Personal Development Mentor – Renfrewshire

Apex Scotland is the leading employment and training organisation which specialises in working with people with convictions.

As a key partner of Invest in Renfrewshire, Apex Scotland has a new employability service in Renfrewshire and we now require a Personal Development Mentor (PDM) to deliver this service.  The service will be based in Paisley and requires cover across Renfrewshire.

This new service is designed to support unemployed people with convictions to progress towards or move into employment.  The service will achieve this by working in partnership, assisting individuals to reach their goals by breaking down barriers including lack of self-confidence, lack of work experience or qualifications and primarily addressing issues raised by criminal records.  The Personal Development Mentor will help re-engage individuals into meaningful, positive activity, and to integrate into their communities.

The aims of the service are that all attendees who complete an action plan will be equipped with life skills, core and basic employability skills and, crucially, be provided with advice around disclosure of previous convictions.

Funding has been secured initially to 31 March 2019.  This is subject to review and efforts are ongoing to confirm additional funding to secure the service longer term.  Therefore we now require a dynamic, self motivated and hard working individual who is able to motivate and inspire change in others.  The Personal Development Mentor will work alongside Criminal Justice Social Work staff to engage with service users on community payback and other court orders to proactively source work experience, learning and activity based opportunities and be involved in the facilitation of these opportunities.

As part of this role we would like the post holder to develop a group work service for vulnerable women in the area; therefore we feel the post may be more suited to applicants who can demonstrate a good level of understanding of the complex needs of women offenders.

The successful applicant will have knowledge or experience of mentoring approaches.  Experience of working with a caseload of service users and working to targets are essential.  Experience of working in a community environment would be an advantage.  It is anticipated that there will be some travel throughout the area therefore a driving license or access to a means of transport is essential.  Part time/job share applications will be considered, please state on application.

In view of the nature of this post, the successful candidate will be required to join the PVG scheme.

PDM-Job-Description April 2018