering a psychological service within fixed resources (e.g. capacity and demand) that is compliant with relevant performance indicators (e.g. waiting times).
• Experience of line managing staff.
• Experience of managing budgets.
• Experience of clinically leading a team of psychological professionals.
• Experience of professional oversight and professional supervision of the psychological professions.
• Experience of working as a consultant psychologist in an MDT (including consultation).
• Experience of working with a wide variety of client groups, across the whole life course and presenting with the full range of clinical severity across the full range of care settings, including outpatient, community, primary care, inpatient and residential care settings.
• Experience of working with a variety of health conditions presenting with the full range of clinical severity.
• Experience of exercising full clinical responsibility for clients' psychological care and treatment, both as an individual practitioner and also within the context of multidisciplinary care.
• Experience of representing psychology within the context of multi-disciplinary care.
• Experience of multi-agency working.
• Experience of clinical teaching and training.
• Understanding and knowledge of NHS commissioning arrangements (e.g. ICS/ICB NHSE)
• Experience of conducting clinical research and complex audit.

Desirable

• Experience of work with commissioners and stakeholders including preparation of bids/business cases.
• Relevant national role/links (e.g. BPS PPN BPS/ACP national assessors CQC etc)

Personal Attributes

Essential

• Excellent interpersonal communication skills (verbal, non-verbal and written) when communicating highly technical and sensitive information to patients, carers, members of the multidisciplinary team (MDT) and other professional colleagues, both within and outside the NHS, including situations where there are barriers to communication.
• Ability to maintain a high degree of professionalism in the face of highly emotive and distressing problems and verbal and physical abuse.
• Ability to identify, provide and promote clinically appropriate and clinically effective means of psychological and emotional support to patient, carers and staff exposed to highly distressing situations and challenging behaviours.
• Capacity for tolerating frustration, change and high levels of demand with an ability to work effectively under pressure.
• Work and maintain judgement under pressure whilst effectively managing own and others time.
• Ability to interact effectively and build effective working relationships with staff from all disciplines, both within and outside the NHS.
• Is a team player and has demonstrated ability to work and deliver to team and organisational objectives.
• Adaptable and able to work flexibly when required (e.g. in the light of service priorities).
• Ability to contain and work with organisational stress and ability to 'hold' the stress of others.
• Capacity to analyse problems in a logical and structured way, generating optional and innovative solutions and adapting approaches to problem-solving to achieve sustainable outcomes.
• Ability to accept and use clinical supervision appropriately and effectively.
• Ability to articulate clearly the role of the psychological professions based upon a comprehensive understanding of the framework of government and national professional policy.

Desirable

• Enthusiasm for the application of psychology within medical settings, and the ability to articulate the value added by psychology to patients and staff in these services and to outside agencies.

Employer details

Employer name

South Tees Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust

Address

The James Cook University Hospital

Marton Road

Middlesbrough

TS4 3BW

Any attachments will be accessible after you click to apply.

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