Choice Hotels Reviews

Pros

- If you're unionized, it's great pay for the job.
- Ownership treats employees well.
- Really good discounts on hotels and plenty of options to utilise them.

Cons

- The most political place I have ever worked at. Gossip was rampant. It's worse than high school.
- If you are educated (college/uni) your mind will go numb fast from the tasks of the job. It is very likely that you will be more intelligent than almost all the managers there.
- A lot of "lifers". A couple of them are very hice and helpful, but most of them just want to coast by until retirement.
- Believe it or not you will get yelled at by your co-workers if you want to do more work...goes with the attitude of being in a union.

Advice to Senior Management

If I were to make changes, I would get some new blood in, especially at the management level. Some of them can not even formulate a basic sentence correctly (I'm serious)

Pros

Good work atmosphere, no micro management

Cons

few opportunities for promotion, not enough feedback

Pros

Benefits are good, people are nice. The pay is decent. Training is well done and prepares you for most of the issues that are required to do the job.

Cons

The calls are all very similiar. The franchissees are rude and barely speak english and constantly belittle you when you are trying to help them when they have made a mistake.

Advice to Senior Management

Enforce a penelty on the franchisees that are constantly rude to the call center personnel. This is the reason for a high turnover rate in the call center.

Pros

nice people, currently free parking, free coffee still available. interesting for the most part in marketing, good. current location. good hours

Cons

layoffs!!!!! executives not being cut... lots of admin and "little guys" so the exec wil still get their bonuses in February. high profile exits followed by returns with contracts.... no explanations. it is a big drama.. execs having the company buy tickets to raffle off to employes then canceling raffle toocket big tickets for himself.... the week of the layoff... we think je can still afford to buy his own tickets!!! need an ehics officer

Advice to Senior Management

hire an outside etics officer.... regain employee confidence the recent layoffs of lower level staff only and no consolidation of functions under fewer exec makes people nervous ... big advice --- skip the bonuses this year and plow that money back into an pgrade of IT infrastructure

Pros

They pay is good if you are wise on how to negotiate. You get discounts on hotels in places like NY City, and low-level management is flexible with schedules and leave.

Cons

The health benefits are changing in "response to Obama Care". We are paying the same amount for a lot less care and higher deductibles.

We are profitable this year but still trimming costs, and outsourcing and offshoring. Yet we learn our headquarters is moving from Silver Spring to Rockville to "save on costs and to attract better talent for senior executives". However, non-executives will need to start paying for parking. Current executives that have been here for years are leaving unexpectedly due to "differing opinions with CEO, Joyce."

It is becoming a very odd environment where we are beginning to look like everything people hate about corporate America.

Advice to Senior Management

Revert back to the old health care plan, remember that not everyone makes over 6-figures, and keep in mind this is Maryland (a heavily democratic state) that isn't too impressed with our CEO having intimate meetings with Speaker of the House, Boehner.

Pros

Starting job for a new worker. Not enough training and hard to fit in. Language barrier is difficult so another would be Spanish.

Cons

Management should spend more time training.

Advice to Senior Management

Change the training to be more helpful for new employees to understand the system better and sooner. Need better training systems.

Pros

Working as a house keeper was good because there was a lot of job freedom. I could show up a little late to work and it was no problem. Also, there's no one monitoring you so as long as you finish all your assigned rooms before guests need to check in and make sure the room is done up to standard you have a lot of freedom. I brought my ipod with music/books on tape everyday which really passes the time; others would turn on the tv while making the beds, cleaning.

Cons

It is the same thing over and over and when you get a busy day you get very stressed and fall behind in your work if your not going at a very fast pace. After making 13 beds you get really sick of it and begin to despise bed skirts. The pay is also low without many benefits. Theres not much room for advancement and the owners were stingy about allocating more money to the hotel for fixing things, raises etc.

Advice to Senior Management

I would just say make sure the employeees are appreciated. Its not a really good job and can be very stressful. Make sure your can meet some of their needs whether its a day off or an afternoon for an appointment/ family etc. It would be great if you couldn't give raises to at least give a small gift to employees as raises seem very scarce. Also, make sure the hotel has all the supplies it needs, without them employees can't do there jobs effectively.

Pros

Pay, Work-Life, Time Off, Benefits, Fairness

Cons

Corporate Culture, Silo-ed, People, Pettiness, Not challenging enough

Advice to Senior Management

More inclusive and collaborative

Pros

Benefits and the opportunity to learn.

Cons

Senior Directors and VPs don't have a clue about how to effectively run teams or their areas of responsibility. HR takes the side of poor performers that complain--and they are protected. And there are so many mysterious departures with corporate messages that try to thank them for having worked there. We can easily read between the lines here especially when people talk behind the scenes.

Advice to Senior Management

I think that Steve Joyce is doing a great job considering what he has to work with. Unfortunately, beyond his most senior team he does not see the poor leaders at the Senior Director and VP levels that don't allow their employees to grow or bring their ideas to the table. And some in HR only care about their titles as well and not about the overall well-being of the employees. Steve...walk amongst the employees that do the work for you...those managers and staff on the front lines (Directors and below) and talk to them. Listen to them. And see hear (and see firsthand) how they really feel. Don't count on the engagement survey for that because not all can participate and have a fair voice and vote to share.

Pros

If the Management Group was upstanding and cared about their associates, there would have been some wonderful opportunities for advancement, either on property or with Corporate. Choice had some great sales and marketing courses and I took advantage of all I could. Choice also encouraged me to take my CHSE test, which I did. They were a very education friendly Hotelier

Cons

Our Management Group didn't like Sales Personnel off property often. This didn't make sense, not only for training classes but in the way of cold calls. Their theory was that if I was off property making calls, I could miss telephone opportunities. This never made sense to me as most of my outside calls brought in SMERF business..

Advice to Senior Management

I would say: Keep an open communication with the employees of the property as well as the management group. The management group is only looking for room nights, where the employees of the property looked for repeat business, as well.