Team Leader Review

My role involves being in charge of the pub when either the manager or assistant manager is not present. This means I have to cash up, lock up and ensure all laws and regulations are adhered to while providing good customer service. Also this role involves being a point of call for members of staff when issues arrive and being able to help them solve their problems. I often have to help train new members of staff when they first start also.

I have learned to be more confident in my work and understand that I am very capable of doing my job. I have also come to understand better that in hospitality there are many different points of views and not everyone is correct and not everyone is wrong. There is often a point in the middle which would make the most sense. Any ideas can be good I have also through the course of this apprenticeship learned how to better deal with members of staff and how to garner more respect from them.

I moderately enjoyed the programme, at times I found the questions to be tedious and very difficult to understand. I think the questions should be looked over again to see if there is a clearer way to portray the questions. The practical work was enjoyable to some extent but difficult to organise some things or notice that it applied to the work I had been doing. I was also a bit disheartened when I was 2 weeks from completion in March and the pandemic hit and was unable to complete my course until August.

The programme is structured well. The key points were understandable the way they had to be presented and the overall portal system used by lifetime was easy. Arranging meeting with my trainer and getting into contact with him was also very easy. My only complaint as said before was that the questions could be a bit clearer or asked differently. This was what mainly put me off doing questions for a long time but I persevered.

I had a lot of support from my employer. My manager helped along the way whenever it was necessary such as setting up meetings, allowing me to train new members of staff or even as simple as listening to some ideas i had that would help to move my progression forward. Other staff members were also vital in obtaining this as they took time out of their own day to come and have a chat with me or to help with my ideas too.

My training provider gave me endless support. He was always arranging meets when it suited me. He was available for emails constantly and even during the pandemic he checked up to see how things were going. He even finished up as much as we could before furlough started for both of us then when it returned he made my work a priority to be able to complete.

I feel like just being able to be more observant through the training and understanding different points of view will be the biggest skills. A lot of the work that I did for this qualification came from work that I had already been doing for a long time so it was nice to know I had already worked towards making great leaps in my progression before I had even started the qualification. Funnily enough I think it helped me learn more about the food side of things because I had never really thought much about it.

No not really. We have often went on nights out with each other for staff nights out. However, many of the staff are very close so we often do things outside of work with one another in order to keep the team together. We also sometimes have competitions in work to see who can sell the most of certain products which can often more than not become very heated and competitive for the staff involved.

Yes

I think its an enjoyable place to work most of the time. It has taken me a number of years to see that people do appreciate the work that you put in to the industry and your work does pay off. Wage wise its ok and up until the pandemic it seemed like a very secure job to have. Even during the pandemic Greene King have topped up wages at times and tried their best to not have to let go of any staff.

Be prepared for some hard work. Working in a bar isn't as easy as people make it out to be. Don't take yourself too seriously when working and always try to have a little fun with the customers. It helps you feel better while working and will ultimately give the customer a better experience. If you drink then try and sample as many of your alcoholic beverages so that you can give tips and recommendations to customers.