Senior Assertive Outreach Practitioner

Job Overview An exciting opportunity has arisen for a Band 7 Team Lead to join our newly established Assertive Outreach Team (AOT) in Hillingdon.

This is a key leadership role within a transformational model of care, designed to support individuals with severe mental illness who are at risk of disengagement and require intensive, proactive community-based support.

This is a high-impact, community-focused role, where you will lead a team delivering care directly to patients in their homes and local communities, ensuring no one is lost to follow-up.

The Assertive Outreach Team (AOT) role is fundamentally a patient-facing position, focused on engaging and managing individuals who are often reluctant to engage with services. Given the nature of this work, requiring proactive outreach, direct contact, and consistent face-to-face intervention, the role is not suitable for remote or hybrid working arrangements.

Main duties of the job

• Provide clinical and operational leadership to a multidisciplinary outreach team
• Ensure delivery of high-intensity, assertive engagement, including home visits and community-based care
• Lead on risk management, safety planning and complex clinical decision-making for a high-risk cohort
• Deliver and embed a model based on:
• Persistent engagement
• No discharge due to non-attendance
• Proactive, flexible contact with patients
• Provide line management, supervision and support to team members
• Oversee team performance, caseloads and quality of care delivery
• Work collaboratively with CMHT/CMHH, Crisis Teams, inpatient services and partner agencies to ensure coordinated care pathways
• Going out to patients
• Maintaining engagement when others disengage
• Providing practical support that prevents crisis
• Not clinic based

Working for our organisation

The Team is committed to delivering safe, compassionate and high-quality care across all services.

The Assertive Outreach Team is a new and developing service, offering:

The opportunity to shape and lead a new model of care

• A strong focus on patient safety, engagement and outcomes
• A supportive multidisciplinary environment with clear leadership oversight
• Opportunities for professional development within a growing Trust-wide model

Detailed Job Description And Main Responsibilities Essential:

• Registered mental health professional (e.g. RMN, OT, Social Worker)
• Experience working with complex mental health needs and high-risk patients
• Experience of clinical leadership, supervision and team management
• Strong skills in risk assessment, care planning and crisis management
• Experience of community-based or outreach working
• Driving licence and access to a vehicle for work

Desirable:

• Experience in assertive outreach, crisis or urgent care services
• Experience of service development or transformation

Person specification

Education & Qualifications Essential criteria

• Registered professional qualification (e.g. RMN, OT, Social Worker or equivalent)
• Current professional registration (NMC, HCPC, Social Work England)
• Evidence of post-registration training relevant to mental health / community services

Desirable criteria

• Leadership or management qualification or training
• Training in Psychosocial Interventions Other relevant training, e.g. psychosocial interventions
• Counselling qualification
• Venepuncture qualification
• ECG application qualification

Experience Essential criteria

• Significant experience working with individuals with complex mental health needs and high risk
• Experience of working with disengaged or hard-to-engage service users in a community setting
• Experience of risk assessment, safety planning and crisis management
• Experience of leading or supervising staff within a clinical team
• Experience of operational management (e.g. rota management, performance, workload oversight)
• Experience of multi-disciplinary and multi-agency working

Desirable criteria

• Experience of service development or mobilisation of new models of care
• Experience in assertive outreach, crisis services or urgent care settings