Senior Tenancy Sustainment Officer

Job Introduction

We are seeking an enthusiastic, effective and committed Senior Tenancy Sustainment Officer who is passionate about the delivery of excellent public sector housing services, to join our dedicated professional team, helping to deliver a first-class service to our residents in tenancy sustainment and preventing eviction, developing strong communities and encouraging independent residents.  Leading the delivery of effective tenancy sustainment services that adhere to national best practice and regulation.

Role Purpose

• To lead an effective Tenancy Sustainment team across BCP Homes delivering tailored support to the residents, to ensure the sustainment of tenancies and prevent eviction. 
• To be responsible for producing and implementing the Safeguarding procedure for BCP Homes residents and staff including effective risk management procedures. 
• To identify and develop innovative solutions and working practices to the challenges of hard to engage residents to improve the levels of tenancy sustainment.

Main Responsibilities

1.  Ensure the delivery of Tenancy Sustainment services are provided by a well-motivated high performing team, which focuses on customer satisfaction and complies fully with service specifications and budgets. 

2. Identify areas of weakness and gaps in service to continually improve services and to ensure horizontal working across other departments and external services. 

3. Deliver a high level of performance from the Transfer Enabling service that supports residents across the social housing sector in the  BCP council area to downsize properties or move from general needs to sheltered housing and ensure that it targets the priorities of BCP Council. 

 4. Manage the Tenancy Sustainment Team members, including recruitment, training and development, performance management, one-to-one meetings, and annual reviews. 

 5.Work horizontally and effectively across BCP Council, including adult social care, Strategic Housing and Partnerships, Public Protection, to contribute towards the prevention of homelessness, safeguarding and to ensure identification of vulnerable residents with support needs and clear referral pathways.  

 6.Support the tenancy sustainment approach across the organisation, collate data for the early prevention panel and tenancy sustainment board and represent the Tenancy Sustainment team at the board.  

 7.Implement clear procedures in line with the vulnerable resident’s policy, which support BCP Homes in dealing with the effects of welfare reform and vulnerable residents.  

 8.Contribute to the IT procurement and solution within the housing management database to record and report the support service performance information and outcomes.   

 9.Lead BCP Homes in relation to adult and child safeguarding, to keep up to date with any changes to legislation or guidelines to the Pan Dorset adult protection policy, ensure internal procedures result in appropriate safeguarding alerts. 

 10.Represent BCP Homes in issues related to domestic abuse (DA), being a DA champion to ensure up to date knowledge, to promote awareness to identify victims and ensure the fluency of information and actions with regards to the Multi Agency Risk Assessment Conference (MARAC). 

 11.Ensure that risk assessments and risk management plans are completed    where necessary and that staff are aware of risk management.  

 12.Forge close links to work in partnership with key stakeholders including drug and alcohol and mental health services, health and social care in delivering Tenancy Sustainment services to vulnerable tenants and leaseholders. 

13. Provide training, advice and guidance in line with best practice. 

 4.Develop strategically appropriate support services in relation to government strategies, including mental health, homelessness, health and older people, preventative measures regarding anti-social behaviour. 

 15.Promotion of tenant sustainment services within BCP Council and with key partners and organisations including voluntary organisations and charities. 

 16.Keep abreast of national developments and best practice to ensure the Tenancy Sustainment Team is at the forefront of excellent service delivery. 

 17.Promote and develop social enterprises which support residents, such as the Furniture Recycle Scheme, working with partner agencies to gain funding. 

 18.Cover in the absence of the other Senior Officers addressing any staff issues or concerns. 

 19.Continual improvement of services to ensure effective and efficient working practices. 

 20.Monitor and support outputs and outcomes, ensuring timely completion of information for KPIs and the commentary of explanation for governance. 

 21.Prepare and monitor budgets, ensuring maximising its effective use and keeping within allocation.

The Ideal Candidate

• Risk and need assessments and health and safety assessments 
• Supervising and leading a team  
• Working to Support Service contracts 
• Partnership working and developing new protocols or services
• A relevant professional qualification (e.g. Chartered Institute of Housing or National Sheltered Housing Certificate or other relevant qualification)   
• Excellent communication and networking skills  
• Strong managerial skills 
• Highly motivated and able to work creatively on own initiative 
• Able to encourage service users to shape services  
• Strong time management skills 
• Able to work under pressure to tight deadlines
• Good knowledge of housing law 
• Good knowledge of community-based support services 
• Good knowledge of safeguarding and domestic abuse 
• Good knowledge of housing management and specifically interventions to support victims and tackle perpetrators of Anti-Social behaviour 
• Knowledge of budget monitoring 
• Understanding of financial exclusion
• Enthusiastic and committed to customer service excellence 
• Flexible and co-operative working style 
• Strong commitment to equality & diversity and working with older and other vulnerable people

About BCP Council

BCP Council provides services to a diverse community of 400,000 residents and employs more than 5,000 people.  Our area includes over 15 miles of beautiful world-renowned coastline.  We can offer career defining roles to transform and improve services.  By working with us, you can help deliver a vision of a thriving, word-class, prosperous and inclusive place for generations to come.

Our Benefits

We offer an excellent benefits package for further details see our website

As a result of the creation of BCP Council in 2019, we are working on simplifying our terms and conditions of service and will be creating a single pay structure which is to be applicable for all employees. It is important to us that we offer benefits that our colleagues value as part of their total employment package and we are reviewing these to make sure we have it right. We are in the process of establishing a timescale for implementation and colleagues joining us will be included in these changes. Expected to be in place in 2025.

DBS

BCP Council is committed to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of the community and expects all staff and volunteers to share the same commitment.  Applicants to this post will be required to complete the appropriate level of Disclosure & Barring Service Check. Please refer to the Job Description or Role Profile for more details.