Role: Area Manager for the Portadown and Newry areas
Company: PBNI
Track Record: “The biggest challenges for me are to remain resilient to the pace of work, to keep abreast of the frequent changes in criminal justice, and to make thinking space to allow for decisions to be defensible and reasonable.”
What does your job entail?
Everything the Probation Board for NI (PBNI) does is about contributing to making NI safer and ensure there are fewer victims of crime.
As an area manager for the PBNI, I am team leader of a group of probation officers and other staff in the Portadown and Newry areas, and I am the local representative of PBNI at various multi-agency meetings in those areas.
The team I manage consists of over 20 staff with various roles. My job on a daily basis is to support and develop staff as well as to ensure that offenders are managed according to the required standards.
PBNI is involved at all key stages of the criminal justice process; at courts, in prisons and in the community. In my team the main roles of staff are to provide assessments to courts on convicted offenders, as well as supervising offenders who are subject to Court Orders.
As area manager I need to read reports and regularly monitor cases, and then have professional discussions with staff about their work. I also chair regular multi-disciplinary risk management meetings, which exist in order to assess and plan for managing the risk of harm posed by certain offenders on probation.
Is it 9-5?
Frequently some of our most important work is done outside office hours and the representational aspect of the job can mean regularly working outside the 9-5. For example, I attend my local Policing and Community Safety Partnership meetings in Craigavon, which will often be in the evenings. I also am one of a number of ‘out of hours’ managers, providing a service for emergency situations. This could be a late evening application for an arrest warrant if required, for example, if a high risk offender had absconded from their approved hostel accommodation.
How did you get into this line of work?
Following social work training, I worked in Social Services in family and childcare, before joining Probation in 2003 having had an interest in criminal justice work. I became an area manager in 2008, after a number of years working as a probation officer.
Outline your qualifications/training and your career to date
My undergraduate degree was in civil engineering, but after a couple of years I realised it wasn’t the path I wanted to go down. I finished the degree, and then took two years out to gain work experience in the field of social work.
The first of these was spent in Vancouver, and the second as a full-time voluntary worker in a residential addiction unit in Belfast, before commencing post graduate social work training at Queen’s University.
Following the social work course I worked initially as a social worker in Craigavon, before starting as a probation officer in Newry. All probation officers are social-work qualified.
I then secured an area manager job in 2008, initially managing PBNI’s specialist community service team in Belfast, before moving to my current post in early 2011.
What qualities are required for your job — personal and professional?
My job is incredibly varied, which is both a challenging and also a rewarding aspect of the job.
Today I affirmed a recommendation by a probation officer to return an Order to Court, met with a community group which is funded by PBNI and discussed a number of prolific offending cases with police colleagues at a meeting.
The biggest challenges for me are to remain resilient to the pace of work, to keep abreast of the frequent changes in criminal justice, to make thinking space to allow for decisions to be defensible and reasonable and to keep a balance between home and work.
I find it a very rewarding job, made easier by the quality staff in PBNI and good relationships with colleagues in other agencies with whom I regularly work.
What do you like to do in your spare time?
I like running, (or at least the idea of running), and also getting away in my caravan with my wife and three daughters.
Who has inspired you most in your life?
Various people have inspired me at key points in my life. However, my first manager in PBNI, Rita O’Hare, made a significant impression on me, and she has had a big influence on my professional life.
For more information on the Probation Board for Northern Ireland (PBNI) visit www.pbni.org.uk, phone (028) 9026 2400 or email info@pbni.gsi.gov.uk