Job overview
This is an exciting opportunity to join West London NHS Trust in a role funded by Adopt London based in Adopt London West (ALW). This is a Department for Education DfE grant funded project via Adoption England to develop a multi-disciplinary team that offers consultation, formulation and some direct intervention to adoptive families. Adopt London are regional adoption services which recruit adopters and ‘family find’ for children across partner agencies and offer support services to adoptive families. Every child has the right to a safe and supportive family life and Adopt London aspires to promote best practice across its adoption services.
We are seeking a Highly Specialist Clinical Psychologist (8a 0.6 WTE 1-year fixed term post with possible extension) to join our multidisciplinary team to embed a therapeutically informed social work intervention model and MDT offer across each Adopt London region. This role will enhance the quality and consistency of therapeutically informed practice, and the main activities will consist of delivering consultation and training to social workers, co-delivering therapeutic parenting groups, and delivering a brief assessment, formulation and intervention model to families across the Adopt London agencies, supported by the Lead Psychologist for the project. The role is based in Ealing, with across London travel and hybrid working is supported and encouraged.
Main duties of the job
The team values are a committed, empathic and trauma-informed approach to the work with children, their carers, families and the professional network. Applicants must be keen to facilitate service development and be open to develop new ways of working, demonstrate flexibility and adaptability in their approach to their work and team life and be willing to practice in a collaborative way. Offering consultation to develop reflective thinking and sharing complex psychological knowledge in an accessible way is a key skill within this role. The role will also include delivering training and skills development sessions for social workers, supporting therapeutic parenting approaches, developing psychologically informed plans and collecting and presenting qualitative and quantitative evaluation data. The Adopt London Team have been trained in Dyadic Developmental Practice (DDP) and the post holder will be expected to attend this and any available trainings to support the development of an attachment and trauma-informed model of practice, as well as offering a range of other interventions to support a therapeutically informed social work model. This a varied role which offers the opportunity for service development, leadership skills and working with teams/ systems around adopted children, young people and their families. The post holder will be supported and supervised by the Principal Clinical Psychologist.
Detailed job description and main responsibilities
The Candidate Pack provides an overview of the key tasks and responsibilities of the role, and the person specification outlines the qualifications, skills, experience and knowledge required. Please view as attached.
The person specification below is not the full person specification, but outlines the criteria against which your application form will be assessed.
Person specification
Experience
Essential
- Experience of specialist psychological assessment and treatment of clients across a range of care settings, (e.g. outpatient, community, primary care, in patient settings).
- Demonstrate further specialist training/experience through having received a minimum of 50 hours clinical supervision of working as a specialist clinical psychologist over a minimum of 18 months, or an alternative agreed by the Child Clinical Psychology Lead
- Experience of working with a wide variety of client groups, including maintaining a high degree of professionalism in the face of highly emotive and distressing problems, verbal abuse and the threat of physical abuse.
- Experience working with children and young people in a CAMH setting.
Desirable
- Experience of teaching, training and/or supervision.
- Experience of working with other agencies.
- Experience of the application of clinical psychology in different cultural contexts.
- Experience of working with Children in care or adopted children
- Experience of working in Social Services settings
Qualifications
Essential
- Doctoral level training in clinical psychology including specifically models of psychopathology, clinical psychometrics and neuropsychology, two or more distinct psychological therapies and lifespan developmental psychology as accredited by the British Psychological Society.
- Eligible to work as a Practitioner Psychologist as approved by the Health Care Professions Council.
Desirable
- Training and qualifications in research methodology, staff training and/or other fields of applied psychology.
Knowledge & Skills
Essential
- Knowledge and skills in the use of complex methods of psychological assessment, intervention and management frequently requiring sustained and intense concentration.
- Skills in the use of complex methods of psychological assessment, intervention and management frequently requiring sustained and intense concentration.
- Well-developed skills in the ability to communicate effectively, orally and in writing, complex, highly technical and/or clinically sensitive information to clients, their families, carers and other professional colleagues both within and outside the NHS.
- Skills in providing consultation to other professional and non-professional groups.
- Doctoral level knowledge of research methodology, research design and complex, multivariate data analysis as practiced within the clinical fields of psychology.
- Knowledge of legislation in relation to the client group and mental health.
- Evidence of continuing professional development as recommended by the BPS (dependent on grade).
Desirable
- Knowledge and skills in specialist psychological assessment and treatment of specific groups (e.g. care experienced and adopted children)
- High level knowledge of the theory and practice of at least two specialised psychological therapies.
- Knowledge of legislation in relation to children and families and mental health.
- Knowledge of application of therapeutic models to looked after and adopted children and/or people who have a history of trauma, loss and/or attachment difficulties.
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Applying for this NHS job
This advert is for Highly Specialist Clinical Psychologist with West London NHS Trust in Southall, London, England. It is listed as a Band 8 Psychologist role. The advertised salary is £63,665 - £70,887 per annum inclusive pro rata. The contract type is Fixed term: 12 days (Short term funding). The application deadline is 21 Jul 2026.
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