Support Worker
A support worker helps people who draw on care and support to be able to live their lives, this may involve aspects of personal care, support with everyday life or supporting them to live independently.
You may work in a residential home or out in the local community, you could be working with people with substance abuse issues, a learning disability or a mental health condition.
Day-to-day activities
Key responsibilities:
- Supporting individuals with different aspects of everyday living, including housing and finance as well as social activities.
- Supporting people with life skills such as budgeting and cooking.
- Working with the person and their family to design their own care plan.
- Providing emotional support.
- Supporting individuals to improve and maintain their well-being.
- Working in teams with other professionals such as social workers.
Requirements for the role
Skills
What you’ll need:
- The ability to treat people with dignity.
- Supervisory or team leading skills.
- Good interpersonal skills.
- Good listening and observational skills.
- Build and maintain positive relationships with others and seek their views when needed.
- Be open to new digital knowledge and skills that may enhance performance in the care sector.
- Be caring, compassionate and empathetic towards others, acknowledging the differences between individuals.
- An enhanced DBS (Disclosure and Barring Service) check would be required.
Qualifications
You will also need:
- For some roles there are no formal entry-level qualifications, but applicants need to have strong English and numeracy skills (GCSE Grades A-C).
- You could apply directly (many places offer training whilst in the job), take on an apprenticeship, or take a college course.
- Level 2 Diploma in Care, this level helps you gain a solid knowledge base and involves practical, work-related experience, often through a work placement one day a week.
- Don’t worry if you don’t have these qualifications – if you’re interested in getting them, you can work towards them once you start the job.
Training & Progression
You can also benefit from:
- Moving your practice to a Level 3 standard, potentially through a diploma or apprenticeship route, you can also complete setting-specific areas of practice through the optional units in the Level 3 Diploma in Adult Care or an apprenticeship.
- In any role you’ll have to do some mandatory training; this might include moving and handling, health and safety, food hygiene, fire safety or a condition specific awareness course.
- There should be plenty of opportunities to do additional training at work and this could include classroom based training, e-learning or on the job training.
View our career pathways tool to help guide you with your future in social care.
Browse our learning opportunities page to help get the support you are looking for.
Making people smile
“I’ve always wanted to help people as much as I can, but I never thought I could do it as a job. Being able to make people smile and happy for a job is amazing, it doesn’t feel real it’s out of this world. It’s an amazing thing to be able to do and I’m so pleased I kept an open mind and came into it.”
Liam Scope-Mearns
