Pros
They are committed to building a Christian culture, which was something that I identified with. They are very well respected within brands, which helps immensely. Overall, very good people within corporate and the vertical growth they have gone through has allowed HE to be a force in the hospitality industry. They take risk with development and really are committed to the people they hire. They are no frills, and that was a definite benefit in most regards. This is not a company with an opulent corporate office demanding you make cuts at your hotel to fuel their culture. It really is a top to bottom corporate culture of expense management that owners appreciate and the employees of Hotel Equities should embrace.
Cons
Benefits and pay are atrocious. Simply put, good talent walks out the door continually because they are laser focused on reaching bottom line profits through finding the best qualified at the lowest price. I can understand that, no one is forced to take the subpar offers and again, it is a culture thing. However, this is secondary to the horrific benefits they offer. The top tier of benefits are impossible for most positions to pay, and the tiers within the realm of affordability are pretty much useless, unfortunately. Talking $22,000 in deductibles for a family. High co-pays, limited doctors, just really needs to be re-negotiated. Bonus payouts were....confusing at best. I honestly had no idea how it worked despite conference calls and talking to my Regional Directors. I fashion myself someone of reasonable intelligence, so it was disappointing to say the least that I couldn't understand how it really worked. Finally, with the vertical growth, corporate is stretched too thin. While some departments like HR actually do very well despite this (love ya Juanita!), departments like Operations and Sales are just way too lean.
