Jon's story
Role of a director
Jon is the director of adult social services for Leicestershire County Council. Local authority's are required by law to have a director who is responsible for ensuring that the social care and wellbeing needs of residents in their area are met.
The director role is an extremely diverse role. Jon has oversight of approximately 1800 staff across the adult social care department and has direct line management responsibility for 5 senior members of staff.
Some of the key responsibilities within the role of director include;
- Making decisions on how resources are used
- Risk management
- Presenting reports to councilors
- Developing partnerships with key governmental and voluntary organisations
These are the things that we can clearly show we are improving people's life experiences and opening opportunities up for people whether that be service users or staff, it also shows that we are valuing people.
Day in the life of a director
A week in Jon's role can be extremely diverse. During a typical week, Jon will attend a range of meetings with different colleagues from inside and outside the local authority. Examples of Jon's roles in these meetings include presenting reports to councillors, chairing departmental meetings with the management team and attending engagement events such as the Inspired to Care Ambassador Forum (Jon is an I Care Ambassador).
To meet the demands of his role, Jon is required to have a strategic oversight of a broad range of work areas. With the support of personal assistants, Jon manages his time, prioritises workloads and, where appropriate, delegate tasks to staff within the department.
It is essential to Jon's role that he is an excellent networker because Jon works in partnership with professionals across health and other governmental organisations. As the director of adult social care in Leicestershire, Jon is also the subject of public and media attention. This means that it is important that Jon is able to develop and maintain positive relationships with people across our region.
Some of Jon's proudest achievements in his time as director include;
- Increasing the number of people are living independently in the community
- Increasing the number of disabled people who are in employment.
- The work undertaken around in-house learning disability services
Jon's journey into a career in social care
Throughout the course of his career, Jon's passion has been improving the quality of life of people who need extra support in their lives.
Jon didn't always think he would work in social care and had previously started an urban land economics degree which he decided wasn't for him. It was the people he worked with as a support worker early on in his working life that made Jon passionate about developing his career in the social care sector.
My career is an example of an ability to progress in social care, that with opportunities that are open to anybody working in social care. You don't need to be a qualified social worker, have qualifications or an extensive qualification list, what you do need is a sense of purpose and a sense of wanting to provide people with the best quality of support and assistance that you can and it is a career path that is open to everybody.
2015- present |
Director of Adult social services – local authority |
2013-2015 |
Deputy Corporate director – Adult social care – Local authority |
2006- 2013 |
Service Director – Personal Care & Support younger adults – Local authority |
2006 |
Completed MSc Partnership working in Adult social care – Birmingham University |
1996- 2006 |
Head of Mental Health services – Local authority / NHS Trust |
1991-1996 |
Programme Officer / Team Manager / Service Manager – Mental Health – Local authority |
1989-1991 |
Support Worker, mental health Independent Living unit - private care provider |
1987- 1989 |
Senior Support Worker, Residential Alcohol Service, Private Sector provider |
1985- 1987 |
Support worker, residential mental health service - private care provider |
1984- 1985 |
Domestic assistant, Learning Disability residential care - private care provider |
My progression was about seizing opportunities and an element of luck in being in the right place at the right time, taking the opportunities that come your way and having the people surrounding you who want to help with that journey.
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