Community Engagement Worker

Job overview

Part Time, Fixed Term Ends Dec 2025

Must be living in Islington and Understand Local Community

Suitable for a parent or having lived experience of the challenges local families face in accessing services .

Are you passionate about making a difference in your local community? Do you want to help address inequalities and ensure that everyone has access to Bright Start Local  services? We are looking for a dedicated Community Engagement  Worker to engage with underrepresented groups and increase access to Bright Start  universal services in Islington.

About the Role:

As a Community Engagment Worker, you will: Connect with local families and individuals, particularly those from underrepresented backgrounds.  Promote and increase awareness of essential services.  Build trust with families and  encourage participationin Local Bright Start Activities   Work closely with Health visiting Service  to address inequalities.

About You:

You live in Islington and understand the local community. You’re passionate about social justice and reducing inequalities. You have excellent communication and outreach skills.  Experience in community work is desirable but not essential.  Being a parent or having lived experience of the challenges local families face is a plus.

This is a fantastic opportunity to make a real impact in your community. We welcome applications from local residents, particularly parents, who want to help create positive change!

Main duties of the job

The community engagement worker's role is to bridge the gap between families/communities  not accessing health visiting services and available healthcare resources. They will actively reach out to these families/Communities , serving as a link to health services. This role is crucial for promoting community/family health and wellbeing and addressing healthcare access disparities. Recruits will be from within the community and may be bilingual, particularly in Somali and Turkish, to better serve the diverse population. They should have strong connections within these communities and be knowledgeable about health visiting services.

Working alongside a team of professionals, including health visiting staff and Bright Start Islington, the community engagement worker will facilitate access to health visiting services and other local resources. They will liaise between agencies and community/family members, participating in outreach activities and collaborating with health visiting teams to tailor services to community/family needs. Acting as positive role models, they will raise awareness and share key information about health visiting services to empower families and community to make positive choices. Ensuring a positive experience for service users is a priority, with a focus on listening, respecting, and empowering individuals to achieve desired outcomes. They will also behave in a professional manner, as a representatives of Whittington health Trust.

Detailed job description and main responsibilities

Outreach

Identifying target communities/ families that may benefit from health visiting services but are currently unaware or not accessing health services.

Actively engage with community members through various channels such as community centres, schools, religious institutions, and social gatherings to raise awareness about available health visiting / healthcare services

Developing outreach strategies to effectively reach families/communities such as  knocking on doors, setting up information booths at community events, distributing information leaflet about services , partnering with local groups, face to face activities with local communities and support the wellbeing offer that are tailored to community needs.

Works in partnerships with the health visiting teams.

Ensuring that services are aware of local culture and language as well as what families/ communities are saying they need

Communication & Building Relationship

A key part of the role will entail relationship building and maintaining relationship with local community groups and organisations along with statutory services also working with Turkish and Somalia community but not limited to these communities.

Building strong relationships and networks within the community to understand their needs, concerns, and cultural considerations regarding health services.

Engaging in conversations, actively listening to their concerns and needs, and demonstrating empathy and understanding of their unique circumstances.

Follow up with families to provide ongoing support, answer questions, address concerns, and ensure that they continue to receive the necessary healthcare services.

Be an advocate for family and community wellbeing,  encouraging individuals and families to use the services provided

Work collaboratively with service on the issues that are raised by families/ communities, and base the response on solution-based collaboration principles.

Develop and maintain effective and appropriate communication systems with staff and colleagues within Whittington Health, Children’s Centres, Schools, GP Practices, and other identified agencies

Share information about available services with families and community using persuasive, reassuring , tact and empathy to share information

Have skills and knowledge to overcome/deal with  barriers to understanding such as learning disability/mental health/language barriers

Providing Information and Education:

Community engagement workers share information about the importance of health visiting services, the benefits they offer to families and children, and how to access them.

Provide educational materials on topics related to child development, parenting, nutrition, and healthcare.

Provide support and guidance to overcome barriers to accessing health services and connect families with the resources they need.

The post holder will be visiting various locations throughout the borough, including Mosques, homes, community centres, outreach centres and schools when assisting with information sessions.

Positive role models to raise awareness, sharing key information that will enable the community to make positive choices.

The postholder will support the promotion and delivery of co-produced health interventions to local communities and families.

They will contribute to the reporting of activities undertaken to aid evaluation of the pilot.

To contribute to the training and support of staff working with local communities where appropriate.

Reports back to senior management on the needs of the community, primarily identifying service gaps that the community feel they need and makes recommendations.

Creates records of the above

Clinical

The post holder will sign post families and members of the community to appropriate health visiting services/ other services and where appropriate support with interventions to meet identified needs.

The post holder will support the co-production of interventions and Health promotion sessions with families/community. This may occur across a range of settings, including the service base, schools, or pop up clinics in the community, children centre etc.

The post holder will liaise with and support the service working with individuals families within the local community.

There is expectation of the post holder to assist parents/ family who may struggle as necessary accompanying them to health services , supporting them with completing any paper work as necessary, holding items for them whilst parents attend to children.

The post holder will be expected to work independently according to a plan agreed with the line manager and within the overall framework of the team’s policies and procedures.

Ability to acts on own initiative when visiting/ working with families, with access to regular supervision by line manager and guidance from senior professional colleagues.

• Create records of health needs of the community and contribute to suggestions on meeting health needs. The post holder will have good time management skills, especially when organising events. They will be able to work on their own initiative and plan their day. Uses their judgement to make decisions when to escalate a situation upwards. The post holder maybe required to support in the baby clinic setting, setting up weighing scale, length measuring equipment, cleaning toy and equipment, supporting with measuring older children’s weight and height and reporting figures to the practitioner.

Responsibility

There will be a need for periods of concentration, when planning the days work or events.

Working conditions/ patterns can be unpredictable with interruptions, unpleasant weather, may meet people with aggression, risk associated with working in the community.

There might be occasional encounter with unpleasant/ emotional or distressing circumstance including people who may have experienced trauma.

There will be occasions where individuals can become frustrated and upset.

This role involves using frequent moderate effort for several times depending on the activity  as the activity, such as walking, carrying items, lifting / moving equipment or during events. It also involves moderate effort for short periods such as writing up reports.

General

Maintain strict confidentiality of service user information at all times.

Be sensitive to cultural differences.

Genuine commitment to serving the needs of the community.

To develop skills and competencies that assist in the delivery of current duties.

To receive

This is not an exhaustive list of duties and responsibilities, and the post holder may be required to undertake other duties which fall within the grade of the job, in discussion with the manager.