Our Leadership Team
Below we introduce you to each of the directors within Children & Families...
Sukriti Sen
Sukriti started as Director of Local Delivery, Children and Families in 2015. She qualified as a social worker in 1992 and obtained an MA in Health and Social Care Management in 2008. She worked in two London boroughs before making the move to Essex. Her social work career has spanned the spectrum of children in need, child protection, looked after children, fostering and adoption, and quality assurance.
Sukriti is a long-standing trustee on the Frontline Board, a DfE-funded social work graduate scheme focused on bringing high-calibre graduates into local authorities to receive training on the job, in addition to obtaining the academic social work qualification.
Sukriti is passionate about improving social work practice and leading positive change. She has a keen interest in learning and development, and is an active member for ECC, on the national Association of Directors of Children’s Services Workforce Policy Committee (ADCS) . She has coached and mentored a number of managers who have stepped into senior positions or have sought support and advice.
Sukriti’s roles as Director for Local Delivery include the leadership of the Mid Quadrant which covers the areas of Chelmsford, Maldon and Braintree.
Nicky O’Shaughnessy
Nicky started in her current post of Director for Local Delivery, North, in February 2015. Nicky had previously been the Director for Mid Essex, for 3.5 years.
Nicky qualified as a social worker in 1989, having completed a 4 year combined social studies honours degree and CQSW.
She has worked in 2 Local Authorities before moving to Essex.
Nicky has had a long and varied career in Essex having had 14 different roles in her 26 years working for the Council – some roles involved working for other parts of the council.
In her career, she has worked across a wide spectrum of services and areas including, early help, managing the ‘front door’, children in need, child protection, children in care, care leavers, Fostering, Youth Offending Service and Agency Decision Maker for Adoption.
Nicky is proud to be a social worker and is passionate about social work and contributing to improving the lives of the children and families we work with. Nicky is a Practice Educator and a qualified leadership coach and mentor. She also has trained as a peer reviewer. Nicky chairs 2 of the Eastern Region Forums and is a great believer in collaboration and joining up opportunities to support, learn and develop.
Nicky’s role as Director for Local Delivery include the leadership of the North Quadrant which covers the areas of Colchester and Tending.
Michelle Hayden-Pepper
I am the Director of Local Delivery for West quadrant I started on the 18th Jan 2021, I came from the London Borough of Lambeth where I was assistant director for safeguarding however this is a return to Essex as I was here from 2010 to 2016 in South quadrant. I am Essex born and bred so returning to Essex is like coming home. I am delighted to be back.
I’m responsible for all the social work teams in West quadrant, which takes in the districts of Uttlesford, Harlow, Epping Forest and Brentwood. I also have overall responsibility for ESCA and the Emergency Duty Service.
I hold the strategic lead for Family support and protection and I am particularly interested in our interventions and how we best create space for excellent social work practice to flourish. I qualified in 1999 where my career started in front line social work practise in child protection and I went on to develop my studies in New Zealand where I completed research for my dissertation on family group conferencing.
I am passionate about social work practice and delivering a safe consistent service to children and families which involves authoritative professional practise that gets alongside families working in partnership to safeguard children. I have a strong belief that children should where possible remain within their families and promote families making decisions about their children wherever safe to do so. I take the role of corporate parent seriously and have high aspirations for child in our care.
I am fundamentally a social worker; I see the social work role as advocating social justice and a voice for those children and families that are underrepresented and marginalised in wider society.
Gaye Cole
Gaye Cole started her role as Director of Local Delivery South in September 2020.
Gaye joined Essex County Council in 1999 as a call taker for the Out of Hours Emergency Duty Team before undertaking her Social Work training through Essex.
She has had a varied career within Essex, working in all the front-line Children’s teams and as a Local Authority Designated Officer (LADO) before moving into management roles. In the past year, Gaye has been working in our Partners in Practice team (PIP) supporting other Local Authorities who are in need of improvement.
Gaye is very passionate about improvement work and enjoys helping others make positive change. The Systemic Leadership and Supervision training has been highly beneficial in delivering the PIP work.
"Helping others find their strengths whether that be children, families or organisations is such a pleasure and a privilege".
In her new role, Gaye will have responsibility for the South Quadrant and will be the strategic lead for a number of areas including Children and Young People with Disability. Gaye is looking forward to driving forward opportunities for this group of young people and working on the SEND agenda.
Paul Secker
Paul is the Director for our Safeguarding function.
This involves being the county wide strategic lead that is responsible for:
- The Professional Standards and Audit service
- Essex Safeguarding Children's Board
Dave Barron
Dave qualified as a Social Worker in 1997 and started with Essex from college. Prior to starting with Essex Dave worked in 4 residential establishments caring with a wide range of children for over 15 years.
During his 24 years in Essex Dave has worked across a wide range of services. He started his career as a Social Worker in a Child Protection Investigation (CPI) Team in Basildon (South Quadrant) and soon began to contribute to Multi-Agency Training through the District Child Protection Committee. This involvement lead onto a post as the Training & Develop Manager for the Essex Child Protection Committee where he was involved in all aspect of the committee’s work including delivering safeguarding training a small football clubs to UK armed forces who flew personnel from around the world for the training. He also organised the 1st regional conference following the Victoria Climbie inquiry.
Dave moved on to manage a CPI team in Chelmsford until 2008 when he moved to manage a Children in Care Team back in South. In 2012 Dave was appointed to Service Manager for CIC South where he managed CIC, Leaving & After Care, Fostering and the Contact Service. In 2015 have moved across to manage Family Support & Protection South which remains his substantive post. Dave has been actively involved in the improvement work Essex does with other Local Authorities and was seconded to work in our Partners In Practice team in 2018. In 2019 Dave along with another colleague travelled to the Turks & Caicos Island to support improvement in Social Work practice, joint working with Police and safeguarding.
Dave is currently seconded to Head of Children’s Improvement Partnership and is involved in support improvement in Essex and with a number of other Local Authorities.