Cara Operations Reviews

Pros

The management /owners were great. It was a busy location with great tips. The staff was fun, overall it was a great place to work. I only left the job because I moved.

Cons

A sometimes unpredictable business flow, but that is normal in the service industry. As a senior staff member I had great hours and made great money there, as a new hire it would take a little longer to build up to this point.

Pros

Very smart, high performing people who set the bar high
Great restaurant brands
Passion for food
Focus on talent management
Opportunities for advancement if you're willing to work hard

Cons

Difficult to achieve work/life balance

Advice to Senior Management

Cara's vision is great and one that many can get behind. Advice is to remember that we run restaurants, that the line level associates are the key to our Guests, and to be friendly and treat all levels equally.

Pros

They pay more than minimum wage

Cons

Boring work for a summer student

Pros

I have been here for 2 years and things are finally getting better! We recently received our merit increases and the company and reinstated the 5% RRSP matching program - yeah! They have begun to rehire people and people seem focused, expecially the past few months.

There is a great gym on the upper level, which has everything.

Cons

It is an open office environment which can be difficult to get used to, though it also has it benefits. Lunch in the cafeteria is overpriced, though it's discounted.

Advice to Senior Management

more communication to Associates in future growth plans and franchising.

Pros

Below the Senior Management level there was a good group of people to work with. For many it felt there was more than just a Team environment.
Benefit package though cut back was still pretty good in comparison to other equivalent firms.
Vision for the long term of the company was correct even though it was not properly executed causing much of the troubles the company is in today.

Cons

Senior Management lost touch on how to communicate properly with their employees not unless you were a Queens Graduate.
Respect of knowledge from long term employees was not solicited.
Senior Management coming from a Marketing Oriented company could not adapt to working in an Operational environment. No experience on how to deal with real people. There past was to worry about getting the product on a store shelf and doing what it takes to get people to purchase it. Having to deal with real consumers was too much of an adjustment for them.
Senior Management made some questionable decisions such as a New Head Office where they do not even own the property but a friend of Don's does.
These decisions may have resulted in the mass layoffs that occurred. Severance packages were dismal but necessary to allow them to continue to pay the ridiculous salaries of Queens Graduates straight out of school.

Advice to Senior Management

Understand the need for the change but removing your base of knowledge completely is a very questionable business practice. Book smarts is not always the best way to operate in a Service Oriented environment.

Pros

There is a “good base” salary for front line managers. Salary can get better based on your performance. Bonus program is above average for senior front line mangers. Benefit program is great!

Cons

The little amount of praise from upper management, when over performing. The lack of information provided to front line managers about changes within the brands. An abundance of people changes to deal with.

Advice to Senior Management

Build stronger realationships with your front line managers. Get more feedback from the front line employees. Have team building meetings with all managers from all brands.

Pros

Opportunity to Advance. Opportunity to lead important programs. Great collection of competent people from various backgrounds

Cons

Not a very good training organization.

Advice to Senior Management

Invest in growing everyone, not a select few

Pros

Cara maintains a reasonable benefit plan for its employees while a lot other companies are cutting back the benefit. The new office is nice.

Cons

Surely, Cara is following the trend of cutting back on benefit. Sooner or later there won't be any medical coverage.

Advice to Senior Management

Cara is not a training camp for newly grad. They are even getting more paid then current employees with the same qualifications.

Pros

Compensation before they slowly started taking it away.

Cons

Limited movement and unsupportive management

Advice to Senior Management

no comment

Pros

Ability to move across brands. Definitely some good people at the mid manager level that you can learn from and are genuinely interested in helping you develop

Cons

Overall Culture is poison. Very subjective decisions made on people without much thought to the impacts on the remaining team. Change direction way too often without allowing good people to have impact

Advice to Senior Management

Probably too late to save this puppy. The original vision was ambtious but likely doable if not for the numerous mis-steps.