Pros
+I've met some amazing people during my time there. Truly, I feel that I've made more than just co-workers or acquaintances, but friends. +Some customers are great! I enjoyed helping most of the customers and got to know them pretty well during my time there. +There is definitely some room for advancement. They often times (but not always) like to promote from within in order to keep the team dynamic strong. +Honestly, the food is pretty good. A lot of people underestimate the amount of work that is put into making the food at Qdoba. This is not Taco Bell or another typical fast food chain. There are no microwaves. The produce and meat is fresh and many items are made by hand every day. +There was a year or two where the corporation offered college scholarships of $2K-$3K (I don't remember how much) for a select few employees who applied for it. That seemed like a really nice gesture. I don't think they do that anymore, but I'm not sure. +I think once you get to the salary-level, the benefits are not too shabby. Things like holiday parties and golf outings are not uncommon for general and district managers.
Cons
+The absolute biggest con is the compensation. These stores can be outrageously busy, customers can be extremely entitled and rude, the stores are often under-staffed, the menu is constantly changing and making more and more work for the employees, and the expectations are always set far too high. I'm typically all for setting the bar high, but not when the expectations are never attainable. But most of all, these issues would not be such huge ones if they simply PAID THEIR EMPLOYEES A FAIR WAGE. Employees on the hourly level are seriously underpaid while general managers, district managers, and up are boasting huge salaries. I can't even imagine what the pay gap between hourly and some salaried employees is. But I think that's why they try to push advancement on some people. I've seen line servers working there for years and still not making anywhere near $10/hour. It's deplorable. All the other high-stress aspects of the job could be easily eliminated by just paying the hourly workers a fair wage. Turnover would go down, fewer employees would call in (or no-call, no-show), employees would work harder, customer complaints would go down because the people making their food would be in a better mood, and profits could rise because more customers will come in if word-of-mouth experiences would be overwhelmingly positive.