About Canteen

Just when life should be full of possibilities, cancer can crash into a young person’s world and shatter everything. Canteen provides young people impacted by cancer, and their parents, with access to a team of Allied Health Professionals who deliver programs, counselling and a range of other group and individual support activities.

The team at Canteen assist these young people to access the support they need to develop and maintain the skills and confidence to live healthy and happy lives.

Canteen also engages in community awareness and seeks to develop awareness of cancer support for young people around Australia. Canteen aims to create highly accessible, youth friendly, integrated service hubs as well as a range of online supports, that provide evidence-based interventions and support to young people aged 12–25 years impacted by cancer.

Job Summary

The Online Support Platform is an online and telephone counselling service made possible through funding from the Federal Department of Health. This funding has enabled Canteen to support young people affected by cancer and their parents in a digital environment, with a goal to reduce distress and improve mental health outcomes for whole families.

This position is responsible for the delivery of a multifaceted online and telephone counselling service. Counsellors will engage with Canteen engaged young clients individually through chat, email and telephone counselling. This position will also contribute to the collaborative development of online therapeutic content, and thus will be instrumental in identifying trends and community needs that can be assisted by tailored professional forum discussions and psycho-educational program material.

This position will contribute to the promotion of the service/program to both internal and external stakeholders and referral sources. Online Counsellors are expected to complete a number of administrative tasks, in conjunction with their clinical role, in order to ensure effective service delivery. These tasks include timely case notes and report writing, data entry, administering evaluation measures with young people and providing feedback to the wider Canteen team

Selection Criteria

Essential

• Relevant tertiary qualifications as a Registered Psychologist (or provisional psychologist close to completing registration), Social Worker or Counsellor with a Masters level qualification
• Registration with the Australian Health Practitioner Regulation Agency (AHPRA) and/or relevant professional bodies such as Australian Psychological Society (APS) or Australian Association of Social Workers (AASW)
• Minimum 2 years experience in the clinical setting and/or counselling service using a number of evidence based interventions (CBT, IPT, ACT, Narrative etc)
• Experience working with young people and young adults, demonstrated knowledge of youth-informed practice
• Experience in conducting risk assessments and developing safety plans
• Knowledge of child protection legislation and mandatory reporting
• Demonstrated ability to maintain professional administrative responsibilities such as case notes, report writing, data entry, responding to and following up client correspondence
• Experience with working within multi-disciplinary teams, liaising with staff from different departments (internal or external) and communicating with colleagues off site
• Willingness to participate in supervision (group and individual), team meetings and clinical reviews
• Demonstrated experience, confidence using and ability to learn web based technology, including: instant messaging services, email, chat rooms and social media channels
• Availability to work specified shifts (2-3 evening shifts 2pm-10pm, 1-2 daytime shifts 10am-6pm and 1 weekend shift (varying between Saturday and Sunday) from 11am-6pm.)

Desirable

• Experience in grief, loss and bereavement counselling
• Experience in working with families, especially with parenting and communication themes
• Experience in group work and facilitation
• Experience with a variety of interventions including telephone and online counselling and group work
• Ability to work autonomously and reliably achieve objectives
• Ability to relate to young people, anticipate needs, and to present information in a clear and logical way, and with confidence, to target group

Personal qualities

• Approachable, ability to listen actively, friendly and professional
• High level of integrity, honesty and commitment
• Highly motivated team player
• Open and honest person who seeks and provides guidance and feedback from others including co-workers, volunteers and Canteen service users
• Adaptable to change

Employment Details:

• Location: National
• Job type: Fixed-term until 30th June 2020, Full-time
• Hours of work: 5 days/ 37.5 hours per week

For more information about the role click here.

A position description is attached.