Job overview

Are you someone who thrives in a fast paced environment? Do you have a passion for being the first point of contact for those in need of mental health support when they need us the most? Can you provide a voice of reassurance and support? If so, we are looking for individuals like you to make a real difference!

For our Mental Health Practitioners, we’re seeking applications from professionals with a mental health nursing, social work, LD or OT background.

Our First Point of Contact Centre (FPCC) is a priority one urgent response telephone service and is an integral part of our mental health services. We are continuing to evolve and build our team and the support we offer as part of the development of the National Mental Health 111 response model.  Which involves 24/7 working, including night shifts.

Forget caseloads and case management. Your skills and expertise will be in triaging patients at the point of contact and identifying what service will best meet their needs. The spectrum of mental health needs varies significantly; you will have the ability to offer advice, guidance and support for mental health issues, with a routine, urgent or crisis response, and ways this can be managed and improved. Equally, you'll have the ability respond to urgent referrals with more acute needs and higher risks in the community.

Main duties of the job

Handling a wide range of calls and thriving amid the challenges this presents, requires an outstanding amount of resilience and emotional strength as you will be supporting unwell and upset patients at their time of need. Your support will make a difference to lives and requires people who can be there for those that need it, sometimes in the face of adversity and trauma.

You’ll be part of the team that provides the first stage in the Trust’s care navigation system receiving requests using contact methods, including letters, e-mail and telephone.

We provide a central resource for referrers and Trust staff to ensure the effective receipt and subsequent processing of referrals into our services. We further provide effective signposting to services external to the Trust.

We provide an effective first point of contact, a link with primary and secondary services, partner agencies and organisations outside of the trust.

The service focus is to ensure callers or requests are directed to the appropriate person/resource in the Trust. The intention will be to leave the person making the request, feeling valued and satisfied with the outcome. Where an immediate response for advice/specialist opinion is not available staff will work to an agreed response time.

You will have support from Senior Health Practitioners and the Operational Manager to help your development and you’ll be able to share your knowledge and experience with our Call Handlers.

Working for our organisation

We have a skilled and dedicated workforce of over 5000 colleagues working in a diverse range of services over 55 sites and within people’s homes. We strive to enable a welcoming workplace culture that builds and celebrates civility, inclusivity and diversity, while providing a sense of belonging and trust. 

Annual staff surveys, regular Pulse surveys and other engagement opportunities provide our people with lots of opportunity to tell us about their experiences of working with us.  In the latest staff survey, 61% of colleagues gave us their views.  It was great to hear that: 

72% of colleagues would recommend the Trust as a place to work, ranking us 1st for Provider Trusts in the South West region on this question. 

76% would recommend the standard of care provided in our services if a friend or relative needed treatment, also ranking us 1st in the South West region. 

81% said that care of patients and service users is the Trust’s priority, compared with an average in comparable NHS Trusts in England of 64%. 

 This high-level overview shows we are in a healthy position, with higher scores than average for comparable organisations, alongside a great response rate, indicating good staff engagement.  However, we also know we have plenty of room for improvement in many areas. To that end, we continue to prioritise and invest in our commitment to genuinely becoming a Great Place to Work with consistent top-quartile performance in the annual staff survey and Pulse surveys.