Principal Clinical Psychologist

Job overview

We are seeking an enthusiastic psychologist passionate about improving the quality of care and support delivered to autistic people.

This is an exciting opportunity for a suitably qualified, experienced professional looking to lead in the development of new service.

The Adult Autism Intensive Support Team includes a diagnostic assessment service and a newly commissioned Intensive Support Team (IST). The post holder will work clinically within the IST, a pilot program that offers specialist assessment, therapeutic interventions, and consultation to individuals with complex needs. The IST supports autistic adults, without a co-occurring intellectual disability, under the care of existing SWLSTG services. This service's outcomes will shape future provision in South West London.

You will be highly motivated and dynamic individual with an ability to integrate psychological skills and leadership capabilities to lead the development and delivery of this new service.

You will be thoughtful in the way you work with the multi-disciplinary team and have experience in developing the skills of colleagues. You will be interested in working with external partners to develop supportive networks and have energy, drive and enthusiasm for working with complexity.

You will be expected to provide psychological assessments and interventions to autistic people, across a variety of community settings, with individuals, groups, families and staff teams.

Main duties of the job

You will have excellent written and spoken communication skills, an ability to work sensitively and thoughtfully with service users and their carers often around challenging and complex presentations. You will be flexible in your approaches to problem solving, be creative and be ready to embrace challenges and enjoy working as part of a team.

• The post-holder will actively lead, manage and support the Psychology aspects of the Intensive Support Team (IST) and have a key role / function in the provision of the IST.
• The post holder will lead in the development and implementation of the service in its pilot phase. Collaboratively developing care pathways and establish ways of working for the entire service.
• The post holder will be expected to work effectively with others in the MDT, supporting the provision and development of a range of interventions, both directly with individuals and their families, and via consultation with their networks.
• The post holder will deliver highly specialist psychology assessments (e.g. cognitive / neuropsychological, personality, eating attitudes) and psychological formulation(s).
• To supervise and support the psychological assessment and therapy provided by other psychologists and other clinical members of the team who provide psychologically based care and treatment by agreement with the Psychology and Psychotherapies (P&P) lead for the service area.

Detailed job description and main responsibilities

• To provide specialist psychological assessments of clients referred to the team based upon the appropriate use, interpretation, and integration of complex psychological data from a variety of sources including psychological and neuropsychological tests, self-report measures, rating scales, direct and indirect structured observations and semi-structured interviews with clients, family members and others involved in the client’s care.

• 2.     To formulate and implement plans for the formal psychological treatment and/or management of a client’s mental health problems, based upon an appropriate conceptual framework of the client’s problems, and employing methods of proven efficacy, across the full range of care settings. 3.     To be responsible for implementing a range of psychological interventions for individuals, carers, families, and groups, within and across teams employed individually and in synthesis, adjusting and refining psychological formulations drawing upon different explanatory models and maintaining a number of provisional hypotheses. 4.     To evaluate and make decisions about treatment options taking into account both theoretical and therapeutic models and highly complex factors concerning historical and developmental processes that have shaped the individual, family, or group. 5.     To exercise autonomous professional responsibility for the assessment, treatment, and discharge of clients whose problems are managed by psychologically based standard care plans. 6.     To provide specialist psychological advice, guidance and consultation to other professionals contributing directly to clients’ formulation, diagnosis, and treatment plan. 7.     To ensure that all members of the treating team have access to a psychologically based framework for understanding and care of clients of the service, through the provision of advice and consultation and the dissemination of psychological research and theory. 8.     To undertake risk assessment and risk management for individual clients and to provide general advice to other professionals on psychological aspects of risk assessment and management. 9.     To act as care coordinator, ensuring the provision of a care package appropriate for the clients needs, coordinating the work of others involved with care, tasking responsibility for arranging CPA reviews as required and communicating effectively with the client, his/her family and all others involved in the network of care, and to monitor progress during multi-disciplinary interventions. 10.  To communicate in a skilled and sensitive manner, information concerning the assessment, formulation, and treatment plans of clients under their care and to monitor and evaluate progress during both uni- and multi-disciplinary care. 11.  To provide expertise, advice, and support to all members of the treatment team to facilitate the effective and appropriate provision of psychological care and to support other team Applied Psychologists in the service area, in their contribution (direct and indirect) to providing a psychologically based framework of understanding and care to all clients of the service in which they work.