Food Quality Trainer

Salary up to: Competitive

A bit about us...

Ask people where Nando’s comes from and you’ll get a different answer every time. Portugal? Mexico? The UK? Our story actually starts in Rosettenville, a Portuguese neighbourhood in Johannesburg, South Africa. With stops in Mozambique and the UK along the way.

It was 1987 and Robbie Brozin and Fernando Duarte opened their first chicken restaurant. Then another. And then another. Fast forward five years and Nando’s landed in the UK. Now, with over 480 restaurants (and counting), our PERi-PERi is a bestselling hot sauce and Nando’s has become as big a part of culture as drinking tea.

We’ve got a growing family of 20,000 Nandocas (what we call our employees), fuelled by our values: Pride, Passion, Integrity, Courage and Family. We care as much about them as we do our legendary, flame-grilled PERi-PERi – because it’s the people that make the chicken.

Inspired by our Southern African heritage, we know and value the richness diversity brings. So we're committed to creating an inclusive and respectful culture for all. We’ve even been recognised as one of the industry leaders by the Financial Times.

Purpose of the role

Engage, inspire, train and support Nandocas and Managers to have the relevant food education, upskilling and expertise to sustain future growth and be able to deliver fantastic food quality and standards through restaurants

Be the subject matter expert in the following areas:

• Product and ingredients – maintaining food quality standards, processes, and procedures
• Equipment – expert on all equipment large and small
• Packaging and other non-food – expert for all small equipment and materials used in restaurant related to food and equipment

A day in the life...

Operations

• Subject matter expert to regional teams for
  • All areas of food quality, education and upskilling linked to process, product and ingredients
  • All equipment current and new
  • New systems related to food and packaging
  • Supporting with food plans
• Responsible for the execution and delivery of upskilling sessions and ongoing evaluation of work in the regions with recommendations for changes and enhancements
• To deliver food education and upskill for open workshops and refurbs and capacity sprints, ensuring the team are engaged, have the relevant tools and have a clear plan to execute during their new opening or reopening
• Deliver food inductions across the year, own and update the food knowledge content for all new Nandocas (restaurant teams, MDs, RDs, central support)
• Work with Ops Implementation Specialist team to transfer knowledge and ensure fully equipped to execute and implement new equipment where required

Product

• Support on National menu changes to engage, train and implement and gather feedback and data
• Record, evaluate and report on the effectiveness of food interventions and tools, updating or making recommendations for improvement as appropriate to the L&D team
• Evaluate the effectiveness of launches, gathering Nandoca and restaurant feedback to analyse and recommend changes and inform future thinking
• Manage recipe and operational cards ensuring up to date and relevant, point of contact with supplier for production and distribution
• Investigate and feedback on outputs from Category Meetings for NPS and yumpingo data
• Create learning content for any product or process outside of a standard trial or launch including recipe cards, videos and operational cards
• Update current resources as necessary including recipe cards, videos and operational card information

L&D

• To own and update the food knowledge content of new openings training and supporting L&D operational trainers to ensure they have the relevant knowledge to enable them to deliver passionately alongside all other food training during openings
• Work with L&D to update all food skills training modules for back of house skills and front of house knowledge online including restaurant induction, Nandoca essentials and learning to be
• Provide L&D with all the correct content enabling them to produce relevant and current operational cards
• Work closely with regional Learning Ambassadors to help upskill wider Nandoca population with food knowledge

Hot Skills

• 3 years + experience in L&D or operational Training role within Retail or Hospitality
• Experience with food quality training is beneficial
• Able to relate to and influence our operational partners by demonstrating their own knowledge and passion for delivering food standards ensuring a clear understanding of what the standards are and why they were set enabling them to influence and change behaviour
• Excellent upskilling, facilitation, evaluation and feedback skills with specific expertise in delivering Nando’s food standards
• Able to design content for each role from Nandoca to MD and pull together interactive and engaging content that aligns with delivering food standards
• Able to deliver specific content to engage, educate and inspire Nandocas, Buddies, Supervisors and newly appointed Managers 
• Has the credibility and confidence to deliver content and alter pitch at all levels from Nandoca through to RD and Central Support
• Able to read individuals and situations and flex style and content to match both the individual/group whilst still reaching objective
• Analytical and problem solving skills – able to solve problems and make sound judgements
• Positive attitude, self-motivating with interpersonal sensitivity and warmth
• Flexibility and resilience to undertake extensive travel and work outside of standard working hours including working away from home for long periods

Extra Hot benefits

• Company bonus
• 25 days holiday + bank holidays
• Free Nando’s when you're working (and 40% discount when you're not)
• Annual team trips, AKA a free holiday
• Reward membership scheme and access to great discounts
• Four-week sabbatical every five years you’ve been with us
• Private healthcare