Deputy Manager - Residential Family Centre; Ofsted

Deputy Manager, Residential Family Centre

Westcliff-on-Sea, with occasional travel to the registered office at Socata House, 543–545 London Road, Westcliff-on-Sea.

Vacancy listed
30/09/2026

• Support the Registered Manager in the day-to-day management of the centre, ensuring the centre operates consistently with the Statement of Purpose and provides a safe, well-run environment for families.
• Take a share of shift leadership, including acting as the person in charge of a shift on a rota basis, in line with the staffing structure
• Support rota management, ensuring two staff, awake, are on duty overnight and that paediatric first aid cover is in place on every shift.
• Contribute to the weekly placement plan and risk assessment review for each family, and lead these reviews when asked to do so by the Registered Manager.
• In Registered Manager’s absence being responsible for leading safe evaluations and fire safety actions, contribute and support the development of personal evacuation plans with families and staff
• Help ensure the quality of the physical environment, and report premises, health and safety and maintenance matters promptly.
• Help ensure the Centre is Ofsted visit ready every day, with the premises, records and evidence kept in a state that would satisfy an unannounced inspection at any time.
• Undertake cleaning duties directly, and support the wider staff team with cleaning tasks as needed, and provide some direct physical support to new parents with practical day-to-day tasks.

• Act as the nominated deputy for the Registered Manager during periods of planned and unplanned absence, in line with regulation 27 of the Residential Family Centres Regulations 2002.
• Maintain continuity of the centre's day-to-day management while deputising, including decisions on admissions, staffing and the immediate response to incidents.
• Escalate to the Responsible Individual any matter that cannot reasonably wait for the Registered Manager's return.
• Hand back to the Registered Manager on their return with a clear account of decisions taken and matters outstanding.

• Provide supervision to allocated members of the staff team, in line with City Family's supervision and appraisal policy and the cadence set out in the Statement of Purpose.
• Support the Registered Manager in holding and reviewing the training matrix, and in ensuring induction is completed and signed off before anyone works unsupervised, including bank and agency staff.
• Model good practice and support the professional development of less experienced members of the team.
• Contribute to recruitment, including sitting on interview panels in line with City Family's safer recruitment training requirements.

• Promote a culture of safeguarding across the centre, in line with City Family's Safeguarding Policy and the Southend Safeguarding Partnership procedures.
• Identify and act on safeguarding concerns promptly, including referral to the Local Authority Designated Officer where required.
• Support the Registered Manager in preparing for the Responsible Individual's monthly regulation 25 visit and the regulation 23 quality of care review, and help act on the findings of both.
• Contribute to the quarterly safeguarding audit.
• Support the handling of complaints in line with the Complaints Policy, including the 48-hour acknowledgement and 28-day response timescales.

• Help ensure records are kept in the form Schedule 3 and Schedule 4 require, and retained for the periods the regulations set: 15 years for family records and at least three years for centre records.
• Suppo…