Location: Local Authority

Contract: 3-month rolling contract

Hours: Full-time, 37 hours per week

Office Requirement: Minimum 3 days per week onsite

Level: Must currently be working at Director level, or have previously worked at Director level — this is not a step-up role

Aatom Recruitment is currently supporting a local authority in the appointment of an interim Director of Safeguarding and Support. This is a senior leadership role responsible for providing strategic direction, operational excellence, and high-quality safeguarding services for vulnerable children and families across Swindon.

The successful candidate will ensure the effective delivery of Children’s Services, driving continuous improvement, workforce development, and cross-agency collaboration to deliver positive outcomes for children and young people.

• Provide professional leadership, strategic direction, and performance oversight for Children’s Services.
• Ensure the delivery of high-quality family support, safeguarding, and protection services for vulnerable children, including those on child protection plans or identified as children in need.
• Lead, motivate, and support senior managers, ensuring strong accountability, effective supervision, and robust performance management.

• Ensure effective operational execution through partnership working with internal departments and external partners, including Education, Health, Schools, Police, and other statutory agencies.
• Promote excellence in workforce planning, staff development, and quality assurance.

• Attend and report to Council, Scrutiny Committee, Cabinet Meetings, Joint Commissioning Groups, and the Health & Wellbeing Board as required.
• Manage service budgets, ensuring financial governance and identifying efficiencies without compromising service quality.
• Work closely with the Lead Member for Children’s Services, providing professional advice on relevant issues.

• Lead the next stage of service development within Swindon Children’s Services, ensuring continuous improvement and high-performance culture.
• Foster a culture of transparency, equality, and positive trade union engagement.
• Develop effective working relationships across central and local government, Ofsted, schools, health services, criminal justice, third sector partners, and private providers.

• Ensure the service maintains effective systems for recording and sharing performance data.
• Use intelligence-led insights to drive improvement and deliver high-quality outcomes for children and families.
• Lead multi-agency collaboration to ensure coherent and effective service delivery across the Borough.

• Accountable to the Director of Children’s Services (DCS) for statutory safeguarding and child protection functions.
• Advise the DCS on service quality, performance, and improvement needs.
• Deputise for the DCS or Director of Corporate Parenting as required.

• Social Work qualification with current Social Work England registration.
• Degree-level management qualification, or equivalent significant senior management experience.

• Comprehensive understanding of legislation, regulations, and statutory guidance relating to Children’s Social Care and Early Help.
• Significant experience operating at a senior level within a political or local authority environment.
• Proven success in leading and improving statutory children’s services, quality assurance frameworks, and operational delivery.
• Experience designing and implementing service transformation and improvement programmes within financial constraints.
• Strong background in managing large, complex budgets.
• Proven ability to work across multi-agency partnerships and establish strong networks.
• Experience leading performance management, quality assurance, and data-driven service improvement.
• Excellent interpersonal, negotiation, and influencing skills.
• This role is classified as regulated activity and is subject to full vetting and barring checks.

Please contact Anisha Patel to apply!