Assistant Chaplain (Tranning Post)

Job Overview

This is an exciting training post as an Assistant Chaplain at the RUH. The Spiritual Care Team aims to provide Religious and Spiritual Care and support to patients, their family, carers and Trust staff - engaging with people of all faiths and none, without prejudice, fully embracing the principles of the Equality Act 2010.

Main duties of the job

You will be an excellent team player, committed to team working and the development of other people with an ability to work on your own initiative, whilst remaining accountable to others. You will have the ability to enable others from any faith and none to address their Spiritual and Religious needs in a manner consistent with their own culture, background, values and beliefs.

You will be given full training over a year and on-going support and supervision. This will involve engaging with speakers of various disciplines together with placements internally and externally and Trust wide to gain extensive experience.

The Spiritual Care Team is actively involved in all clinical and non- clinical areas within the RUH, and works closely with the Emergency Department, Elderly Care, Palliative Care, Critical Care, Oncology, Women and Children’s Services.

Working for our organisation

At the RUH we’re proud to put people at the heart of what we do, working together as one team to make a difference for our patients, each other, and our community. No matter what your role is, we value everyone’s contribution in supporting the exceptional, person-centred care we pride ourselves on.

We are committed to creating a compassionate and inclusive environment. This can be seen in our growing community of staff networks – celebrating successes and creating opportunities to listen and learn. We value our differences, champion kindness and civility, and truly believe that diversity makes us stronger.

A culture of learning, developing and innovating is the thread that runs throughout our whole organisation. We want to support you to thrive, taking your career to its full potential.

We value staff wellbeing, with a well-established programme of support. We believe in a holistic approach spanning all aspects of living a healthy life, including physical, emotional, spiritual and financial wellbeing. We’ve even got a pool!

We are committed to supporting you and hope you want to join our team. In the meantime, find out more about living and working the beautiful historic city of Bath, learn about our extensive package of staff benefits, and read about how we’re providing healthcare fit for the future with the landmark Dyson Cancer Centre and our passion for research.

Detailed Job Description And Main Responsibilities

Please find attached to the vacancy a detailed person specification and job description for further information about this role.

Person specification

Qualifications And Training

Essential criteria

• Ordained Priest or Lay minister in good standing with their faith community or authorising body and having permission to practice.
• Evidence of continuing personal and professional development.

Desirable criteria

• Experience of Healthcare Chaplaincy
• Training in Health Care Chaplaincy
• Membership of the College of Health Care Chaplains (CHCC), subscribing to its Code of practice and Professional Conduct.
• Membership of the United Kingdom Board for Health Care Chaplaincy (UKHBC)

Knowledge and experience

Essential criteria

• Good presentation, training and teaching skills with an ability to engage with others.
• To be able to discern, assess and provide for the Spiritual, Emotional and Religious – Of patients, relatives, and staff - whatever their philosophy, belief and value systems
• To be able to make independent, specialized judgements regarding their care.

Desirable criteria

• Counselling Training and De-briefing experience.
• Specialist knowledge of NHS guidance and directives on delivering Spiritual Care within the NHS.
• Specialist knowledge of all aspects of Spiritual Care and how this is applied to other faiths and cultural traditions.
• To be able to work in an Ecumenical and Multi-faith and no faith team

Values

Essential criteria

• Values and respects others, treats everyone as an individual, is non-judgemental
• Motivated to be genuinely kind and caring
• Supports and co-operates with colleagues
• Pro-active and takes responsibility and willing to learn, open to change.
• Motivated to make a difference in whatever way they can
• Takes pride in themselves, their appearance, their role and where they work.

Specific Skills

Essential criteria

• Ability to work on own initiative, whilst co-ordinating a team and remaining accountable to the Lead Chaplain
• An excellent team player committed to team working and the development of other people
• Excellent interpersonal skills, able to develop good communication with a range of people about difficult, challenging distressing or sensitive matters in equally difficult or distressing situations.
• Ability to deliver care with kindness compassion dignity and respect even when own values are being challenged
• Committed to accepting and supporting others across the full Equality Diversity and Inclusion agenda from prejudice or bias. Understanding of Equality and Diversity legislation.
• Ability to handle highly sensitive confidential or contentious information in a highly emotive or hostile atmosphere working consistently under stress.
• Ability to provide Spiritual and Religious Care for the dying, critically ill and newly bereaved, including those experiencing sudden death or pregnancy loss.
• Ability to enable others from any faith and none to address their spiritual needs in a manner consistent with their own culture, background, values and beliefs.
• Capable of preparing and leading corporate acts of worship which have spiritual significance
• Good level of competence in administration, computer skills (Database, Emails, Word processing, Trust eLearning). Effective with time management, including keeping to deadlines and the ability to work flexibly.

Desirable criteria

• To respond to all referrals to Spiritual Care Services and be willing to offer support during a Major Incident.

Physical Skills & Effort Emotional Effort

Essential criteria

• Requires good physical, mental and emotional stamina. To be able to walk substantial distances around the hospital with long periods of standing.
• To be able to work creatively as part of a team or as a lone worker.
• Ability to recognise and manage personal stress and to maintain clear judgements and decisions under pressure.
• Sustained exposure to high level emotional distress in breaking news of a close family member’s death, being present in the hospital mortuary to support bereaved family members to see their loved ones.
• Ability to respond in a timely manner to on call requests, with the ability to travel off-site as and when required, including being able to undertake full on-call duties

Please note - Due to recent changes in UK immigration and visa rules applicants who do not currently have the right to work in the UK may not be considered unless an alternative right to work solution can be provided. Candidates requiring sponsorship (or will need sponsorship at the end of a current visa e.g. those with graduate visa's) should review the eligibility criteria on the gov.uk website before applying: Prove your right to work to an employer: Overview - GOV.UK

Applicant requirements

This post is subject to the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974 (Exceptions) Order 1975 (Amendment) (England and Wales) Order 2020 and it will be necessary for a submission for Disclosure to be made to the Disclosure and Barring Service.

Documents to download

• Job Description & Person Spec - Band 5 Trainee Chaplain (PDF, 240.4KB)
• Join the RUH (PDF, 1.3MB)

Further details / informal visits contact

Name Narinder Tegally Job title Lead Chaplain Email address ***email_hidden*** Telephone number 01225 824039