Practitioner Psychologist (clinical or counselling)

at  Cardiff and Vale University Health Board

We are looking for energetic and enthusiastic Practitioner Psychologists (band 7/8a or 8a) to complete our team of psychologists working in adult Community Mental Health Teams. Working in CMHTs offers a rich diversity of experiences and opportunities: you will provide a range of psychological services to persons with a wide range of complex or enduring psychological distress (therapy; assessment, including cognitive and other specialist assessments; care planning etc). You will also work with your CMHT colleagues to offer psychological advice, formulation, consultation, supervision and training. There are opportunities for individual & group therapy, service development and research, as well as joint working with our friendly and hard-working team of psychologists.
We have 1.7wte posts available in total. The substantive post (full time preferred) would be based in the South Locality with a primary responsibility for the Links CMHT alongside the locality 8b psychologist, with a chance to work alongside band 7 and 8a colleagues at the neighbouring Hamadryad CMHT. There is some flexibility with the other (0.7wte) post depending on skill mix and experience: but it is likely that this post-holder would be joining one of our colleagues in a North CMHT. We are developing our provision of therapy groups so we are especially interested to hear from applicant with experience of or interest in developing and running groups.
We can offer 7/8a developmental posts, or 8a posts. The 8a is an excellent opportunity for those looking to progress their career, and we can support you with making the move from band 7. It is also a great opportunity for established 8as who want to be part of our developing service, offering a chance to pursue special interests and actively contribute to service development. We are also keen to hear from applicants who are completing training this year: we have a well-established pathway for our 7/8a developmental posts. We offer a professional development programme giving you the opportunity to consolidate your training, and to further develop skills and competencies to transition to 8a through successful completion of the programme. We can arrange for you to chat to people who are on a developmental pathway to hear about their experience. Working in CMHTs offers a rich diversity of experiences and opportunities. You will provide a range of psychological services to persons with a wide range of complex or enduring psychological distress (individual and group therapy; assessment, including cognitive and other specialist assessments; care planning etc). You will also work with your CMHT colleagues to offer psychological advice, formulation, consultation, supervision and training.
Cardiff and Vale University Health Board is one of the largest Integrated Health Boards in the UK, employing over 17,000 staff, providing over 100 specialist services. Working across 6 hospital sites, we have a diverse range of career opportunities to offer. Serving over 500,000 people living in Cardiff and the Vale, we are focussed on the health and care needs of our local population whilst working with our partners to develop regional services. Together we are committed to improving health outcomes for everyone, delivering excellent care and support.
Our mission is “Living Well, Caring Well, Working Together”, and our vision is that every person’s chance of leading a healthy life should be equal. Our 10-year transformation and improvement strategy, Shaping Our Future Wellbeing, is our chance to work collaboratively with the public and our workforce to make our health board more sustainable for the future.
have remodelled the structure of psychology services in CMHTs giving us a cohesive structure with increased staffing. Every team has an in-team psychologist and these posts will add to that provision - we have also recently appointed a high intensity psychological therapist to further increase therapy resource: this is a rare chance to work alongside professional peers in truly multi-disciplinary teams.
The roles are well supported - we have three locality leads (8b) working with the psychologists in each locality cluster of CMHTs, as well as an 8c service lead. These posts are managed by the service lead for CMHT Psychology, and report to a Locality Lead Psychologist. We have a well-established framework for reflective, caseload and peer supervision, as well as access to model-specific supervision for people using EMDR, IPT or facilitating our DBT groups. We have accredited BABCP practitioners who can supervise and support people who are themselves looking for full CBT accreditation. There are good in-house opportunities for CPD, including substantive training in Interpersonal Therapy and Open Dialogue Approach. C&V UHB is fortunate to have a number of services focussed on specific issues (for example, Eating Disorders service) and, for people in full-time posts, there may be opportunities to pursue CPD time in these services. We also have excellent links with our local doctoral training courses (clinical & counselling). It is an exciting time to be part of psychology provision in the Community Mental Health Teams for Cardiff & Vale UHB.
Please contact Dr Tansy Mayfield, Lead Consultant - tansy.mayfield@wales.nhs.uk – to arrange a time for an informal discussion.
The ability to speak Welsh is desirable for this post; Welsh and/or English speakers are equally welcome to apply

Please refer the Job description for details