Flexible Hours - Waitress Farnham Castle Employee Review

Beautiful historic building with gorgeous grounds. Casuals and most staff members are great to work with and are easy to get along with.

Where to start?! Many of the challenges in this work environment stem from the Venue Director. She berates all staff members, defends useless and creepy employees and has a total lack of knowledge on the hospitality industry. While imposing unrealistic expectations she makes it almost impossible for anyone to do their job effectively by bullying them, imposing unreasonable targets, and generally interrupting the business day to complain and remind you that you aren’t working hard enough wasting your time that could be spent doing everything she is complaining about. The culture in the office is beyond toxic. With employees regularly crying or being burnt out as a natural state. You think it would be easy to potentially address these issues with Human Resources but unfortunately the HR representative is the Venue Director, who is also on the board of directors and is your direct report within the office. Aside from being outstandingly frustrating it is a huge conflict of interest as if you did want to speak up you could risk termination. While there is some training on systems, packages and selling there is nothing further beyond this. No health and safety training, no cross training of departments, and no training offered to potentially further your career. There is chronic understaffing. In an effort to save money employees are pushed to their absolute limits. Many roles have been abolished and workload divided amongst remaining staff adding further fuel to an early burnout. The contract you sign when you are employed (a fate I wouldn’t wish on my worst enemy) is very well worded to make you a trapped circus monkey forced to complete any number of ridiculous tasks for any number of hours (well in to overtime) deemed fit and appropriate by… you guessed it… the Venue Director. There are also no benefits beyond your pay check. There is no commission, medical benefits, TRONC or even praise for the effort that goes into this job. Only consider working at this venue if it is your absolute last hope but know that you will walk away with shredded mental health, probable physical health issues and absolutely no experience in actually selling, planning or running events.

*Stunning venue *Friendly and empathetic fellow event and casual staff

*You will be expected to waive the Working Times Regulation Act *you will be expected to come in at 9am the following day if you have finished delivering an event at 11pm the night prior *expect really condescending and short tempered demeanour from Head of Sales who despite being overworked herself, is so far down the rabbit hole to stand up for herself *expect to be given no formal training *expect to be reimbursed with leftover half-drunk bottles of wine for your overtime instead of pay