Associate Director of Nursing – Mental Health

Are you a senior mental health nursing leader ready to influence practice on a national scale, shape safer services and drive excellence across complex and secure care environments? Join Elysium Healthcare as Associate Director of Nursing – Mental Health Services and play a pivotal role in strengthening nursing quality, safety and professional practice across our mental health services.

This is a high-profile clinical leadership and advisory role, providing specialist expertise across a range of mental health environments, with a particular focus on forensic and secure services. Working closely with the Chief Nurse, Clinical Director and Operations Director, you will provide expert guidance on nursing practice, helping services deliver safe, effective and recovery-focused care while ensuring adherence to security requirements and professional standards.

As the subject matter expert for mental health nursing, you will lead on key areas including violence reduction, relational security, risk management and long-term segregation, ensuring robust nursing standards are maintained across PICU, Medium Secure, Low Secure and High Secure pathways. Through your expertise and influence, you will support services in strengthening quality, improving patient safety and embedding best practice across the organisation.

You will play a key role in supporting governance, assurance and quality improvement programmes, providing specialist nursing input into service development initiatives and helping teams achieve compliance with national standards, regulatory expectations and organisational policies. Using data, insight and clinical expertise, you will provide accurate and timely advice to senior leaders, enabling informed decision-making and offering assurance around nursing quality, safety and workforce capability.

Leadership & Strategy

• Act as the lead subject matter expert for Mental Health Secure Services nursing practice within the service line.
• Provide specialist clinical input and advisory direction to support the development of service line nursing practice, aligned with organisational goals and Nursing Directorate priorities.
• Promote compassionate, recovery‑focused, person‑centred nursing care.
• Offer specialist clinical guidance to Nursing and Operational Leads to promote consistency in practice standards across all services.

Clinical Governance & Quality

• Provide specialist input into governance processes to support safe, effective and high-quality care delivery.
• Advise and support services in embedding learning from incidents, complaints and audits into practice.
• Support services to maintain regulatory compliance and NMC standards.
• Promote and support the application of evidence-based practice and improvement science across the service line.

Workforce Development & Professional Leadership

• Provide professional leadership influence and specialist guidance to high standards of practice and conduct.
• Provide specialist advice to support nursing workforce planning to ensure safe skill mix and capability.
• Support high quality supervision, appraisal and professional development.
• Promote advanced and specialist nursing roles relevant to the service line.

Service Development, Pathways & Projects

• Lead as a subject matter expert into the development of clinical pathways, supporting consistent adoption across services within the Mental Health Secure Services service line.
• Ensure nursing interventions are evidence based, measurable and aligned to best practice.
• Oversee clinical documentation, standards and nursing procedural frameworks.

Clinical Consultancy & Support

• Provide senior nursing expertise for high‑risk, complex or challenging clinical cases.
• Offer professional input into MDT discussions and clinical risk management.
• Support teams during periods of heightened escalation or acuity.
• Clinically based at least 2 days a week.

• Work collaboratively with operational, medical, AHP, psychology, social work and governance leaders.
• Represent the nursing perspectives within service‑line governance and transformation programmes.
• Engage positively with families, carers, commissioners and external partners.

• Use nursing metrics, audit findings and patient experience data to drive improvement.
• Provide timely professional assurance reports to senior leadership.
• Support development of meaningful nursing outcome measures.

To be successful in this role, you will need:

• Specialist training in forensic mental health, security, or risk management.
• MAPPA training (D).
• STMVA/therapeutic safety training qualification (trainer level desirable).
• Secure pathways (PICU, MSU, LSU) and relational/procedural/physical security interfaces.
• Forensic risk assessment models (HCR 20, START, SAPROF) (knowledge level).
• Violent and challenging behaviour management, restrictive practice reduction and sensory/trauma-informed approaches.
• MHA legislation, recall, CTOs, Section 17 leave, and security linked risk governance.
• Current NMC registration (RN/RMN/RNLD as relevant to service line).
• Degree-level qualification (or equivalent experience)
• Master’s level qualification (e.g., Advanced Clinical Practice, Leadership/Management, Quality Improvement) or equivalent senior leadership experience.
• Evidence of ongoing CPD aligned to role (leadership, governance, safeguarding, improvement methods).
• Formal training in improvement science/Lean/QI (D).
• Coaching/mentoring accreditation (D).
• Expert knowledge of clinical governance, risk management and regulatory compliance (NMC Code, CQC expectations, safeguarding, incident learning systems).
• Advanced leadership & change capability: able to set a vision, engage stakeholders, and embed practice change at scale across multiple sites.
• Pathway & model‑of‑care design: translating national guidance and NICE into operational nursing standards, SOPs, competencies and documentation.
• Data & assurance literacy: uses KPIs, clinical audit, patient experience and workforce indicators to prioritise, evidence impact, and report assurance.
• High‑stakes communication & influence: credible at Board/ Regional level and with external partners; skilled in negotiation, conflict resolution and just culture approaches.
• Talent & culture development: builds supervision frameworks, succession pipelines, and advanced practice pathways; sets and sustains standards of behaviour and professional conduct.
• Safeguarding leadership (Adults/CYP as appropriate), including escalation pathways and multi‑agency working.
• Equality, Diversity & Inclusion: demonstrable commitment to inclusive leadership, culturally responsive care and staff experience.
• Resilience & professional integrity: acts decisively and ethically under pressure; role‑models values and psychological safety.

Experience

• Substantial senior nursing leadership in relevant services (matron/lead nurse/HoN/ADoN level) across complex, multi‑site environments.
• Delivering measurable improvement in safety, quality and experience through QI, audit and practice development.
• Leading pathway implementation end‑to‑end (design → rollout → evaluation), with assurance and sustainability.
• Managing clinical risk at scale, including serious incident oversight, thematic learning and governance reporting to senior committees.
• Workforce development: establishing supervision/appraisal frameworks, advancing specialist/advanced roles, shaping safe skill‑mix.
• Strategic partnership working with operations, medical, AHP, psychology, social work and external agencies.
• Inspection readiness & response: leading services through CQC or equivalent reviews, gap analyses and action plans.
• Budget awareness and resource prioritisation in a service context (D).

Other Requirements

• Ability to travel across regional sites; flexible to meet service needs.

What You’ll Get

At Elysium Healthcare, we believe in taking care of the people who care for others, you’ll enjoy a comprehensive benefits package designed to support your wellbeing, growth, and future:

• Competitive annual salary
• £5,000 car allowance
• The equivalent of 33 days annual leave (including bank holidays) – plus your birthday off and the option to buy additional annual leave, in our annual selection window.
• Career development and training to help you achieve your professional goals
• Access to our Rewards & Benefits platform Ely-Vate; Your one-stop destination for everyday savings, exclusive benefits, and wellbeing hub!
• Wellbeing support and activities to help you maintain a healthy work-life balance
• Access to Blue Light Card, which provides a range of exclusive offers and discounts
• Life Assurance, for added peace of mind
• Stream – instant access to earned wages when you need it, plus access to save, directly from your wages, alongside financial wellbeing support.
• 24/7 GP service and second medical opinion, to ensure you are the best you can be
• Enhanced Maternity Package, so you can truly enjoy this special time
• Pension contribution, to help secure your future

About us:

Elysium Health care has over 8,000 employees and a unique approach to the delivery of care. With a network of over 80 services across England and Wales covering Mental Health, Neurological, Learning Disabilities & Autism, Children & Education, there is opportunity for you to grow and move. 

Elysium Healthcare is part of Ramsay Health Care with a global network that extends across 10 countries and employs over 86,000 people globally. 

Elysium Healthcare follows safer recruitment of staff for all appointments and is a Disability Confident employer, committed to inclusive and accessible recruitment. It is a requirement that all staff understand it is each person’s individual responsibility to promote and safeguard the welfare of service users. All candidates will be subject to a DBS disclosure