Service Manager

As they say, no two days are the same in Jigsaw! There are regular meetings, for the team and case management. On a daily basis, there are also operational elements such as budgeting, planning, staff management, and providing line management supervision to staff.

Most of my time I work closely with the Youth and Community Engagement Worker (YCEW), creating links with other mental health services as well as the wider community and voluntary sector providers. This involves delivering workshops on youth mental health to these groups, along with schools and workplaces.

My own background is in counselling and psychotherapy and while I miss the clinical work in my current role, I certainly feel more comfortable not having to deal with both aspects. I was a manager of a counselling service previously so had a good sense of what it would be like working for Jigsaw.

Local mental health services can be one of many different projects set within a community group environment. In my experience, this can sometimes lead to distractions for the service.

In Jigsaw we have one focus, youth mental health, and all we do is geared in that direction. Being a national organisation with this focus means that we can concentrate on our primary business tasks, early intervention, and community education.

One of the things I was attracted too, was the joint leadership model, with the Clinical Manager taking clinical lead primarily. This allows for the Service Manager to address the overall operational and community engagement pieces.

Having said that, I didn’t have any experience on how it would work and was somewhat fearful that it could lead to conflict. It was worth the risk and we were well inducted into this model and my colleague is a very open communicator.

I was also really attracted to Jigsaw because of the early intervention/prevention ethos of the organisation. I firmly believe that the earliest possible suitable support to young people and their families leads to better outcomes in terms of helping young people learn and build resilience.

Busy. Being a Service Manager in Jigsaw is all about time management, organising tasks in order of priority, and managing logistics in collaboration with your clinical counterpart.

A typical day could include providing line management supervision to members of your team; reports required for good governance; linking in with partner organisations; interacting with the various departments within Jigsaw; attending planning and strategy meetings both internally and externally; attending relevant community networks; working on finance and budgets; managing logistics – particularly having oversight of the scheduling of appointments for our one to one/clinical service; interacting with the Youth Advisory Panel, monitoring health & safety for staff and visitors to the hub; dealing with, or assessing risks to avoid, any potential complaints.

Basically, making sure that everything runs as smoothly and efficiently as possible. You can definitely say that two days are never the same!!

My own background is in youth work and I am also an accredited psychotherapist. Prior to working in Jigsaw, I coordinated a project working with young people at risk of leaving school early in both school and community settings.

Before that, I worked with a local youth service delivering a range of community-based youth initiatives. I have also worked as a counsellor with a youth counselling service.

What attracted me to Jigsaw was that it was one organisation that combined all my areas of training and experience including; providing therapeutic support, promoting youth participation, working with schools, and collaborating with other community-based organisations in promoting and supporting youth mental health.

The community-based approach, the emphasis on youth voice and meaningful participation, the opportunity to work with colleagues from a broad range of disciplines.

>> Read more about the benefits of working at Jigsaw

I was really excited to come to work with Jigsaw as the organisation has a reputation for quality service delivery with a strong evidence base.

My questions were really around how much interaction I would have with young people in the Service Manager role, and how the collaborative leadership model would work in practice. I also wanted to clarify how much of a role I would have in the design and delivery elements of Jigsaw Youth Mental Health Promotion in schools and the local community.