Part-time (17.5 hours per week) fixed-term contract

About One Family
One Family is Ireland’s organisation for people parenting alone, sharing parenting, and separating. We believe in an Ireland where every family and child is respected and cherished equally. We have been working with one-parent families for over 50 years. We provide a range of direct services to parents and children, along with campaigning and advocating for legislative and social change to deliver true equality for all families.

About the role
The purpose of this role is to strengthen relationships between adolescents, living in one parent families and their parent. The ideal candidate will have experience and training in working with this age group and will respond to the challenges currently faced by these families.

This position will be based at One Family’s offices in Smithfield, Dublin 7 and at other locations intermittently for inter-agency meetings, as required. Some hybrid working is possible subject to negotiation.

Role & Responsibilities

• Engage parents and young people in short term Counselling/Psychotherapy both in person and online.
• Provide high-quality individual counselling and psychotherapy to adolescent presenting with a range of emotional and psychological difficulties and to those impacted by conflictual separations.
• Manage an agreed clinical caseload from assessment and allocation through therapeutic intervention, review and planned discharge.
• Assess and manage clinical risk including self-harm, safeguarding concerns and other significant clinical risks.
• Engage with referring professionals in clarifying the context of a referral and the scope of work.
• Maintain all quality/professional standards and codes of practice.
• Attend monthly Counselling team meetings and internal One Family meetings and training as required.
• Attend monthly line management supervision.
• Attend paid external supervision to a ratio agreed with One Family.
• Maintain all relevant service user records and service data.
• Follow all of One Family’s policies and procedures.
• Contribute to evaluations, policy development, reports and funding applications as requested.
• Be managed by the Counselling Manager and take direction where appropriate on issues relating to service users.
• Maintain a high professional and ethical standard in the provision of care to service users and work within the agreed ethos of the One Family Counselling Service.
• Undertake other areas of work where necessary or as requested by the Counselling Manager

Essential Experience & Skills

• A recognised qualification at minimum Level 8 or higher qualification on the NQAI framework in Counselling or Psychotherapy.
• Be a fully accredited Counsellor/Psychotherapist with an appropriate recognised professional body such as IACP, IAHIP, FTAI or an equivalent recognised professional body.

Ideal Experience & Skills

• Demonstrable experience in engaging with and working with adolescents.
• Have a minimum of three-year professional experience working in a similar context.
• Have a client-focussed perspective.
• Be enthusiastic and motivated.
• Have competent ICT knowledge and skills.
• Have knowledge of the issues facing people who are parenting alone.

One Family provide a range of benefits including:

• Employee Assistance Programme
• Cycle to Work scheme
• Two staff privilege days: Christmas Eve & Good Friday

Employment Type

This is a part-time, fixed term contract from October 2026 to June 2027. The role is subject to a three-month probationary period and to all the Policies and Procedures of One Family. One Family is an equal opportunities employer. The salary for this role is €27,173.00 for 17.5 hours/week which is based on a full-time salary of €54,346.00 for a 35 hour/week role.

Application Process

A cover letter, CV addressing the required competencies should be emailed to Maura Leahy at mleahy@onefamily. Your application should be marked clearly: One Family ‘Adolescent Counsellor’. If you require any reasonable accommodation for interview, please include this in your email when you are applying for the role.Shortlisting will apply. A panel may be formed as a result of this recruitment process.

Closing date for applications is 12 noon on 11th September 2026.Garda Vetting, satisfactory references, verification of qualifications and confirmation of current professional accreditation will be required prior to the successful candidate taking up the post. This role is part-funded by the HSE Sexual Health Programme (SHP) and the Community Foundation Ireland, RTE Toy Show Appeal.