Whitbread Reviews

Current Employee – been working at Whitbread

Pros – big, friendly, close to home

Cons – low wages no career options

Advice to Senior Management – none

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend

Former Employee – worked at Whitbread part-time for more than a year

Pros – Often the Front of House teams in the restaurants are quite young so this can make for a fun and sociable working life. Wages and the tip system is brilliant if you're a waiter - can double earnings. Lots of shifts and over-time usually available and people will be quite flexible about swapping shifts.

Cons – Too much brand standards to adhere to and which are changed too often. Sometimes feel the service is just too rigid and pushes individuality out of Front of House staff - can even take customer focus away from staff as they are under time and performance pressures. Management seems to change rather regularly in the restaurants, not very coherent for staff - and often favoritism and personal relationships get in the way of effective management.
I also feel career progression is poor - many at the restaurant I worked at had worked there for years and despite pushing, were getting nowhere with progression.

Advice to Senior Management – Stop changing the brand standards and the menus so often, or if you do, provide REAL training on these changes. Work on having slower turnover of management at each site, it's confusing for the team. Have a better talent spotting system for those wanting to progress into a career with the company.

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend

Current Employee – been working at Whitbread full-time for more than 7 years

Pros – well, really difficult to find any. only one thing may be positive if your work as waiter/waitress - tips, otherwise well underpaid job for work you doing.

Cons – staff meals/drinks - paid, unpaid breaks (it doesnt matter if you take one or not, till system will clock you out autoamticlly after 6 hours, for UNPAID 30 min) , loads of responsibilities (upselling, upsizing, cleaning, advertising, brand standard) for min wage, company doesnt care about their own workers, any good ideas how to improve your working place are ignored, the worst company i ve ever worked for!! No loyality to company, staff demotivated, no benefits to be a part of whitbread whatsoever,

Advice to Senior Management – put more focus on yours staff not on the figuers - we are human not robots, appraciate our hard work,

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend

Former Employee – worked at Whitbread

Pros – Hard to say as nothing jumps to mind. I guess there is some comfort in knowing that the vast majority of your colleagues are in the same bad situation as you are. With a network as big as Whitbreads there is in theory a lot of opportunity for career advancement, however in reality unless you are an ass-kisser then you will get nowhere!

Cons – Poor salary. Understaffed and therefore very over worked. Working in an enviroinment where there is zero room for anything out of the norm to happen without serious consequence to operations, makes for an extremely stressful life. And when these types of issue are not standard across your competitors, you feel totally demotivated and no loyalty to the company.

Advice to Senior Management – Look after your employees - think about their quality of work environment. Stop over working your people, and treat them as you would like to be treated

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend

Former Employee – worked at Whitbread full-time for more than a year

Pros – The shifts are very flexible, easy to pick up extra shifts if needed,
A very good social side and incentives.

Cons – There is not much room to progress, They can cut your shifts down to very few hours as long as the 6 week average matches your contract.

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend

Current Employee – been working at Whitbread

Pros – Friendly people, relaxed and informal working environment, great benefits package with competitive bonus and Sharesave schemes. Great variety of brands to work with and progression across the company is actively encouraged

Cons – Location of Head Office is difficult to reach by public transport and being in the middle of an industrial estate means it is not easy to get to shops etc at lunchtime

Advice to Senior Management – Continue innovating

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend

Former Employee – worked at Whitbread

Pros – The people are salt of the earth, the location is easy to get to, the work is interesting and the money so so...

Cons – Senior management a bit clueless, in the main its not cutting edge.

Advice to Senior Management – Look at your staff (past & present) and look at some of the choices you've made. With hindsight - were they the right choices? Think hard!

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend