Children's Services Strategy and Improvement Manager

Children's Social Care Children’s Services Strategy and Improvement Manager

: 001668

Contract: 12 months fixed term

Salary: £47,181 - £51,356 per annum

Hours: 36.66 per week

Location: Spindles offices, George Street, Oldham, OL1 1LF

Closing Date: Wednesday 26 August 2026

Interview Date: TBC.

This is an exciting time to join Children’s Services in Oldham. We’re looking for an innovative and motivated person to develop and drive strategic improvement and transformation to help families keep children and young people safe and for them to have the best start in life.

If you’re looking to make a real difference, we are looking for people like you, to track progress, outcomes, and impact of improvement programmes across children’s services and co-ordinating directorate wide work such as business planning, inspection preparation and strategy and policy development.

For an informal discussion, please contact

• To drive the development and implementation of robust Children’s Services strategies, improvement plans and local policy to deliver national reforms
• To track and evidence the implementation and outcomes of strategies, development activity and practice standards
• To work with senior leaders to deliver key priorities and projects
• Establishing a positive performance culture that delivers effective performance and continuous service improvement
• Provide effective, independent challenge, which is underpinned by robust evidence

To succeed in this role, you will need as a minimum:

• Experience in leading and managing a high performing team
• Experience of working with a broad range of stakeholders, building consistently positive relationships, influencing senior decision makers and positively promoting organisational reputation and interests
• Well-developed presentation, communication, and interpersonal skills with an ability to explain complex information clearly and concisely to a variety of audiences
• Ability to work through problems, evaluate risks and offer practical solutions

We want Oldham to have vibrant, safe neighbourhoods where people are proud to live with opportunities for healthier, more fulfilled lives; and a sustainable, thriving economy. As we look to the future, the challenges may be significant, but so are the opportunities. We’ve identified three missions with our residents and partners, focusing on what will deliver the biggest impact:

A Great Place to Live, Healthier, Happier Lives, and Green and Growing.

We’re looking for candidates who will support us to achieve our ambitions and we encourage you to download our Corporate Plan:
Ready for the Future and our Oldham Plan for further information

By driving innovation, investing in our people, and championing our communities, we will ensure that Oldham continues to be a place where everyone can live their best life. To support this, we have three core values which define who we are and how we operate. These are Proud, Ambitious, and Together
, and they shape our culture, inform our decisions, and inspire us to deliver on our commitments to the people of Oldham.

We have translated these values into five behaviours which guide our actions and are the standards we hold ourselves to, day in and day out:

• Work with a resident focus
• Support local leaders
• Committed to the borough
• Delivery high performance
• Take ownership and drive change

You can find out more about our values and behaviours on our greater.jobs Oldham page

At Oldham Council we offer a great benefits package for our employees, which includes the following:

• 25 days annual leave which increases after 5 and 10-years’ service
• The option to purchase additional annual leave.
• An attractive LGPS benefit pension scheme with the option to make shared cost additional voluntary contributions.
• Discounted gym membership with Oldham Active.
• Staff discount scheme for shopping, entertainment, eating-out, eating-in, travel, motoring and more.
• Salary sacrifice scheme for home and electronics and Cycle to Work.
• Wellbeing support, including a Mental Health First Aider network and an Employment Assistance Programme that provides 24…