Cemetery Assistant (Memorial)
Service: Bereavement Services
Grade scale: Grade 2 Level 2
Reports to: Cemeteries Officer
Purpose of the job
To ensure the provision of a professional bereavement service and provide support to the Cemeteries Officer to achieve a quality service which complies with legislative and health and safety requirements of all related cemetery services.
Key tasks and responsibilities
To be responsible for carrying out risk assessments in relation to cemeteries issues
To assist all lair arrangements within South Lanarkshire Council’s cemeteries.
To undertake the inspection and monitoring of existing memorials.
To assist in the development, implementation and compliance of a range of cemetery specifications.
To prepare statistics and reports to support all levels of management and committee.
To ensure frontline staff provide the highest standards of customer service, dealing with customer enquiries, requests and complaints.
To ensure all necessary administrative arrangements are complete to allow for burial.
Person specification
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Criteria |
Essential |
Desirable |
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Education, qualification and training |
Hold or willing to work towards an industry recognised certification in cemetery headstone safety Ability to demonstrate competence through job experience |
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Skills, knowledge, experience |
Comfortable using Microsoft Office applications such as Word, Excel, and Outlook, and able to produce standard documents, organise information, and communicate appropriately. A wide and comprehensive range of administrative skills. Strong interpersonal and communication skills, with the ability to handle enquiries effectively and provide clear, helpful support. Supervisory experience with the ability to organise team workload. Ability to adapt to changing priorities and workloads in a fast paced environment Excellent customer care skills Demonstrable ability to communicate effectively and sensitively, both verbally and in writing, with strong active listening skills. |
Previous experience in a bereavement services environment
Previous experience working with memorial safety |
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Personal qualities |
Calm and professional when responding to unplanned or urgent situations. Demonstrate a professional, dignified and courteous manner when dealing with colleagues and customers. Understanding and awareness of working in an emotive environment |
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Other |
To demonstrate behaviours consistent with honesty and openness: treating people consistently, fairly and with respect Inclusive and supportive team player |
Full UK Driving Licence |
Safer recruitment checks
As part of our approach to good practice and safer recruitment we carry out a number of pre-employment checks
- Asylum and Immigration right to work in the UK.
- Reference check: external candidates require 2 references, one of which must be from present or most recent employer; Internal candidates require 1 reference from current line manager.
- Candidate Disclosure Scotland check, where applicable.
Behaviour framework
The council’s behaviour framework is a set of core behaviours that defines how employees approach work to enable the delivery of key tasks for the role. The expected behaviours for this role are:
Efficient
- Punctual and conscientious in your approach to work.
- Use council resources efficiently, avoiding waste and unnecessary expense.
- Identify inefficiency in processes and communicate this to your manager.
- Meet deadlines and targets in your day-to-day work.
- Understand the impact of wasteful behaviours on the environment and you act to minimise this impact.
- Use of information technology to achieve best outcomes.
Flexible
- Willing to learn new tasks and accept new ways of working.
- Willing to be flexible in your approach to work to meet changing service delivery needs, deadlines and urgent priorities.
- Help team members when they have urgent deadlines and prioritise your work accordingly.
- Understand the need for change and are open to this across your working life.
Performing
- Is polite, professional and friendly to customers and apply customer care standards and attitudes at all times.
- Works safely to maintain the safety of yourself and other raising concerns about unsafe working practices.
- Meets standards of work required in your role in terms of quality and output.
- Uses initiative to solve problems and raise potential issues.
- Acknowledges when mistakes are made and learns from them.
- Seeks feedback on your performance to learn and improve.
Working with others
- Works alongside internal and external colleagues to meet common objectives.
- Has professional relationships with colleagues and is aware of dignity at work standards.
- Actively and respectfully listens to people in order to understand them and their views.
- Contributes appropriately in team and other meetings and discussions.
- Presents words and views clearly in a way that other people find meaningful.
- Respects diversity and promotes equality of opportunity when working with colleagues and members of the public.
Leading
- Role models the standards of behaviours expected of a South Lanarkshire Council employee.
- Displays and enables leadership through sharing knowledge and skills, seeking guidance and providing support to your colleagues, team and the wider community.
- Is aware of and adheres to professional codes of practice and the council’s code of conduct and understand how these impact on employment with the council and public perception of council employees.