Job Description

We are seeking an experienced Psychological Practitioner to support an innovative project to improve how we approach, assess, and manage suicide risk. The Personalised Approach to Risk of Suicide project is a trust initiative forming part of our Culture of Care work. South London & Maudsley is one of several national pilot sites, aiming to embed a new way of thinking about risk assessment and management across the NHS. The need for change is based on the latest NICE guidance and research showing traditional risk assessment, especially risk stratification, is ineffective and may lead to poorer outcomes. The project aims to equip staff to think differently about risk and engage in collaborative, trauma-informed, person-centred safety assessment and planning, grounded in therapeutic relationships and underpinned by psychological formulation. This work will be co-produced with service users, carers, and staff and requires an organisational culture shift.

The successful candidate will join a small MDT of clinical leads supporting this work across Adults of Working Age and Specialist Services. They will deliver the strategy in collaboration with MDT stakeholders, service users, carers, and the local community. The project supports strategic priorities around anti-racism, building trust with communities, and delivering outstanding mental health care. The candidate will have extensive experience in risk assessment, trauma-informed approaches, and stakeholder engagement.



This role will work alongside clinical leads and the Improvement Service to develop and lead the early stages of a trust-wide culture change strategy to improve how we approach, assess, and manage suicide risk. The strategy will include training and team-based behavioural interventions. The post-holder will support development of a measurement and evaluation plan, provide updates for monthly reporting, and manage interdependencies with other trust-wide programmes, such as the Calocane review action plan. They will participate in the Steering Group and Lived Experience Reference Group, working with stakeholders to identify additional needs for the strategy.

They will work with all stakeholders, including peer workers, service users, and leads from medical, nursing, therapies, social work, and psychological professions. The postholder will lead the design and commissioning of elearning and video content to integrate into existing clinical risk training and for wider use. This work will be co-produced with the Lived Experience Reference Group. They will liaise with relevant programmes to integrate team-based behavioural interventions supporting delivery of a Personalised Approach to Risk of Suicide. They will also work with the Trauma-Informed Care team in inpatient settings and with community care development programmes.

The post-holder will work closely with PCREF leads to ensure the strategy reflects our anti-racism commitment. Flexible working can be discussed at interview.



This post will work with the Improvement Service and Clinical Leads for the Personalised Approach to Risk programme and be co-located with the Trauma-Informed Care team, working closely alongside them. It will sit within the Corporate Psychology & Psychotherapy team at South London & Maudsley , a small, central team providing support, governance, and leadership for Psychological Professionals and staff support across the trust. It is a diverse, experienced team with a warm and supportive culture. The post will be supported by the Improvement Service, part of the Quality Centre. The service plays a key role in enabling the Trust to use improvement methodology within Our Care Improvement System (the Trust's quality management system) to deliver strategic ambitions set out in the Changing Lives, Aiming High strategy. The service's work is underpinned by improvement and organisational science, theory, and evidence-based practice to help services, teams, and individuals deliver safe, effective care and outcomes that matter to patients, families, and carers. The post will have access to office space at Maudsley Hospital, Trust HQ, alongside the Trauma-Informed Care Team. Trust HQ is at Denmark Hill, less than 5 minutes from the station (Zone 2), near Ruskin Park and a vibrant high street with shops and restaurants. The Trust operates across Croydon, Lambeth, Lewisham, Southwark, and substance misuse services in Bexley, Lambeth, Greenwich, and Wandsworth. Travel may be required .



The Personalised Approach to Risk Project is a initiative in the trust which forms part of our Culture of Care Work. South London & The Maudsley is one of a number of national pilot sites for this work which seeks to embed a new way of thinking about and approaching risk assessment and management across the NHS. The need for a new approach is based on the latest NICE guidance around risk of self-harm and suicide and research which shows that the way we traditionally approach risk assessment and, in particular the stratification of risk, is ineffective and may led to poorer outcomes. We will aim to equip staff to think differently about risk and engage in collaborative, trauma-informed and person-centred safety assessment and planning grounded in a therapeutic relationship and underpinned by psychological formulation. This work will be co-produced with service-users, carers and staff and will require a culture shift across the whole organisation.

Job Purpose:

To develop, in collaboration with the Clinical Leads, the Improvement Service and service-users, a strategy for trust-wide culture change in embedding the new approach to risk assessment and safety planning. To co-ordinate and ensure the systematic provision of psychological consultation trust-wide in the area of personalised approach to risk and safety planning and personally provide highly specialist clinical input To manage interdependencies between this and other risk projects in the trust and to ensure joined up working with colleagues and to link the work to other pieces of culture change work happening in the trust such as those projects looking at trauma-informed care in inpatient wards, Dialog+ and community transformation including the pilot project in Lewisham N2. To provide clinical supervision and consultation as appropriate, functioning as a lead specialist in approaches to psychological formulation, collaborative risk assessment and safety planning and trauma-informed ways of working. To ensure that systems are in place and working effectively for the clinical and professional supervision and support of psychological practitioners and MDT staff across the trust in relation to a personalised approach to risk and safety planning. To promote and, in collaboration with the improvement service, the evaluation of the programme and the changes achieved. To lead on the dissemination and writing up of this work. To work as an autonomous professional within registration body guidelines and codes of conduct, and guided by principles and policies or procedures of the service, taking responsibility for interpreting policies within defined parameters. To agree outcomes/results with clinical/professional leads and improvement service and to decide how they are best achieved. To support the production of monthly highlight reports. To participate in the steering group for the project and the lived experience reference group. To lead the design and delivery of e-learning and/or in person training for staff across the organisation in the new approach. * Engage with a wide range of stake-holders including around embedding policy change and in making minor changes (where possible) to the Electronic Patient Record system (EPJS)