Child Protective Manager

Family Service Unit (FSU) staff are responsible for serving families by providing preventive and court-ordered supervision services, to ensure the safety and well-being of children, and to support parents and caretakers in providing a safe and nurturing home for their children.

The Deputy Director oversees the work of FSU teams (10 to 15 Units).

This unit is critical to DCP operations in achieving desired child welfare outcome. This position is intended to be a FLOATER position fulfilling the responsibilities below when there is a need for interim coverage of a unit for an extended period of time.

Other related duties may be assigned to this position. This position involves traveling between boroughs.

Under the administrative direction of the Executive Deputy Commissioner, Associate Commissioner and Borough Commissioner, with wide latitude for the exercise of independent action and decision-making, the Child Protective Manager will have overall responsibility for a geographic zone within a borough or satellite borough office.

CPS borough offices consist of several child protective service units which conduct highly sensitive investigations into alleged reports of child abuse and or neglect;

administers programs designed to assess the needs of families and the provision of services such as intensive preventive services or foster care placement outside the home.

The Child Protective Manager will be responsible for the following :

• Manage up to four units of Supervisors and Child Protective Specialists.
• Responsible for all compliance and quality case practice initiatives.
• Monitor the field activities of the managerial, supervisory and / or child protective specialist staff they manage.
• Ensure that operations conform to all applicable federal, state and local mandates and guidelines.
• Monitor and evaluate the results of operations by reviewing aggregate and individual performance data.
• Intervene in difficult case management decisions by exercising responsibility and discretion and assuming accountability.
• Attend meetings with other managerial staff and relays progress reports and issue analysis to the Borough Commissioner.
• Create and implement management controls to monitor the performance of individual zones and / or units.
• Hold regular staff meetings and individual conference to monitor performance; plans and determines needs for various personnel and budget actions.
• Prepare performance evaluations, including recognizing outstanding achievements or making disciplinary referrals where appropriate.
• Ensure that each unit within the zone is sufficiently staffed, properly equipped and trained and capable of carrying its responsibilities in accordance with applicable law, rules, regulations and policy.
• Exemplify leadership skills of effective communication, modeling, coaching, educating and support to foster quality supervision to their subordinates regularly.
• Perform other related duties.

Minimum Qualifications

1. A baccalaureate degree from an accredited college and four years of full-time, satisfactory professional social services or related experience in organizations dealing directly with children and / or adolescents;

such as (but not limited to) child welfare agencies, Day-Care, educational institutions, mental health groups, pediatrics, juvenile justice.

At least eighteen months of the required experience must be in a supervisor, administrative, managerial or executive capacity.

2. Education and / or experience equivalent to "1" above. However, all candidates must have at least eighteen months of experience in a supervisory, administrative, managerial, or executive capacity.

A Master's degree in Social Work may be substituted for one year of the required general experience.

Preferred Skills

The preferred candidate should possess the following : a record of proven managerial or supervisory accomplishments in child protection or a closely related human service field Master of Social Work degree or Master’s degree in a related discipline excellent communications skills ability to deal tactfully and effectively with diverse constituencies at all levels and an extensive understanding of child welfare issues knowledge of the NY State Connections comprehensive case management system, or other automated child welfare system familiarity working with NYC’s diverse communities experience and ability to step into an existing unit and assume all responsibility quickly.

Bilingual ability to communicate clearly in Spanish or other languages is considered a plus for this position.

Residency Requirement

New York City Residency is not required for this position