Social Work

**Position Title: Social Work & Programs Manager**
**Reports to: CEO**
**Hours of Work: Permanent, Full time, 40 hours per week**
**Remuneration: $$71,500 Annually, paid breaks, Vacation and paid Absence time, Group Benefits, RRSP Matching**

**Hospice Halifax is seeking a compassionate and supportive individual to join our multidisciplinary team in providing care and comfort for patients and families facing illness, death and bereavement.**

**About us**

Hospice Halifax is a compassionate and supportive community of staff members, volunteers, and donors dedicated to making dying and living as comfortable and meaningful as possible at the end of life. Our 10-bed hospice residence is an inclusive space where individuals and their families receive personalized and dignified end-of-life care.

Hospice Halifax continues to take action against racism and discrimination the workplace and to identify and address systemic barriers to full and equal participation. As such, all members of the team must be committed to fostering a safe working environment where all members experience an authentic sense of inclusion and belonging.

**About the Role**

As a member of a multidisciplinary team, the **Social Work and Programs Manager **is responsible for providing psycho-social-spiritual support to patients and families with a wide range of program and service needs. This role conducts needs assessments, oversees data collection, and contributes to grant proposals and reports related to support services and larger organizational objectives, as needed. The Manager provides oversight, leadership, and case management to the Support Services team in its delivery of Hospice Halifax’s bereavement programs and services, including the supervision of the Support Services team (Bereavement Social Worker, Music Therapist, Bereavement Counsellor, Nav-CARE Volunteer Coordinator, and any social work student practicum placements). The role works closely with the Clinical team to deliver multi-faceted patient-family centered care.

**Duties and Responsibilities**:
**Social Work Delivery**
As the primary psycho-social-spiritual support for patients and families at Hospice Halifax:

- Works closely with, and provides consultation services to, Hospice Halifax’s multidisciplinary team to support patients and their families, while focusing on enhancing end-of-life care
- Assesses patient and family status upon admission to hospice, identifying family dynamics, communication patterns, support service needs and barriers to care
- Develops and coordinates support plans for patients and their families, relating to their well-being, including individual meetings with families and patients, bereavement programming, crisis intervention, grief counselling, complementary/alternative therapies, etc.
- Provides assistance to patients and families in the preparation of advance directives, funeral/memorial planning and fiscal, legal and healthcare planning responsibilities at the end of life
- Identifies and uses appropriate community resources, assesses patient/family ability to access those and advocates for access as needed
- Organizes and coordinates supportive and complementary therapies for patients and families (i.e. massage, pet therapy, reiki, etc.)
- Organizes and coordinates the Spiritual Care Network, a community of faith-based leaders who volunteer their services as needed to Hospice Halifax patients
- Supports the planning and facilitation of bereavement programming (i.e. anticipatory grief groups, bereavement groups, children’s groups, recreational therapy groups, etc.)
- Integrates cultural awareness and humility within the hospice environment, including the coordination of cultural services and accommodations for patients and families
- Engages with external organizations and processes to meet patient/family needs in regards to visitation, access, information collection and other needs (i.e. Department of Community Services, Department of Justice, etc.)
- Contributes to the professional education of students completing learning practicums with Hospice Halifax (i.e. supervising social work student practicums)
- Builds capacity through strengthening community relationships and providing community education regarding social work services at Hospice Halifax
- Assumes additional responsibilities as required

**Program Development**
Oversees the development, implementation, and case management of the following bereavement programs alongside the Support Services team:

- Adult bereavement programming (individual and group)
- Family recreational/complementary therapy programming
- Individual legacy programming for patients/families
- Anticipatory grief support
- In-house educational programming
- Children/youth bereavement programming

**Leadership**
Contribute to the Hospice Halifax leadership and management team through:

- Operational decision-making
- Crisis management
- Quality and improvement committee membership
- Justice, equity, di