As Head of Quality Assurance & Performance, you will lead quality, practice, and performance activities within children’s services, directly shaping outcomes for children and young people. Reporting to senior leadership, you will help drive strategy, support transformation, and ensure services consistently meet high safeguarding standards. The role will focus on large-scale improvements, the oversight of critical quality frameworks, and contributing to inspection readiness and service delivery.
You will provide strategic leadership across reviewing services, quality assurance, performance, and practice development, fostering a high-performing culture centered on safeguarding excellence and continuous improvement. Responsibilities include developing and implementing robust QA frameworks, conducting audits, inspections, and service reviews, acting as a specialist advisor to influence stakeholders (including regulators and senior leaders), and overseeing inspection readiness, performance reporting, and complex decision-making.
This role is suited to candidates with extensive senior leadership experience within children’s social care and a proven ability to deliver strategic transformation and complex service improvement programs. You should have strong experience in quality assurance systems, audits, and performance frameworks, along with exceptional stakeholder management, influencing, and negotiation skills. The position also includes managing budgets, leading partnership engagement, ensuring compliance with statutory requirements, and championing the voice of the child at the center of service delivery, supported by leadership experience and professional registration as a qualified social worker.