Career oPPorTUNiTies aT WHiTbreaD

Whitbread is a fTse 100 business with an annual turnover of £1.7bn and 270 years of successful trading experience. Whitbread operates as a hotel business with Premier inn, as a restaurant business with beefeater, brewers fayre, Table Table and Taybarns and as the UK’s favourite coffee chain with Costa.

There are currently more than 49,000 Premier inn bedrooms across 630 hotels, 387 branded restaurants and 1,400 Costa outlets in the UK. Whitbread employs over 38,000 people in the UK and plans to create a further 10,000 jobs over the next three years as it expands its brands aggressively.

as the UK’s leading hospitality business, Whitbread provides a number of leading staff training and development programmes. over the past 12 months Whitbread’s hotels and restaurants business, Whitbread Hotels and restaurants (WHr), has invested £3m in staff development programmes and has provided one million hours of staff training. WHr team members have been awarded 3,600 nationally recognised qualifications since 2008 and over the next 5 years 4,103 team members are expected to go through the Whitbread management Development programme.

WHiTbreaD PlC

Our Brands

There are many advantages of working for the UK’s largest hospitality business. Whitbread has developed industry-leading staff recruitment and training programmes from work placements for those at school through to Gold level management training. more information on our training and recruitment programmes is below:

beNefiTs of WorKiNG for WHiTbreaD

Recruitment

Whitbread is intending to create 10,000 new jobs over the next three years. full and part-time jobs are expected to be created at all levels and in a variety of positions including front of house, kitchen, technical and management positions. Whitbread has the target for 50% of these new jobs to be taken by those not in employment, education or training (NeeTs) and full training is given to all new recruits with properly structured training programmes, assessments and “buddy” schemes in place.

like many leading businesses, Whitbread operates a graduate recruitment programme (targeted at 80 places a year from 2013) and actively participates in jobs fairs and in cooperation with recruitment websites such as notgoingtouni.co.uk.

Work Placements

Whitbread is currently developing 10 day, fully structured work programmes aimed at NeeTs and is currently running a pilot scheme of 50 places in the midlands. The placements have been designed so that applicants benefit from a variety of work experiences whilst still being able to claim Job seekers allowance.

entrants on the Whitbread work placements programme are required to complete a log book and assessment and on completion of the project, each entrant is provided with a reference and feedback form signed by the site manager to help with future job applications. To give applicants the greatest opportunity of finding employment within Whitbread, work placements are targeted at sites where job vacancies may be available so that promising candidates can be offered employment should roles be available. The scheme is targeted to provide 520 places over the next 5 years.

Apprenticeships

all Whitbread employees are entitled to apply for these programmes. The full apprenticeship framework is the equivalent of 5 GCses and there are schemes leading toward catering or hospitality roles. since the scheme’s introduction in 2009 over 3,600 Whitbread team members have achieved Whitbread apprenticeship qualifications and there are over 800 Whitbread employees currently on an apprenticeship programme.

Work Inspiration

Whitbread is experienced at engaging with local schools to help those in education gain valuable work experience. more than 1,200 schools have currently registered an interest in structured work placements and Whitbread is targeting 840 work placements over the next five years. The work placements have been designed to involve site management staff, ensuring a quality experience.

Skills for Life

staff training and development opportunities are widely promoted to existing Whitbread employees. The ‘skills for life’ programme offers the chance for employees who do not have GCse maths or english to develop their literacy and numeracy skills, either as part of an apprenticeship scheme or as stand-alone qualifications.

Career Progression

for Whitbread’s existing team members advanced apprenticeships and high level development are available through the silver, Graphite and Gold levels of the Whitbread “shooting stars” programme. Whitbread plans to pilot the new Higher apprenticeship in Hospitality later this year – the education equivalent of a foundation Degree – and the programme will be embedded into the Gold programme. successful learners have the option to progress into General manager roles.

Deputy General ManagerOperations Manager

gold logoGeneral Manager

NSO, Cluster General Managers

Higher ApprenticeshipHospitality Management

Foundation Degree

Assistant ManagerPremier Inn Manager

Premier Inn Team LeaderSilver Logo

Deputy General ManagerOperations Manager

F&B Manager

Advanced Apprenticeship Hospitality

A Level

Head Chef Graphite Logo Kitchen ManagerAdvanced Apprenticeship

HospitalityA Level

Team LeaderTeam Member

Steel Logo Head ChefChef

Intermediate Apprenticeship

5 GCSE’s

Team LeaderTeam Member

BronzeAssistant Manager

Premier Inn ManagerPremier Inn Team Leader

Intermediate Apprenticeships

5 GCSE’s

Current Role Shooting Stars Programme Next Role Qualification

(optional)Qualification Equivalent

Deputy General manageroperations manager

gold logoGeneral manager

Nso, Cluster General managers

Higher apprenticeshipHospitality management

foundation Degree

assistant managerPremier inn manager

Premier inn Team leadersilver logo

Deputy General manageroperations manager

f&b manager

advanced apprenticeship Hospitality

a level

Head Chef Graphite logo Kitchen manageradvanced apprenticeship

Hospitalitya level

Team leaderTeam member

steel logo Head ChefChef

intermediate apprenticeship

5 GCse’s

Team leaderTeam member

bronzeassistant manager

Premier inn managerPremier inn Team leader

intermediate apprenticeships

5 GCse’s

AVAILABLE LATE 2012

Premier Inn Career Path

Whitbread Restaurant Career Path

Whitbread Shooting Stars Table

Team member Profiles

ashleigh had been unemployed for 8 months when a course run by Job Centre Plus encouraged her to go into a Premier inn and ask for some work experience. ashleigh was given a one week placement and was offered a job when she completed it. Unemployment knocked ashleigh’s confidence but she is learning new skills, enjoys her work and aims to be a manager.

michael joined beefeater as a General assistant aged 18 and worked his way up to assistant manager and then Deputy General manager before taking a short spell away from the Company. on his return to Whitbread he completed the shooting stars Gold level management Development Programme after which he was appointed as a Premier inn General manager. michael is now responsible for six Premier inns in the Hull and Grimsby area, five of which also have branded restaurants but looks forward to taking more responsibility for a larger cluster and meeting new challenges ahead.

Prior to joining Whitbread full-time, James was working at a brewers fayre part-time whilst on the bT graduate programme. after being made redundant from bT, James joined brewers fayre full-time working on the bar and was able to work his way up to an assistant manager role before transferring to a newly opening Premier inn as food & beverage manager. James has completed the Whitbread shooting stars silver level and has been accepted for the Gold level management Development Programme. He hopes to move further up the management scale in Premier inn before moving back into Whitbread’s restaurant division.

Winsome was able to fit a housekeeping role around her family commitments and so applied for a job she saw advertised in her local Job Centre. she got the job and has since moved to a different Premier inn and been promoted twice during her employment with Whitbread, first to room Checker and then again to Team leader. she is now responsible for housekeeping the 100-bedroom hotel and coordinating the staffing within her team.

Winsome has had training in several fields during her time at Whitbread and is now on an apprenticeship course to help with promotion prospects. she hopes to move to new responsibilities in a larger Premier inn.

Ashleigh Robbrestaurant team member london Greenwich

Michael HunterCluster manager Hull & Grimsby

James Tisshawfood & beverage manager Coventry City Centre

Winsome SimmondsHousekeeping Team leader birmingham Central east

20 years old

6 months length of service

28 years old

5 years length of service

25 years old

4.5 years length of service

45 years old

6 years length of service

Case sTUDies

Premier Inn Widnes & Brewers Fayre, Cheshire

Premier inn Widnes is a 60-bedroom hotel located on Venture fields leisure entertainment Complex close to the town centre with a brewers fayre restaurant on site. a total of 75 jobs were created by the hotel and restaurant and 700 people applied for the positions. more than 250 people completed the 2nd round interview and of these 63 were appointed. approximately 33% of the new team members were NeeTs and 51% came from the Job Centre Plus into entry level roles. The remaining team were Whitbread employees from other sites. approximately 90% of team members live within 15km of the site, there are already seven team members studying for NVQs and one team member is waiting to start the bronze shooting stars programme.

General Manager, Premier Inn London Angel Islington

Premier Inn London Heathrow Terminal 5 & Thyme

Premier inn Heathrow Terminal 5 is one of the largest hotels in the Premier inn estate at 400-bedrooms. The hotel opened in 2012 and more than 63 new jobs were created. Whitbread interviewed 110 people for the positions and out of these 63 were appointed. from this number 70% (44) were appointed from the local Job Centre Plus, 18 were Whitbread employees from other sites and one new employee responded to an online advertisement. of the current team members working at the hotel, five are currently working on the Whitbread apprenticeship scheme and four have already completed different levels of the Whitbread shooting stars programme.

Premier Inn London Angel Islington & Thyme, London

The angel islington Premier inn is a 95-bedroom hotel located in a mixed-use development in central london. 61 jobs were created by the hotel and 550 people applied for the roles on offer. more than 220 people were interviewed for the positions and 38 were appointed into a variety of different jobs. The remaining team members were existing Whitbread employees from other sites, or were directly recruited from Hackney Community College which is located close to the site.

of the 61 team members at the hotel, there are already six on the Whitbread apprenticeship scheme, two have already completed the shooting stars programmes and a further two are currently working through the scheme.

60% of team members live nearby less than 5km from the site.

We have developed a close relationship with Hackney Community College who provide several hospitality courses and qualifications for people at all entry levels. We have attended lectures at the college and presented to catering students to inform them about Premier Inn and inspire them to want to start a career with us.

Since then, we have recruited several people from the college and are looking at ways we can offer employment to these students whilst they continue their qualifications.

We have also worked with the local Job Centre to deliver a recruitment day, hosted at Islington Assembly Halls.