Team Manager – Multi Agency Screening Team; MAST

Are you an experienced Social Work leader who is passionate about making the right decisions for children at the earliest opportunity? North Yorkshire Children’s Services is proud to be Ofsted Outstanding, and we are looking for an exceptional Team Manager to lead our highly respected Multi Agency Screening Team (MAST)

This is an excellent opportunity to lead a well-established team that brings together professionals from Social Care, Early Help, Health, Police, Education and Probation to ensure children and families receive the right support, at the right time, from the right service.

MAST receives and screens all contacts relating to children, young people and families across North Yorkshire, and the front door to Children’s Services is a vital part of our early help and safeguarding system.

We have recently undergone significant development, with increased staffing enabling a stronger focus on:

• Meaningful conversations with families and professionals
• Strengths-based practice and Signs of Safety
• Family network identification and safety planning
• Robust threshold decisions
• Multi-agency collaboration and professional challenge
• Ensuring families access the most appropriate support pathway

Our practitioners now spend more time understanding what life is like for children and families, gathering rich information and exploring strengths, risks and support networks before decisions are made. This reflective and relationship-based approach has led to better informed decisions, stronger partnership working and improved outcomes for families.

As we continue to strengthen our Signs of Safety and Strength in Relationships approach, this role offers the chance to shape practice, influence strategic decision‑making and lead innovation within one of the most important functions in Children’s Services.

You will provide leadership, oversight and direction to a skilled team of Social Workers, practice supervisors and multi‑agency partners operating at the front door of Children’s Services, leading a culture of curiosity, reflection and high professional standards, whilst ensuring timely and effective decision‑making for children and families.

• Providing visible and inspirational leadership across the Multi Agency Screening Team.
• Embedding our Strength in Relationships Practice Model and Signs of Safety approach.
• Overseeing screening decisions, strategy discussions, threshold application and safeguarding responses.
• Supporting practitioners to undertake high‑quality, strengths‑based conversations with families and professionals.
• Driving continuous improvement through performance monitoring, audit activity and quality assurance.
• Promoting effective multi‑agency working with Health, Education, Police, Probation and Early Help partners.
• Developing staff through reflective supervision, coaching and performance management.
• Managing service performance while balancing quality, timeliness and child‑centred decision making.
• Contributing to service development, innovation and readiness for future reforms through the Families First Partnership Programme.

If you are an ambitious leader who thrives in a fast‑paced environment, values collaborative working and wants to make a lasting difference for children and families, we’d love to hear from you.

It is an exciting time in Children and Young Peoples Services in North Yorkshire as we plan our approach in respect of the Families First Partnership Programme and how we will be responding to the social care reforms. Work is underway to plan our approach and implementations for 2027. As a result of this, some realignment may happen with job roles in the future, we want to be transparent about this in respect of this role.

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