Advanced Health Protection Practitioner

Job responsibilities

COMMUNICATION AND KEY WORKING RELATIONSHIPS

The postholder will develop working relationships and communicate regularly with a wide range of individuals, clinical and non-clinical, internal and external to PHE.

This will include:

Internal

• PHE regional teams
• Other PHE divisions/directorates

External

• Local Authorities
• Healthcare Professionals
• Care Homes
• Community & Voluntary Sector
• Local Prisons
• Other Government Agencies
• Local NHS, including commissioners and providers
• Local Resilience Fora and Local Health Resilience Partnerships

Summary

The Advanced Health Protection Practitioner (AHPP) is a key member of a multi-disciplinary team providing the day to day acute service response. They will share responsibility with other senior members of the health protection team to provide oversight and management of incidents and outbreaks of infectious and non-infectious environmental hazards.

The post holder will have extensive experience at a senior level in health protection as well as having excellent generic public health skills. They will be able to lead on specific lead areas of work involving partnership working with external organisations. They will actively assist in the development of joint plans and system wide priorities for public health action or improvement.

The post holder will contribute to the strategic work of the health protection team deputising if appropriate and will lead and coordinate defined complex areas of work including regional and national work streams.

Location

This role will be based in Nottingham.

The UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) operates a hybrid working model where business needs allow. This provides us with greater flexibility about how and where we work, to get the best from our workforce.As a hybrid worker, you will be expected to spend a minimum of 60% of your contractual working hours (approximately 3 days a week pro rata, (averaged over a month) working at Nottingham office, For certain roles, some additional flexibility may be possible, which will be agreed upon with the hiring manager based onindividual requirements and business needs.

*Please be aware that this role can only be worked from within the UK and not overseas. Relocation expenses are not available.*

Selection process details

STAGE 1 - APPLICATION & SIFT:

You will be required to complete an application form and a statement of suitability. Your Statement of Suitability should outline your skills, experience, and achievements, providing evidence of your suitability for the role, against the essential criteria (outlined in the person specification section). Your Statement of Suitability must not exceed 1,250 words.

You will also be asked to provide information within the Employer/ Activity history section of the application form. This is equivalent to the information you would provide on a CV, setting out your career history. The sift selection panel will only consider relevant career history information from the last 5 years.

If you are successful at this stage, you will progress to an interview.

STAGE 2 INTERVIEW:

This competition will involve an interview via Teams

As part of the process, candidates will be invited to interview which will involve an in-depth discussion of your previous experience and professional competence in relation to the criteria set out in the Person Specification.

Candidates might also be required to prepare and deliver a presentation to the panel. This will be followed by a question-and-answer segment. The presentation will be designed to assess each candidates experience in line with the requirements of the role. Full details will be provided prior to the interview.

Expected Timeline:

Advert close: 23:55hrs 19/02/2024 unfortunately, late applications will not be considered. Once this job has closed, the job advert will no longer be available. You may want to save a copy for your records.

Interviews: w/c

Please note these dates could be subject to change.

Eligibility Criteria

Open to all external applicants (anyone) from outside the Civil Service (including by definition internal applicants)

Nationality requirements

Appointments to roles within UKHSA will be made in accordance with the Civil Service nationality rules. These can be found athttps://www.gov.uk/government/publications/nationality-rulesThis job is broadly open to the following groups:

• UK nationals
• Nationals of Commonwealth countries who have the right to work in the UK
• Nationals of the Republic of Ireland
• Nationals from the EU, EEA or Switzerland with settled or pre-settled status or who apply for either status by the deadline of theEuropean Union Settlement Scheme (EUSS)
• Relevant EU, EEA, Swiss or Turkish nationals working in the Civil Service
• Relevant EU, EEA, Swiss or Turkish nationals who have built up the right to work in the Civil Service
• Certain family members of the relevant EU, EEA, Swiss or Turkish nationals

We recruit by merit on the basis of fair and open competition, as outlined in the Civil Service Commission's Recruitment Principles.

The Civil Service embraces diversity and promotes equal opportunities. As such, we run a Disability Confident Scheme (DCS) for candidates with disabilities who meet the minimum selection criteria.

The Civil Service welcomes applications from people who have recently left prison or have an unspent conviction. Read more about prison leaver recruitment.

Security clearance level requirement

Successful candidates must pass a disclosure and barring security check. Successful candidates must meet the security requirements before they can be appointed. The level of security needed is Basic Personnel Security Standard. People working with government assets must complete Basic Personnel Security Standard checks.

For posts on UKHSA Civil Service terms and conditions, new entrants to the Civil Service are expected to start on the minimum of the pay band. For existing Civil Servants and roles advertised across government, the rules of transfer apply, i.e., level transfers move on current salary or the pay range minimum, transfers on promotion move to new pay range minimum or receive a 10% increase. Either case is determined by whichever is the highest.

Please Note

This role is to be appointed under Civil Service Terms & Conditions or NHS Terms & Conditions. Full details on the T&Cs are found https://www.ukhsa.reed.com/

Are you already a civil servant, or employed by a Civil Service Commission accredited public body? Please state home department on your application form.

Do you meet the nationality requirements for this post? https://www.ukhsa.reed.com/

The law requires that selection for appointment to the Civil Service is on merit on the basis of fair and open competition as outlined in the Civil Service Commission's Recruitment Principles. If you feel your application has not been treated in accordance with the Recruitment Principles, and you wish to make a complaint, in the first instance, you should contact UKHSA Public Accountability Unit via email:Complaints1@ukhsa.gov.uk. If you are not satisfied with the response you receive from the Department, you can contact the Civil Service Commission: Visit the Civil Service Commission website.

Education and qualifications

Essential

• Registered General Nurse or Allied Health Professional in relevant clinical discipline with current professional registration e.g. NMC or current registration with an appropriate health or science related professional body
• Master's in Public health, or higher degree in a related subject, or evidence of CPD in health protection and documented experience at master's level
• Recognised qualification in Infection Prevention and Control or demonstrable equivalent experience
• Extensive experience in a health protection role at a senior level with specialist knowledge and expertise in Health Protection
• An understanding of and ability to work under the current Health and Social Care Act (e.g. safe guarding vulnerable adults; data protection, information governance)
• Proven experience of managing others in a managerial or supervisory role including performance management and appraisal and development
• Proven experience and ability to prioritise own work effectively and be able to direct activities of/to others including managing and motivating a team and reviewing individual standards
• Ability to identify areas for development and delivery of training programmes ensuring national and strategic objectives
• Experience of leading and maintaining quality and governance frameworks
• Proven experience of leading and developing robust audit and service improvement practices
• Ability to identify areas for policy development and experience of delivering these for service improvement utilising a variety of literature and resources
• Leadership and management of projects (e.g. Quality Improvement and research)
• Involvement and co-ordination of public health initiatives
• Incident and outbreak investigation and management
• Ability to undertake on call responsibility for public health
• Sound knowledge and understanding of the wider public health agenda
• Working knowledge of the principles of epidemiology
• Experience of effectively engaging with the media e.g. reactive press statement
• Experience of developing and delivering training programmes on a wide range of topics including to trainees, pre and post registration
• Experience of professional supervision/mentorship including supporting public health trainees e.g as a project supervisor
• Highly effective verbal, written and presentation communications skills; capable of constructing and delivering clear ideas and concepts concisely and accurately for diverse audiences
• Proven ability to build trusted stakeholder relationships networks in a politically sensitive and/or changing environment
• Ability to interpret, analyse and disseminate complex and/or sensitive information in a concise yet insightful way, pre-empting and evaluating issues and recommending appropriate course of action(s) to large and influential groups
• Proven capability to plan over short, medium and long-term timeframes and adjust plans and resource requirements accordingly
• Evidence of ability to handle challenging issues taking a problem-solving approach to ensure proactive and effective resolution
• Proficient in the use of Microsoft Office including Word, and Excel
• Experience of clinical and/ or professional supervision/mentorship
• Evidence of ongoing CPD and committed to self-development and willing to share experience with others to influence practice
• Ability to prioritise own work effectively and be able to direct activities of others including managing and motivating a team and reviewing individual standards
• Experience of leadership within a changing environment
• An understanding of and commitment to equality of opportunity and good working relationships, both in terms of day-to-day working practices, and in relation to management systems and has the ability to take actions which support and promote this agenda

Desirable

• Recognised teaching qualification or equivalent experience, e.g. ENB 998, PGCE or NVQ Level 4 Certificate in Education
• Professional Public Health qualification and registration e.g. Specialist Community Public Health (SCPHN) part of the NMC Register or UK PH Register for practitioners
• Experience of project principles techniques and tools such as Prince 2 and Managing Successful Projects
• Understanding of public health law
• Experience of budget management and financial processes
• Evidence of understanding of the principles of workforce profiles, strategic workforce planning and workforce deployment issues

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).