Consultant Psychologist/Psychotherapist

Job overview

A senior clinical and leadership role within the Trauma and Dissociation Service, responsible for shaping and delivering specialist psychological care for adults with complex PTSD, trauma and dissociative disorders. The post-holder leads service strategy, clinical governance and a multidisciplinary team while providing expert assessment and therapy. It requires advanced clinical expertise, strong leadership, and the ability to drive service development, research and high-quality, inclusive care.

Main duties of the job

Lead and manage a specialist therapy service, delivering expert assessments, formulations and interventions for complex trauma cases. Oversee team performance, supervision, recruitment and training. Develop and implement service strategy, policy and governance standards. Coordinate care with internal and external partners, ensuring accessible, culturally competent services. Drive research, audit and service improvement while maintaining high professional, ethical and record-keeping standards.

Detailed job description and main responsibilities

Key Responsibilities

Clinical Leadership and Patient Care

• Lead the planning, organisation and delivery of a highly specialist psychological therapy service for individuals with complex trauma, PTSD and dissociative disorders.
• Provide expert assessments, formulations and evidence-based interventions for highly complex cases, including risk assessment and management.
• Ensure services are accessible, culturally appropriate and responsive to the needs of diverse communities, including work with families and carers where required.

Service Delivery and Multidisciplinary Working

• Lead and coordinate multidisciplinary team functioning, including chairing meetings and ensuring effective, psychologically informed practice
• Work collaboratively with internal teams, external agencies, referrers and GPs to deliver integrated care pathways.
• Provide expert advice and consultation on complex psychological care to colleagues and partner organisations.

Strategic Development and Governance

• Lead the development and implementation of service strategy, policies and clinical governance frameworks.
• Drive service improvement initiatives, ensuring high-quality, efficient and evidence-based care aligned with national and Trust standards
• Engage service users in service design and contribute to wider organisational strategy and innovation.

Leadership, Management and Supervision

• Provide leadership and operational management to a multidisciplinary team, including recruitment, appraisal and workforce development
• Ensure robust clinical and professional supervision structures are in place and deliver supervision and mentoring to staff and trainees.
• Deputise for senior leaders where appropriate and manage professional standards within the service.

Teaching, Training and Workforce Development

• Lead and deliver specialist teaching, training and clinical placements for trainees and qualified professionals.
• Promote continuous learning by embedding current research and best practice into clinical work.

Research, Audit and Service Evaluation

• Lead and contribute to research, audit and service evaluation aligned with the service and wider organisational research agenda.
• Develop outcome measures and support the use of data to inform service improvement and innovation.

Governance, Resources and Professional Standards

• Ensure high standards of record-keeping, information governance and clinical documentation.
• Oversee the effective use of resources, including budget awareness, equipment and therapy materials.
• Maintain and promote professional standards, ensuring ongoing development and compliance across the team.

General Responsibilities

• Contribute to a psychologically safe and supportive working environment, including staff wellbeing initiatives.
• Manage complex, emotionally demanding situations and support others in doing so.
• Work flexibly across the Trust, including travel for meetings and outreach activity where required.

For further information please see the full job description.