Consultant Clinical Psychologist

Job responsibilities

At MPFT, we are keen to encourage and facilitate the development of all staff members. There will be opportunities for you to identify and discuss with your service and professional leads relevant professional, clinical or leadership development such as NHS Leadership Academy programmes, in house courses and/or relevant clinical courses. There will also be opportunity to consider where in our services you should deliver your own specialist clinical role.

For further information on the Job Description, main responsibilities and person specification to ensure you have the relevant skills for the post, please see the attached documents below.

Qualifications

Essential

• Post-graduate doctoral level training in clinical / counselling psychology (or its equivalent prior to 1996) as accredited by the BPS, including models of psychopathology, clinical psychometrics and neuropsychology, two or more distinct psychological therapies and lifespan developmental psychology.
• Eligible for BPS Chartered Status. Eligible for full membership of the Division of Clinical Psychology (DCP).
• Post registration training in one or more additional specialised areas of psychological practice (e.g., neuropsychology, psychotherapy, trauma, attachment) as required for specific clinical post.
• Trained in clinical supervision and the supervision of psychological professionals in training including doctorate level trainee psychologists.
• Trained in care co-ordination.
• Evidence of continuing relevant professional development and growth, relevant to the clinical area, sufficient to ensure continued professional registration.

Desirable

• Registration with other professional bodies as relevant e.g., registration with BPS as a chartered psychologist, membership of ACP-UK
• Leadership development or management qualification / training.
• Additional post-graduate qualification in accredited therapeutic intervention relating to the client group

Experience

Essential

• Working as a registered Clinical Psychologist, with significant assessed experience, to include a significant period of working/clinically specialising at a senior level in a relevant clinical field for the post
• Professional leadership/management of registered and pre-registered clinical psychologists and able to demonstrate examples of positive impact/change within service delivery/practice at an advanced/expert level
• Working as a registered Clinical Psychologist both within the designated service and also with a wide variety of client groups, across the whole life course and with a full range of clinical severity across the full range of care settings (in-patient and outpatient settings, community, primary care inpatient and residential settings).
• Working in specialist Perinatal mental health provision which includes multi-disciplinary working.
• Exercising full clinical responsibility for clients' psychological care as a care co-ordinator
• Assessing and working therapeutically within perinatal mental health services
• Working collaboratively with parents and their families/carers and professional network
• Experience of providing clinical consultation services to other professional staff.
• Liaison and joint working with statutory, voluntary and private sector agencies
• Teaching, training, and clinical supervision of both trainee and qualified psychologists and other professionally qualified staff, including field supervision of research projects.
• Research and development
• Project management of quality and service improvement initiatives.
• Providing clinical and professional leadership to other registered and non-registered members of the psychological professions
• Managing multi-agency service delivery models.
• Working at a strategic level.
• Quality and Assurance Governance issues.

Desirable

• Substantial experience of working in AMH settings
• Experience of working in the NHS and/or publicly funded health or care settings
• Experience of clinical leadership in a multi-disciplinary team.
• Demonstrable experience of developing others through education, mentorship, coaching, teaching, assessing, presentations, publishing
• Experience of representing the profession in local, regional or national forums
• Experience of staff recruitment, line management and performance management
• Experience of working at a senior level, leading and developing effective and responsive clinical services

Skills

Essential

• Doctoral, or equivalent, level knowledge of: Evidence-based practice relevant to the role
• Knowledge and skills in the assessment and treatment of the client group and the usual range of co-presenting problems.
• Risk assessment and risk management
• Clinical governance
• Knowledge of legislation in relation to the client group and mental health and its implications for clinical practice.
• Audit and research methodology
• Social Inclusion agenda
• Application of psychological understanding, formulation and intervention across therapeutic modalities and within clinical, multi-disciplinary and service level working.
• Highly developed knowledge of: The care of difficult to treat groups e.g. dual diagnoses, additional disabilities or severely challenging behaviour.
• Maternal mental health, infant mental health and parent-infant relationships,
• The theory and practice of specialised psychological therapies in the perinatal period addressing both perinatal, maternal and infant mental health difficulties.
• The assessment and management of risk to both the mother and baby.
• Must be able to: Demonstrate skills in the use of complex methods of psychological assessment, intervention and management and their application in a perinatal and maternal mental health setting.
• Provide effective clinical leadership.
• Communicate highly complex, highly sensitive and highly contentious information effectively, to a wide range of people.
• Ability to exercise highly advanced and complex negotiating skills in planning, developing and establishing services, in particular where services interface with different areas within and outside of the organisation.
• Ability to identify, provide and promote appropriate means of support to carers and staff exposed to highly distressing situations and severely challenging behaviours.
• Ability to identify, and employ, as appropriate, clinical governance mechanisms for the support and maintenance of clinical practice in the face of regular exposure to highly emotive material and challenging behaviour.
• Adapt evidence- based interventions creatively for clients with communication difficulties / learning disabilities and have the ability to tailor interventions where service users have not responded to normally recommended interventions
• Demonstrate skills in providing liaison, consultation and clinical supervision to other professionals and non-professional groups in health and non-health settings.
• Articulate sensitively and collaboratively the value added by the range of psychological services within the context of multidisciplinary mental health and learning disability healthcare provision, whilst also valuing the range of roles and skills represented in the MDT.
• Undertake complex multiagency working and liaise with multiple systems.
• Utilise psychometric tests competently.
• Provide effective teaching, training and clinical supervision for the multidisciplinary team.
• Identify, provide and promote appropriate interventions / means of support for carers and staff exposed to highly distressing situations and challenging behaviours.
• Utilise appropriate clinical governance mechanisms within own work.
• Project management.
• Use approved breakaway techniques following approved training.
• Demonstrate proficiency in the use of Microsoft Word, Excel, Powerpoint, Outlook and similar applications. as well as Clinical Consulting platforms.
• Use multimedia materials for presentations in professional, academic and public settings.

Desirable

• Skills and experience of working therapeutically with attachment and trauma is highly desirable such as: oEMDR oTrauma Focussed CBT oCFT oVideo Interaction Guidance oCircle of Security oDDP
• Supervision skills in the above therapeutic modalities.
• Delivery of reflective practice groups.
• Demonstrate knowledge and experience of Quality Improvement methodologies. resulting in measurable improvement to patient care

Personal Attributes

Essential

• A passion and enthusiasm for developing psychologically informed services in perinatal, maternal and infant mental health services.
• Ability to demonstrate leadership and management skills with the ability to create a culture where staff are valued and supported.
• Ability to develop productive therapeutic relationships with a range of clients.
• Able to work in accordance with the Trust Values and Behaviours.
• Able to engage with vulnerable service users and partners/carers and work effectively in highly distressing and challenging circumstances.
• Able to maintain a high degree of professionalism within highly emotive and distressing problems, verbal abuse and the threat of physical assault.
• Able to provide containment, insight and direct input to complex and challenging cases where there is a high degree of carer distress and/or hostility in addition to the difficulties presented by the service user.
• Able to work flexibly and co-operatively as part of a team.
• Ability to contain and work with organisational stress and hold the stress of others.
• Able to use own initiative and make decisions independently.
• Committed to continual quality and service improvement.
• Self aware and committed to professional and personal development. Able to accept and respond positively to feedback from supervision.
• Willingness to undertake further clinical and leadership development both formal and informal.
• Enthusiasm for a broad range of psychological phenomena, theories and application.

Desirable

• Personal lived experience of mental health issues and use of mental health services.
• Ability to demonstrate leadership and management skills.

Disclosure and Barring Service Check

This post is subject to the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act (Exceptions Order) 1975 and as such it will be necessary for a submission for Disclosure to be made to the Disclosure and Barring Service (formerly known as CRB) to check for any previous criminal convictions.

Certificate of Sponsorship

Applications from job seekers who require current Skilled worker sponsorship to work in the UK are welcome and will be considered alongside all other applications. For further information visit the UK Visas and Immigration website (Opens in a new tab).

From 6 April 2017, skilled worker applicants, applying for entry clearance into the UK, have had to present a criminal record certificate from each country they have resided continuously or cumulatively for 12 months or more in the past 10 years. Adult dependants (over 18 years old) are also subject to this requirement. Guidance can be found here Criminal records checks for overseas applicants (Opens in a new tab).

UK Registration

Applicants must have current UK professional registration. For further information please see NHS Careers website (opens in a new window).