Once you work here, you'll have no life.
Pros
- SOME nice co-managers - You get extra money if you cater food orders. - Decent food (aside from the pastas). That's about it. Read the cons, please.
Cons
-Lack of a flexible schedule (even though they claim to be flexible. Not exactly) -Poor pay. (For the amount of work we all do, our pay is horrible. This doesn't just apply to Panera, it applies to much of the Food Service industry.) -Poor benefits. Pretty obvious. -Barely any time for a break. (90% of the time you wont get one, and they get kind of iffy if they see you in the back area trying to get a drink of water...let alone going to the bathroom) - The place is constantly unorganized. There's a lack of communication and way too much chaos. - Its nearly impossible to call out sick (if you do... they get pretty angry. If you're extremely sick or if there's an emergency, what choice do we have sometimes? Is it worth it to not call out? So whats the attitude you get for trying to call out? It's basically like this..."Well *I* come into work sick so ..so can you! Deal with it!" Excuse me? Panera Bread is not my life. My health comes first.) -They pile on far too much work on you within short amount of time, and this applies to everyone. You work like a dog and get treated like one too. Even if you work as hard as you possibly can, apparently you still didn't do "good enough". -E-Learning. AKA Electronic Learning. They sit you down at a computer to review your upcoming job duties and to do some quizzes, .....but you're limited to the amount of time you can spend on it. So do you truly learn everything from it? No. No one does... unless they make you do e-learning again. (IF they have time for you to do it!) -Poor training (e-learning barely helps, though they act like e-learning is a freaking godsend and you're expected to know EVERY SINGLE THING once you've done it.). I trained for a few sections on e-learning but I didn't have "enough time" to do all of it because they had more new people coming in to do e-learning as well. So what happened when I was finally put to work? Thats right, I barely knew how to do anything....and when I asked co-workers to help out, they were rude, snapped at me, and asked "didnt you do e-learning?" Gee, thanks for the help. -Unfair management. While our manager tells us not to eat while on the job, she is seen occasionally putting together her own food and pigging out in front of employees who are sometimes unable to even take a break. Shes also been known to fire or write up people if she catches them eating. Completely unfair and rude. -They make us stay far too late after our scheduled work hours. Good luck trying to convince them to be able to clock out! Got somewhere to go? Ha! Nope, you gotta stay at Panera because no one else is able to cover you, since their scheduling plan is unorganized! Have a life, such as responsibilities at home, school, or anything else that you need to absolutely do? Hah! WRONG AGAIN! You gotta stay at Panera until they give you permission to clock out. Already done with everything you need to do? Ready to clock out? Too bad! They're going to make you stay there even if they don't urgently need you! Ridiculous. In the meantime you might as well give up your entire life if you work there. I feel like I'm in a prison. With my work experience in the past, I was usually ASKED if I could stay longer, instead of being forced to stay there longer. Its more polite that way, dont you think?! Some employees see this as an opportunity to make more money, but to me and most others, its just simply not worth it. (especially if they try to make you stay an additional 3-4 hours after an already long day you might have had!) To anyone interested in working here, consider this an entry level job. It is going to be extremely chaotic and messy. Please don't make this your permanent job. Let this be a learning experience.