Senior Manager, Strategic Commissioning and Contract Management

Job description

Job responsibilities

Please apply via Suffolk Jobs Direct.

The Senior Manager contributes to the effective leadership of Adult Social Care (ASC) and will lead commissioning and contract management activity across the county to support delivery of our ASC People at the Heart of Care Strategy.

In this role you will ensure that the directorates strategic and statutory responsibilities are met whilst driving innovations to deliver the best possible outcomes for our residents and best value for money. You will lead on the development and implementation of strategies that foster partnership working, enable an integrated and outcome focused approach to commissioning for health and social care and, be passionate about delivering excellent outcomes.

This role will ensure the delivery of high quality, sustainable care and support services that are essential to achieving good outcomes for people by being assured that there are effective and robust contract management processes in place that are risk based, proportionate and appropriate for the services that people use.

This is a dynamic role which will require you to shape the provision of care and support through a combination of effective marking engagement, shaping, commissioning, contract management, relationship management, service development and service decommissioning activity.

Typical responsibilities of a role at this level

In this role you will be responsible with full accountability for commissioning and contract management across the county. You will hold responsibility for service redesign and market development functions within the commissioning cycle by supporting the Heads of Strategic Commissioning and Contract Management, (SCCM) who will be leading on several defined areas within their portfolio of services.

You will provide leadership to all the teams within the SCCM function to deliver the highest standards and carry responsibility, under the Care Act 2014, for commissioning activity including, shaping the supply of care and support, robust contract management and ensuring market sustainability within the resources available.

Providing system leadership on behalf of ASC for the care market and the quality-of-care services is an essential part of the job. You will deliver integrated, personalised solutions to care and support needs, in line with Care Act principles of prevention, partnership and promoting independence. This requires building and maintaining effective relationships with ASC operational teams; commissioners in the NHS, local government and other public sector bodies; with NHS, voluntary sector and commercial suppliers and with representatives of people who require care and family carers.

You will report to a member of the ASC Directorate Management Team (DMT) and line manage Heads of Strategic Commissioning and Contract Management.

About the team

Commissioning and contracts teams operate in a dynamic and pressured environment.

The teams need to be agile, balancing workload between commissioning activity and risk based, proportionate management of contracts, whilst being sufficiently flexible to respond rapidly to opportunities and challenges presented by the care market in Suffolk.

Commissioning and contracts teams support both place based and strategic commissioning activity. As the Senior Manager for Strategic Commissioning and Contract Management, you

will oversee all commissioning and contract activity across the county either through direct line management or by matrix management of Heads that are based in the locality teams.

You will make informed decisions on future commissioning and contracting priorities and opportunities for cross directorate working and integration. You will lead the entire service area to support delivering the best possible outcomes for residents and the council.

What you will be expected to deliver in the role

This section gives examples of the types of activities that are carried out at this level. This list is not exhaustive.

Commissioning and Contract Management

• Leading on commissioning and contract management of high-quality social care and health and/or housing related services.
• Developing and maintaining strong and collaborative relationships with key stakeholders; ICBs in Suffolk, District and Borough councils and with independent and voluntary organisations.
• Ensuring people with lived experience and their carers are consulted, engaged and have opportunities to co-produce as appropriate on commissioning activity and in the delivery of services to them through the contract management process.
• Developing and implementing strategies that lead to the continued development of partnership working and a clear approach to commissioning activity for adult social care
• Leading change in a complex organisational environment and development of teams ensuring succession planning.
• Effective communication strategies for sharing the vision and plans with staff, partners and the public to ensure there is clear understanding.
• Developing and implementing planning, commissioning and performance frameworks in a multi-disciplinary and partnership environment.
• Effective contract management of all ASC contracts, ensuring contract compliance in terms of supplier performance in accordance with Suffolk County Council contract management guidelines
• A continuous drive to improve the quality-of-service provision through effective supplier relationship management holding them to account to ensure the delivery of services of the highest standards of care and services for all customers.

Service Development

• Providing expert advice and timely reports to senior managers, elected members and stakeholders as appropriate.
• Leading on transformation plans to ensure these are delivered within set resourcing and timescales
• To ensure the development of relevant strategic commissioning plans to support the delivery of the Care Market Strategy.
• Ensure plans are in place that support effective market development and sustainability
• Ensuring that effective co-production of services and care pathways through engagement with ASC operational teams, suppliers and representatives of people needing care underpins activity.
• Delivering innovative and more cost-effective solutions, making use of research and national/ international best practice. This includes both use of technology, new ways of working and personalised solutions to care and support.
• Implementation of service plans through a combination of service development, procurement, locality engagement and service decommissioning.

Management Responsibilities

• Joint management and leadership of required savings plan/ transformation programmes ensuring that lead accountable budget owners are established, and appropriate governance is in place to track financial performance, delivering agreed out-turn targets.
• Ensuring staff have PDRs, regular supervisions and team meetings to effectively manage performance, drive change and deliver outcomes, contributing to both local system and Suffolk wide priorities.
• Providing leadership of multi-agency programme teams that are involved in the redesign of services and care pathways.
• Ensuring awareness of broader political and service delivery issues within Strategic Commissioning and Contract Management, providing briefings where necessary.
• Lead on Business Continuity issues that could adversely impact on continuity of service both within the team and on behalf of ASC.
• Cover for the relevant AD in ASC with full accountability.

Person Specification

Experience

Essential

• Demonstrates a passion for making a positive difference for Suffolk.
• Shares our WE ASPIRE Values and strives to lead by example in relation to these.
• A strong commitment to fairness and Equality, Diversity and Inclusion (EDI).
• Strives to continuously improve in everything they do, taking the initiative to learn and develop.
• Brings creativity into their work through innovation and openness to change.
• Collaborates well with others and offers assistance and support to colleagues.
• Ability to remain calm in stressful situations
• Ability to create a vision for the wider team and to engage people in working together to deliver against the vision
• Demonstrable evidence of high performance and achievement at a senior level within a local authority or other, multifunctional organisation with comparable scope, size and complexity.
• Good knowledge and understanding of the major issues facing local government and the specific challenges facing Adult Social Care.
• Detailed expertise of commissioning and contract management practice in Local Government and/or NHS
• Financially and commercially astute
• Proven experience of managing a range of successful commissioning projects and delivery of high performing contracts
• Knowledge of adult social care legislative requirements and policy in the areas of responsibility and in relation to the ASC market
• Significant experience of social care or related services (including health)
• A high level of skill in negotiation and influencing, in order to manage stakeholder and supplier relationships
• Evidence of having the self-confidence and perspective to facilitate open and honest conversations about contract performance
• High level of presentation skills to effectively communicate simple or complex information to a broad or diverse audience base
• Proven expertise in establishing new service provisions and management of the transition to business as usual service delivery
• Evidence of harnessing the strengths and talents of team members in order to support them to realise their full potential and achieve area goals
• The ability to manage the financial health of the supplier to ensure contractual viability
• Experience leading operational contract and commissioning teams
• Knowledge and experience of commissioning practice in local authorities.
• Knowledge and experience of public sector financial management.
• Ability to analyse complex/ ambiguous information and make sound judgements based on quantitate and soft intelligence and political skills
• Evidence of having the self-confidence and perspective to facilitate open and honest relationships with the leadership team, staff and the wider community to discuss and remove barriers to the effective delivery of services.
• Demonstrable experience in being an effective team member and contributing to corporate priorities
• To manage delegated budgets within the strategic financial allocation efficiently
• Strong understanding of CQC regulatory Frameworks

Desirable

• Experience of working with Councillors

Qualifications

Essential

• Masters degree in health, social care, contracting or business management or be able to demonstrate equivalent level of functioning through experience or knowledge.

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.

Employer details

Employer name

Suffolk County Council

Address

8 Russell Road

Ipswich

Suffolk

IP1 2BX

Employer's website

https://careers.suffolk.gov.uk/ (Opens in a new tab)