Job summary
- Main area
- Nursing
- Grade
- NHS AfC: Band 8b
- Contract
- Secondment: 9 months (Part time 18.75 hours per week, 9 months fixed term)
- Hours
- Part time
- Job share
- Job ref
- 150-MT2999-CC-A
- Employer
- Sussex Community NHS Foundation Trust
- Employer type
- NHS
- Site
- Brighton General Hospital
- Town
- Brighton
- Salary
- £66,582 - £77,368 per annum / pro rata
- Salary period
- Yearly
- Closing
- 25/10/2026 23:59
Employer heading
Nursing Head of Service
NHS AfC: Band 8b
Job overview
We have an exciting new role as Nursing Head of Service in which the postholder will demonstrate strong professional clinical leadership and provide specialist clinical advice across the services within their portfolio. Acting in support of the Divisional and Deputy Divisional Nurse/AHP Directors, the post holder will be a key member of the divisional leadership team and work as a triumvirate with the Medical/Dental Head of Service and Head of Service.
The post holder will support the Divisional and Deputy Divisional Nurse/AHP Directors to continually improve equitable patient care, experience, access and outcomes and assist with the implementation of national and Trust initiatives working closely with the Head of Service and Medical Head of Service.
The postholder will play a key role in developing the service to meet the population's needs at locality and regional level and will have a service development portfolio and clinical leadership role. They will ensure services provide safe, effective, personalised and evidence based clinical interventions and holistic care.
Main duties of the job
Main tasks
a) Work with the divisional management team and Heads of Service to provide professional and clinical leadership to the Division, ensuring that a framework is in place to ensure all clinical staff are appropriately managed and are clinically and professionally developed so that they are, therefore, efficient, effective, engaged and highly motivated.
b) In partnership with the relevant clinical executive director and the clinical divisional leadership team and other clinical Heads of Services, lead and implement the Trust’s clinical priorities and strategies ensuring clinical staff are engaged and connected to the objectives and plans.
c) Maintain a highly visible leadership profile, undertaking quality rounds and being proactive about engaging with service areas where required to ensure that they continuously meet the health needs of patients.
Working for our organisation
We are the main provider of NHS community services across East and West Sussex, with 6,000 staff serving 1.3 million people. We deliver essential care to adults and children, helping them manage their health, avoid hospital admissions, and reduce hospital stays.
Our Trust vision is to provide excellent care at the heart of the community. We offer opportunities across medical, clinical, support, and corporate services.
Why work for us?
• Positive 2024 NHS Staff Survey results, highlighting compassionate leadership and wellbeing
• Varied environments: community hospitals, patients’ homes, and bases across Sussex
• Flexible working options: part-time, flexi-time, annualised hours, and flexi-retirement
• Excellent training, development, and research opportunities
• Accredited Living Wage Employer, we ensure fair pay for all our staff
• Cost-effective workplace nurseries in Crawley, Hove, and Brighton
• Active EMBRACE, Disability & Wellbeing, LGBTQIA+, and Religion & Belief networks
• Level 3 Disability Confident Leader and Veteran Aware Trust
Our values—Compassionate Care, Working Together, Achieving Ambitions, Delivering Excellence—guide everything we do.
We embrace diversity and encourage applications from all backgrounds, particularly from ethnically diverse, disabled, and LGBTQIA+ individuals. We aim to create an inclusive environment and support reasonable adjustments during recruitment.
This post may close early if sufficient applications are received.
Detailed job description and main responsibilities
The post holder will be a role model for leadership, training, coaching, and facilitating staff development at all levels. The post holder will be expected to provide a clinical perspective to divisional planning and decision-making, interpreting national guidance in relation to all aspects of clinical care delivered by the Trust and advise on the implementation within the modernisation and changing environment of all service
areas.
The post holder will role model leadership behaviours for improvement, supporting the building of Quality Improvement capability and capacity in the division and leading improvement programmes.
The postholder will, with the relevant management team, be responsible for clinical governance including the identification, reporting, management and mitigation of risk and patient safety.
Please see job description and person specification for further information.
Person specification
Qualifications and/or professional registration
Essential criteria
- Registered Nurse or Allied Health Professional
- Postgraduate qualification in Management or equivalent level of knowledge acquired through experience.
- Evidence of continuous professional/leadership/management development.
Experience
Essential criteria
- Substantial experience in a leadership role including contributing to operational management of services.
- Experience in management of health services
- Experience of monitoring, analysing and assessing clinical operational performance across multiple services.
- Experience of managing performance across multiple services, including the drafting, implementation and monitoring of remedial action plans.
- Experience of managing budgets across multiple services and working in liaison with management
Skills and knowledge
Essential criteria
- Knowledge of NHS Human Resource Policies and Procedures.
- Knowledge of clinical and operational governance and its application to services.
- Knowledge of multidisciplinary team working and an understanding of differing professional roles boundaries.
- Advanced knowledge of clinical operational processes, including budget management, target setting, and action planning and performance management.
- Knowledge NHS targets and regulatory requirements.
- Ability to monitor and maintain standards of care across a range of clinical services.
- Ability to identify, assess and manage Clinical and Operational Risks
- Able to translate complex information make it meaningful to staff at all levels and across all professions both verbally and in writing.
- Ability to occasionally manage distressing and emotional circumstances with staff, patients and their carer’s.
- Ability to deal with competing demands, priorities and deadlines whilst managing operational imperatives and frequent interruptions.
- Ability to engage stakeholders through discussion, presentation and direct liaison.
- Well-developed presentation skills.
- Word-processing and keyboard skills and ability to use Microsoft Office packages including Word, PowerPoint and Excel.
- A natural curiosity backed by excellent critical analytical skills.
- Able to effectively challenge poor conduct and behaviours.
- Strong patient focus.
- Excellent time management, prioritisation and organisational skills and ability to manage and deliver to agreed deadlines.
- Skilled in writing clear and coherent operational business cases, reports, and service plans.
- Demonstrate understanding of the unique qualities and needs of a team and ability to provide a caring, safe environment to enable everyone to do their jobs effectively
- Use and interpret varied information to generate new ideas and make effective plans for improvement or change
- Demonstrate understanding of how health and social care services fit together and how different people, teams or organisations interconnect and interact
- Able to communicate a compelling and credible vision of the future in a way that makes it feel achievable and exciting
- Ability to involve individuals and demonstrate that their contributions and ideas are valued and important for delivering outcomes and improvements
- Able to agree clear performance goals and quality indicators for services, supporting individuals and teams to take responsibility for results and providing balanced feedback
- Able to build capability within the workforce to enable people to meet future challenges. Using a range of experiences as a vehicle for individual and organisational learning
- Able to use interpersonal and organisational understanding to persuade and build collaboration
- Able to work as part of a team, using own and others skills and adopting a coaching style to drive individual and organisational performance
Employer certification / accreditation badges
Applicant requirements
This post is subject to the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974 (Exceptions) Order 1975 (Amendment) (England and Wales) Order 2020 and it will be necessary for a submission for Disclosure to be made to the Disclosure and Barring Service.
Documents to download
Further details / informal visits contact
- Name
- Anna Hollingdale
- Job title
- Deputy Divisional Director
- Email address
- [email protected]
- Telephone number
- 07484 447088
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