For all people in Australia living with mental health and wellbeing challenges to live a life that is meaningful to them.

Position Details

• Full-Time Permanent
• Classification: SCHADS Level 3 with a salary range between $73,883 - $79,218 per annum + Superannuation
• Salary packaging arrangements providing tax benefits available for living and entertainment expenses increasing your take home income where part of your wage is paid tax free each pay, savings thousands in tax each year
• Location: Head to Health, Penrith NSW

About your new role

Peer Support Workers are integral members of the team and represent 50% of the workforce within Head to Health Penrith. Peer Support workers draw on their lived and living experience of recovery from mental illness, mental health crisis or caring for someone living with a mental illness, to instil confidence and hope in others about the journey of recovery. You must have a lived experience of mental illness or of caring for someone with a mental illness with a rich understanding of the processes of recovery with a willingness to purposefully use your own story to help others further their own understanding of recovery.

You will work alongside a multi-disciplinary team inclusive of mental health clinicians, mental health registered nurses, medical officers, and consultant psychiatrists. Delivering a Peer First and Peer Last approach, Peer Support Workers support a high engagement model of care, through actively greeting and supporting guests (consumers) throughout their time at Head to Health Penrith. Peer Support Workers are an important element of the team approach and bring the wisdom of lived experience to many aspects of service delivery. Peer Support Workers will have access to a tailored training program and to regular professional development sessions.

Peer Support Workers (PSW) walk alongside people experiencing crisis and distress in offering practical, emotional, social, and service access support that works out and responds to people's needs through a process of mutual listening, learning, being, doing, belonging and healing. This may include:

• Exploring the intersectional impact on mental health challenges on relationships, employment, identity, and power.
• Exploring wellbeing and meaningful skills, ways, and activities for daily living, connecting with personal power, and self-care.
• Connecting people to resources or advocating for people who may be accessing the service.

PSW apply the Lived Experience lens as their primary way of working. The National Lived Experience (Peer) Workforce Guidelines, describes the Lived Experience lens as:

• Learnings from personal experience of mental health challenges, distress and periods of healing, which may include service use.
• Collective knowledge of universal lived experiences such as stigma, marginalisation, loss of power, and system hurt, as well as hope, healing, and personal recovery as real.
• Professional principles and values such as mutuality, intersectionality, autonomy, hope and sharing power.
• And the history of the Consumer movement, advocacy, and actions.

PSW contribute to a team approach by applying this lens and Lived Experience practice wisdom to strengthen service delivery, including welcoming and supporting guests across their time at Penrith Head to Health, participating in team huddles, service promotion, and continuous improvement. PSW will need to bring strong self-reflection and relational skills to be able to apply this lens effectively with people, in processes, and across a range of service settings. Alongside line management support, PSW will participate in Peer Co-Reflection / Supervision and a Peer Community of Practice to support discipline specific connection, confidence, and professional development.

About Neami National

We're Neami. We're big believers in everyone having the opportunity to live a full life - and we give our all to support people to achieve wellbeing and mental health outcomes that matter to them.

For some people, this means having a stronger sense of self. For others, it may mean nurturing relationships or building the confidence to tackle tomorrow. Everyone has different life goals, and at Neami, we walk alongside people to help improve their quality of life on their terms.

We're proud to support 30,000+ people living with mental health challenges each year across Australia and offer services over 40 different Indigenous lands. These services include mental health and wellbeing, housing and homelessness, and suicide prevention.

Values

Together with our vision and purpose, our values define who we are and guide the way we operate. They are fundamental to our identity, and we align all our actions with them.

• Connecting
• Collaborating
• Learning
• Belonging

What will Neami offer

• Generous leave entitlements including paid parental leave, an Accrued Day Off each month, Gratis Leave and Wellness leave
• Professional development through regular practice development sessions and coaching with your supervisor
• Ongoing extensive in-house Learning and Development programs to encourage learning and skill-building
• Employee Assistance Program (EAP) through TELUS - providing holistic health and wellness supports and resources to Neami staff and their immediate family
• Flexible work arrangements are available for maintaining your work-life balance

What you will bring to the role

Essential:

• Personal lived / living experience of recovery as an individual or as a family, friend or carer. Your recovery experience may be related to mental health, suicidal crisis, drugs and alcohol use or trauma
• Willingness to identify or be identified by others as a professional with lived experience of recovery
• Willingness to share and draw on lived experience purposefully in the role to instil confidence and hope in others about the journey of recovery
• Minimum Cert IV qualification in Lived Experience (e.g. Cert IV Mental Health Peer Work) or complete within 2 years of employment.
• Computer literacy.
• Compliance with Public Health Vaccination Orders, including COVID-19 Vaccination.

Desirable:

• Completed Intentional Peer Support Core Training.
• Experience of the public or private mental health system.
• A valid Australian Driver's License.
• Experience in a similar role.

What the role requires

• National Criminal History Check (police check) - disclosable outcomes considered
• Current Working with Children Check - required before commencement of work
• Australian working rights

How to Apply

To apply for this position, please:

• Click the 'Apply Now' button where you will need to create a username and password
• Upload your resume and cover letter

When applying for this position, you are asked to tell us about your previous work experience, your suitability for this role and your answers to any target questions (where asked). Please include in your application how you would prefer to be contacted (whether via email, text or phone call).

If you are excited about this role, but only meet some of the requirements, we encourage you to call or email us to talk about this opportunity. We're passionate about creating opportunities and supporting professional development.

If your application is shortlisted:

• We may invite you to have an informal phone conversation to discuss the role and get to know more about your experience and interest and answer your questions
• We may invite you to an interview (which may be in person or conducted online via Microsoft Teams) with up to three panel members from Neami

If you have any further questions regarding this role which are not addressed in the job advertisement or position description, or if you require any adjustments to participate in the recruitment process, please contact:

Veronique Jordaan, Clinical Services Manager - [email protected] using the subject line: Peer Support Worker - Penrith enquiry via EthicalJobs

If you have any technical issues when applying for this role, please email [email protected] for assistance.

Be Yourself - Neami values and celebrates diversity including multidisciplinary teams and the unique backgrounds, experiences and contributions that each person brings to our community. First Nations people, those identifying as LGBTQIA+, people with disabilities and culturally and linguistically diverse people are encouraged to apply. Our aim is to create a workforce that is accessible, inclusive and reflects the community in which we live.

Neami is committed to the safety and wellbeing of children and young people. We commit to providing accessible and safe physical and online environments for all childrenand young people. Click Here for full statement.