Assistant Psychologist

Thank you for your interest for the North London NHS Foundation Trust (NLFT), it is an exciting time to join us and being part of our journey to improve mental health care across North London and deliver excellent services to our local people. We will achieve this through the North London Way, as we:

• Collaborate at every level by living our Values to create the right conditions for us all to work together.
• Develop our new Trust culture, to help make our new Trust a great place to work and to receive great care.
• Empower our teams to lead the planned improvements in our services, by skilling them and giving them the tools to make the changes.
• Focus on delivering excellence at every level to improve our performance and ensure consistently high-quality care across all our services.
• Ensure that research, Quality Improvement, and technology lead the way and are embedded in our services.
• Take a trauma informed approach to everything we do

We proactively welcome diversity in our workforce and pride ourselves on being an inclusive employer. We aim to recruit from our local communities and provide opportunities to all including apprenticeships, veterans, care leavers and more.

The North London Way to deliver, Better Mental Health, Better Lives, Better Communities.

Our trust website is: https://www.northlondonmentalhealth.nhs.uk/

Job overview

The NCL ICB and Provider NHS Trusts have committed to redeveloping and improving service for children and young people with Neuro-diverse conditions, autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). To support this, we are establishing a Team led by a senior clinician and supported by experienced A-DOS and A-DI trained clinicians and Assistant Psychologist

Delivery of neuropsychological assessment and psychological therapy may also be required.

• To support formal and informal assessment of the social communication, learning and attention needs of children and young people presenting with neurodevelopmental difficulties, including applying psychological tests, self-report measures, rating scales, direct and indirect structured observations and semi-structured interviews with clients, family members and others involved in the client’s care.
• To help identify and develop resources to enable more functional communication and to develop skills and understanding in children and young people, e.g. visual aids and communication strategies and social stories.
• To work with multidisciplinary and multiagency colleagues as appropriate to offer support and guidance around social communication needs and behavioural needs of children and young people with neurodevelopmental difficulties, under supervision, including supporting the development of multi-agency support plans for behaviour and risk management.
• To co-deliver workshops and trainings to parents/carers, colleagues, and other professionals.
• To attend clinical meetings and in-service training as required.
• To keep up to date with new techniques and research for the maintenance and promotion of good practice.
• Record all clinical information in line with trust policies.
• To be responsible for the planning and prioritization of own workload and activities following the direction and guidelines given by the supervising clinical psychologist.

Working for our organisation

North London NHS Foundation Trust (NLFT) is committed to improving mental health care across North London to deliver excellent services to our local people.

Our Five-Year Strategy:

1. We will provide consistently high-quality care closer to home.
2. With our partners in North London and each borough we will ensure equity of outcome for all
3. We will offer great places to work, providing staff with supportive environment to deliver outstanding care.
4. We will be more effective as an organisation by pioneering research, quality improvement and technology.

The Trust reserves the right to require staff to work at such other places or locations as it considers reasonable and necessary on a temporary or permanent basis.

This vacancy may close early!

• In both CAMHS learning disability and CAMHS generic teams to support formal and informal assessment of the social communication, learning and attention needs of children and young people presenting with neurodevelopmental difficulties, including applying psychological tests, self-report measures, rating scales, direct and indirect structured observations and semi-structured interviews with clients, family members and others involved in the client’s care.
• Under supervision to contribute to functional assessments of behavior that challenges using the principles of positive behavior support, including undertaking observations, history taking and semi-structured questionnaires and interviews with key informants. Contributing to writing assessment reports and behavior and care plans. To help identify and develop resources to enable more functional communication and to develop skills and understanding in children and young people, e.g. visual aids and communication strategies and social stories.
• To work with multidisciplinary and multiagency colleagues as appropriate to offer support and guidance around social communication needs and behavioral needs of children and young people with neurodevelopmental difficulties, under supervision, including supporting the development of multi-agency support plans for behavior and risk management.
• To co-deliver workshops and trainings to parents/carers, colleagues, and other professionals.
• To attend clinical meetings and in-service training as required.
• To keep up to date with new techniques and research for the maintenance and promotion of good practice.
• Record all clinical information in line with trust policies.
• Support service development and quality improvement projects.
• To be responsible for the planning and prioritization of own workload and activities following the direction and guidelines given by the supervising clinical psychologist

Person specification

Qualifications/ Registrations

• • An upper second-class honour's degree or higher in psychology.
• • Entitlement to graduate membership of the British Psychological Society
• • Evidence of additional specialist training or experience related to neurodevelopmental disorders

• • ADOS-II training
• • 3DI or ADI-R training
• • Specialist training in a subject/skill relevant to Child & and Adolescent Mental Health (0-18 years)
• • Post-qualifying training in additional specialised areas of psychological practice
• • Further postgraduate training in relevant areas of research design and analysis.

Skills/ Abilities

• • Understanding of child development stages and psychosocial model.
• • Ability to develop good therapeutic relationships and maintain professional boundaries.
• • Ability to apply learning in practice.
• • Ability to be self-reflective on personal and professional development and use clinical supervision to explore and understand distress both directly with patients and indirectly.
• • An understanding of the needs and difficulties of people with mental health problems or other disabilities.

• • Experience of delivering teaching and training, using a variety of complex multi-media materials suitable for presentations
• • High standard of report writing.
• • Understanding of the need and rationale for using evidence based psychological therapies.
• • An understanding of service evaluation methods in healthcare, and an ability to plan and implement quality improvement projects

Experience/ Knowledge

• • Experience working with children and young people with neurodevelopmental conditions including ASD, ADHD and learning disability.
• • Understanding of NDS alongside other difficulties.
• • Knowledge of assessment tools, including neuropsychological assessments, relevant to the client group.
• • Experience of working to support the mental health needs of children and young people, and their families, including with neurodevelopmental disorders, and delivering low level evidence-based interventions.
• • Experience of signposting to families and linking to alternative services.

• • Experience of working with diverse communities and within a multicultural setting.
• • Experience of working with and knowledge in processes around managing risk and safeguarding.
• • Understanding of importance to modify, adapt methods of communication and interventions.

Personal Qualities

• • Demonstrable ability to work under pressure and respond to demanding situations as appropriate.
• • Ability to recognize own limits & seek support re supervision as appropriate
• • Ability to use clinical supervision effectively for personal development.
• • Regard for others and respect for individual rights of autonomy and confidentiality.
• • A flexible approach to client intervention and to be able to work independently and flexibly to meet client needs.

• • Positive attitude to change.
• • The ability to engage and work with clients in differing environments in line with the needs of the service.
• • Willingness and ability to develop specialist knowledge of clinical aspects of child & adolescent mental health.

Other Requirements

• • Understanding of equality of opportunity & related policies & procedures.
• • A commitment to service user participation across the levels of clinical practice, team/service, and the organization.

• • Knowledge of recent legislation affecting the NHS/Social Care and Education.
• • Awareness and understanding of emotional distress/ mental health problems and the impact can have on clinicians.