Trinity has over 23 years experience of providing support for people experiencing multiple exclusion and complex needs. Our mission is to achieve transformation in the lives of people suffering the effects of homelessness and exclusion. The three main services we provide; support, housing and training & employment, combine in individually tailored ways to achieve three main aims:

1. Trinity residents never become homeless again.
2. Trinity residents at risk of offending never commit crime and Trinity residents with a history of
offending never commit crime again.
3. Trinity residents remain free from addiction to alcohol or drugs for life.

The purpose of a Support Team Member

Facilitated person-centred planning is central for a client to identify firstly their particular relationship with identified pathways to independence and secondly to prioritise the specific support they require. This support will be based on their current understanding of their strengths and individual place on their journey towards their chosen outcomes. The role of the Support Team Member is to support clients to successfully achieve their outcomes as evidenced through the support milestones:

1. Engagement in support plan
2. Meaningful use of time: training and employment
3. Tenancy sustainment

The role of a Support Team Member

The Support Team Member will use the Outcomes Star which focuses specifically on each support pathway and supports clients in making changes by providing him or her with a map of the journey of change and a way of plotting his or her progress, and planning the actions he or she needs to take. It works by moving someone from a ‘stuck’ state to a state of ‘self reliance.’

The Support Team Member will facilitate the combining of these pathways through our close working relationship with our partner agencies that refer clients to Trinity’s services: The Emergency Housing Unit, Probation Service, Persistent and Prolific Offender Team, Youth Offending Team, DATS, Social Services, 16+ Team and other local providers, through referrals, risk and case management, local forums, regular contact and clear information sharing.

The Support Team Member will support clients to manage money and personal administration through good working relationships with both the Housing Benefit department and Job Centre Plus and by access to debt counselling, improving clients ability to manage their own finances and thereby maintain their tenancy.

The Support Team Member will facilitate access to employment opportunities, principally through our Job Coach to enable clients to achieve employment or work experience.

The Support Team Member will support clients to access local health care through registration with GP
and dental practices. This is often the easiest route to referral into more specialised services including;
drug and alcohol services, mental health services and counselling.

The Support Team Member will facilitate client’s progress as they navigate through the different support options through being proficient in the use of solution focused interventions; Maslow’s Hierarchy Of Needs, Motivational Interviewing, Appreciative Enquiry, Solution Focused Brief Therapy and NLP.

Structured and flexible support

The Support Team Member will support a maximum of twelve clients with low to medium and some higher support needs. The actual level of support will depend on the needs of the service user, initially agreed at a client’s initial support plan meeting and reviewed every six to twelve weeks. It is anticipated that the level of support will decrease every six months.

When clients meet with staff, either individually or as a group, we have a normal and straightforward approach, in both appearance and substance,. One of the most tangible indicators of transformation, for our clients, is the achievement to live independently of being monitored and having files ‘kept ‘on them.

Trinity’s support follows a natural rhythm, rather than formal proceedings, this breaks down barriers and is conducive to a balanced lifestyle, including; good morning calls, shared breakfasts and evening meals, routine domestic chores and structured and unstructured activities throughout the day focusing on independent living skills, training, employment, physical and mental health and fun. It is through this daily positive connection with clients that staff are able to provide space and time for clients to address the reasons that caused them to experience homelessness and to demonstrate an alternative lifestyle
that is a proven long-term solution to homelessness.

Support will take place in a number of ways: routine support service focusing on independent living skills, empowerment and crisis prevention; dealing with unplanned events; ensuring health and safety requirements are met; responding to crises; as well as flexible support hours delivered by Trinity staff at a time the client chooses to help achieve outcomes in their personalised plans. Other strategies will be employed, including: telephone and text and email when available.

On call service

Trinity operate a 24 hour on call service as part of our crisis prevention procedures. Clients can make free calls to the specified number and staff manage the service calls on rotation. The number is also available to other providers of support as the client wishes. Where Trinity own or manage property, the neighbours have the emergency number and are informed of our procedures.

The Support Team Member will take responsibility for emergency calls on a weekly rota basis and must
be able to respond at all times during that week. If this is not possible, it is the rostered staff member’s
responsibility to arrange cover.

The Support Team Member will ensure that all practice, activity and decision making is lawful, prudent,
and does not compromise the values of the organisation, fulfils all Health & Safety and confidentiality
and those guidelines and policies for the safeguarding of children and vulnerable adults and complies
with commonly accepted professional ethics.

This job description is a summary of the main responsibilities of the post and duties may change and vary from time to time. Staff will be consulted on any major changes to the job description.

Person Specification

Few occupations place such a premium on a staff member’s human qualities, personal development
processes and self awareness as is required for a good Support Team Member. In this job, it really matters what kind of person you are. In a job that salvages lives it is essentially about facilitating processes to assist people to reclaim, restore, enhance and actualise their innate human potential. Complex issues are often involved such as family breakdown, family trauma and violence, sexual abuse, problematic drug and alcohol use, domestic violence, unemployment, poverty, developmental delays and many other difficult life passages such as divorce, separation, or rejection. Many of these issues lead people to experience homelessness and to seek the services of supported accommodation.

The exacting vocation of a Support Team Member demands a complex ‘juggling act’ of professional skills, as well as excellent personal qualities. It requires knowledge of human behaviour and relations and therapeutic interventions and practice; reliability; loyalty, honesty, enthusiasm, creative thinking; flexibility; responsiveness; a genuinely positive approach; ability to negotiate conflict and crises; and endurance and good stress management, so as to be fairly relaxed amid chaotic and often emotionally demanding environments. As if this were not enough, the personal qualities needed are very stringent and tend to be based on hard won self knowledge and awareness gained through life experience, learning from difficulties and personal development efforts, perhaps rather more than theoretical knowledge.

The foundation for this job is a caring disposition, coupled with the skills to follow through in a practical way which empowers clients. For the right person this can be an exciting, rewarding, inspiring, enriching and satisfying career which is also very socially beneficial. Genuine friendliness in Team Members is also highly valued by clients, and while there are necessary boundaries in this work, these should be applied with sensitivity and discretion.

Absolute sincerity in a Support Team Member is requisite. After all, clients, weary of the ‘system’ are often experts at detecting insincerity. The role of a Support Team Member has no place for; patronising attitudes and talk, self righteousness, quick fixes, babysitting, proselytising and doing good.

Implicit in this is a sort of emerging ‘Golden Rule’ of a Support Team Member’s ongoing personal development and life processes that are linked with his or her work. We are talking about a ‘shared journey’ of understanding and personal growth. Resident empowerment often means the Team Member consciously avoids the temptation to wear the ‘expert's’ hat, instead encourages clients to discover their own solutions, listen to, learn from and value each other, and ultimately determine their own destinies.

A good Support Team Member will be aware of these processes and will constantly be reflecting upon their own experiences, in ways that highlight clients' experiences as being essentially about common, normal and difficult passages in life, which may have temporarily swamped the person beyond their immediate capacity to cope. Problems can escalate further over time if there isn't appropriate personal support and therapeutic work on the issues. Being aware of these processes goes a long way towards developing true empathy for clients and a ‘levelling’ between staff and resident, so necessary for beneficial work.

It is important for a Support Team Member to be a good listener with the ability to reflect back key emerging themes to the resident, provide space for a resident to discover solutions and to exercise restraint when tempted to jump in too quickly with possible solutions, without enough attention to detail or process. It is remarkable just how often clients, when encouraged, can generate their own unique and creative responses or solutions to problems. This says a lot about the nature of people and also a lot about the nature of problems.

The presuppositions we work to at Trinity are:

Each person is unique
The meaning of the communication is the effect
There is no failure only feedback
We respect each person's perception is true for them.
The person with the most flexibility is the person with potentially the most influence
Behind every behaviour is a positive intention
We have all the resources we will ever need
There is a solution to every problem
Mind and body are one system
Everyone makes the best choice available to them at the time

The role of a Support Team Member requires relevant training and qualification in the areas of housing, welfare advice, social work, mental health, health care, substance or alcohol dependency and due to the variety of sites to be visited daily it is essential that Support Team Member are owner drivers. Finally, on a very idealistic but also attainable note, Team Members who possess, develop and creatively employ the qualities outlined above can effectively and enduringly assist clients to find many ways of creating pathways within themselves, illuminated by a growing awareness and self-knowledge and helping clients discover their own, bountiful, inner resources.

Salary
£20,561 to £24,909 per annum.We pay people on the last day of each month. Pay may be reviewed each year in April.

Hours
37.5 hours per week, flexi time, Monday to Sunday, with a daily half an hour unpaid lunch break.

Leave
Annual leave is 25 days with pay, rising to 30 days. An additional days leave to celebrate your birthday.

Pension
We offer a Group Stakeholder Pension Scheme with Aviva to everyone who works for us. We make a percentage contribution that is 4% of salary.

Performance
We monitor how people perform through job coaching every month and through annual appraisals every June.We work to agreed objectives and assess achievement against these objectives and the competencies for the role.

If your application is successful interviews will take place on 11th April 2012.

Probation
There is a six month probation period for new starters.

References
We only appoint someone if we are happy with their references, covering things such as character,
employment, health and eligibility to work in the UK.

Smoking policy
People are not allowed to smoke in any of our properties and whilst engaged in work. Smoking breaks
can only be taken in someone’s own time.

Location
All our contracts state that employees may be asked to work in a different location from the one where
they first started.

You can find more information and an application form and personal checklist at: http://www.trinityhomelessprojects.org.uk/careers.htm

Your application letter and a copy of your personal checklist needs to be submitted April 6th 2012. This can be emailed to sue.serret@trinityhp.org.uk or posted to Trinity Homeless Projects, Redford House, Redford Way, Uxbridge, Middlesex UB8 1SZ