Management was poor... Business needs an intervention.
I hope I will never re-live my experience here. The Management is by far the worst I have come up on at Great Wolf Lodge, VA. There is a lot of favoritism between some of the Managers and employees as a result of friendship. There is absolutely no equality and your work is not appreciated. The housekeeping department was by far the most disorganized and because it was clear the hunger you had for the job you would almost be worked to death. The Management did not care about it's employees and despite the salary received any employee would desire to feel appreciated bending their backs day after day. They would not speak to you with respect and leave all the tasks on you to complete. Bear in mind that this building is 4 floors high, from, east to west and west- west. The Managers did not assist or prioritize their tasks very well. It was clear they were not properly trained before occupying their positions and this was irritating. They chose the wrong things to focus on and often times disregarded the more important matters. The assistant general evidently had more people skills and common sense than the general manager. Well, at least he took the time out to acknowledge your concerns. From the front desk, food and beverage, maintenance to the housekeeping staff. Literally EVERYONE working there was disgruntled. There was absolutely NO ORDER! One Manager did not appear for work days at a time, the other new Manager was so ridiculous, he would call meetings on a busy (weekend),
ProsNone
ConsPoor management, no appreciation, poor management, poor management
Fun, loving enviorment but a twist with the aquatics management
Great Wolf Lodge has many things to offer. It is a place where families come and experience a whole new vacation, the employees become a family, and a place to just have fun. My work day consisted of coming to work, being on stand for a couple of hours, a lunch break, then back on stand. Other positions are different. During the week (not in the summer) it isn't too busy. The only thing I can say, on weekends that's when the job gets real tuff. Everyone comes to the indoor water park, which is where I worked. You would have to look at every inch of the water park to make sure everything was going smoothly. If not we would proceed with the EAP, emergency action plan. The hardest part of the job was making learning to cope with so many people all at once. It was a challenge getting used to thousands of people and watching over their lives. The most enjoyable part about the job is at the end of the day the employees would come together as a whole family and just share everything. Everything we would have to say. Yes I miss my GWL employees so much but its not worth it when my management wants to kick your butt. There's something called a 12 point system, which I 100% agree with. What I don't agree with is the unnecessary reasoning given points towards this 12 point system. The 12 point system is where you get points, like strikes. Once you get to 12 points your are terminated. No I did not get terminated. I quit. I got in a situations where I physically could not come in to work
Most people are good - too short staffed to allow call outs for any reason, even sickness
Most of my coworkers are great. We support each other. We help each other if we have any questions.
However, so many of my coworkers come in sick or call out for no reason. This makes the staffing issue extreme. It puts the burden on the staff that show up, even if they are too sick to work safely. There is a point system. If you call out due to sickness, you may get points added to your record, even if you call out early enough to where you should not get points. It will be 2 points every time that happens and you get fired after 12 points. (Points only erased after a year, no exemption) Due to the nature of the work, you will get sick. You may get punished for being responsible.
Supervisors seem to complain about the constant call outs, creating a culture of not wanting to call out. If you work long hours in a day (9:45-8:15), you will get little recognition. You may even get an extremely late lunch break (I’ve gotten one at 3:35-4:10pm). People who work those shifts are rarely checked in on. Supervisors just seem to want to have their job be easier, which means they want people to stop calling out. However, people have lives outside of work, so the people who show up to work will get punished. Even when you work an open or close shift, you are still rarely checked in on. It can be fine, but when problems arise, supervisors are somehow hard to find.
The water park is hot inside, with water provided. Make sure to drink water. People have came close to passing out due t
ProsCan get the amount of hours you want
ConsLow compensation for work, favoritism, hot environment, chlorine in the air, have to work while sick.
Don't Work as a Snack Bar Attendant-- even as a last resort!
Working as a snack bar attendant at Great Wolf Lodge in the New England (Fitchburg) location is an absolute disaster. The management is nowhere to be found more than half the time, so asking for breaks during long shifts, finding them when a customer asks for one, or just simply needing to ask a question is impossible. I was in school when I had this job, and from the beginning I made it clear that I would not be able to work more than 20 hours a week due to my busy schedule. No matter how many times I tried to reason with her, the manager responsible for the schedule would almost always schedule me for 39 hours a week (I assume, to keep me part-time without having to give me benefits).
The coworkers are no better. Most of them are very unfriendly and can even act cruel towards new employees. The managers make your coworkers responsible for training you, which they don't do. Every now and then, they'll ring a customer out and ask you to fill up a slurpie, but that's about it. I had to figure out the register completely on my own, and when I couldn't find a product that a customer asked for, coworkers and managers alike ignored my questions no matter how many times I asked. On my very last night, a coworker (who was unaware that I was leaving that night) stole my key from me.
The coworkers in the kitchen are hardly better. Throughout all of my time working there, I only found one person who had been genuinely nice to me, either in the kitchen or out front, while I was wo
ProsFree water, Can eat leftovers after shift
ConsHave to ask to leave at the end of a shift, Make you work in other parts of the building, Keep you for hours longer after you're scheduled, Hardly give breaks even during 8+ hour shifts, Poor management, Unfriendly coworkers
Relaxed work environment with decent benefits, management could use some work
The work isn't necessarily difficult, it's about what you'd expect at any hotel front desk, but be prepared to always be busy: the lodge is never closed and more times than not it's at max capacity. Guests are probably the roughest point of the job, which is par for the course when working with the public. At least compared to standard retail positions, guests are actually happy to be there; they're on vacation after all. And a majority of people working at the lodge were genuinely happy to be there.
The general work atmosphere has such strong pros and strong cons that it's hard to pin down a single rating. Coworkers are some of the friendliest, most helpful people I've ever met, and we had each other's backs through every thick and thin - whether it was work related or not. This is naturally not a guarantee, but our front desk was so tight knit we actually kind of bought into the idea of being a 'pack family' as we were referred to, at least with one another. Unfortunately, one of the main things we needed to back each other up on was management. Everywhere you go you'll have your fair share of management issues, and we had ours too: late/missing breaks, not being consistently supported with guest issues, favoritism, some lowkey racism mixed in for fun. When management takes a stand for us, it's a huge highpoint. When they don't, the feeling ripples all through the desk.
Overall I felt like I got a lot out of the job: better communication skills, practice with problem
ProsAmazing coworkers, free waterpark tickets, discounted rooms, food/retail discount, above average salary for the area, generally happy work environment
If you can withstand working in an environment where a gas leak and carbon monoxide issues are prevelant, this is the place for you! The laundry room is run like a sweatshop, and if you ask for help like you’re instructed to do “see something, say something” you’re threatened for it. The laundry supervisor will “reset” the carbon monoxide detector when the alarm goes off and does nightly (ranges of carbon monoxide levels 74-180ppm’s) (OSHA SAYS NOTHING ABOVE 50 ppm per 8 hour work shift!) then instructs the workers to “shut all the basement doors so the carbon monoxide won’t trigger the alarms elsewhere, and tells the employees to “get back to work!” Without clearing the room with fresh air! When you get carbon monoxide poisoning while working like I did they refuse to help you or do anything about it, I had to argue and force the supervisor to call aquatics and fill out a report. When maintenance finally listened to us about the presser machine and all the issues we’d been having, they discovered a gas leak, instructed the machine to be turned off until the manufacturer could make repairs, because OBVIOUSLY a gas leak on a machine that large could be fatal, did anyone listen?!? NO, machine kept running and two nights in a row began smoking and filled the
basement with smoke, setting off an alarm the first night. But when we asked for help the second night (because the new housekeeping manager just ignored it and went back to her office) she became angry and yelled at
A typical day at work starts at 8am store doesnt open till 8:30 so before we open we put our money in our register and check our communication log from the night before to see if there is anything we should know for the morning. Then we turn on the lights and walk around the store to check and make sure that all the shirts were folden and straightened properly and fix anything that is out of place or out of the ordinary. On busy days we usually get alot of people in the morning before they go to breakfast and go play in the waterpark. During those rushes we are mainly behind the registers ringing guest up but when we have a moment we get out of the cash wrap and greet guest see if there is anything we can help them with and constantly make sure the store is looking good. Go to our many stock rooms if guest needs some thing that we may not have out. But it really all depends on what department you are working in and what shift that you have.
I have learned quite a bit more than I had planned on when starting at the Great Wolf. I have learn not only what customer service means but also guest and hotel hospitality. I have learned the good qualities from my managers and directors such as how to treat other employees and be diplomatic.
My manager just recently quite but she was one of the best managers that I have had the pleasure to work with along with my director and even managers from other departments and outlets are all fantastic and well manored people. Which you cant fin
Overall I enjoyed working for the brand.
Senior leadership at the lodges themselves is constantly changing and it seems there's a new GM every few months; this makes for a tough work environment and ever-changing expectations.
Corporate team does a good job keeping property leadership aligned on objectives / goals and works with you to develop programming and initiatives to drive staff performance and the overall guest experience. I thoroughly enjoyed getting to work with my corporate team on creating new trainings, our weekly revenue calls and the annual gatherings we had to strategize.
Being a "newer/growing company" you are able to try new things a bit more than with a more established brand, this is a plus in the sense that they are willing and able to try/hear ideas if they make sense for the lodge/company.
It does seem that so long as the property is profitable, corporate is content and doesn't read too much into the satisfaction of the pack/property leadership. (This will likely be highly contested, but is how i and MANY others felt the majority of the time I worked there).
The most enjoyable part of my day was getting to interact with our guests and pack and seeing the smiles on the guests face as they enjoyed one of hundreds of things to do on-site. We worked hard daily to exceed guest expectations and had fun while doing it!
HR was a wonderful partner and was ALWAYS working hard to engage the pack and recognize everyones efforts with events and surpri
Prosfun work environment, ability to think outside the box and WOW guests
Consconstant turnover in senior leadership, competing priorities, lack of needed management staff to run such a large operation
I will agree, it is a fun place to work at and can be enjoyable to conversate with the families that stay there. The company is good about promoting within and flexible on switching to another position or department. Some managers and directors try their best to compensate with their team or an individual by offering them free food or whatever they have in mind.
Though be expected to not be fully trained in your position, even though they have a solid plan to make sure the person gets fully trained, but yet doesn't happen. Meaning they are pretty loose when someone gets trained. But then they turn around and act upset or complain when something is wrong or tells you that you should know what to do fully by now and yet that is not the case due to poor training. That is mostly because people who get trained, are usually always trained by an employee in that position. Be wary of accepting to help out in other positions of your department, because not only will you be poorly trained in that position((because they feel since you been with this company for however long, they feel you know some of what your doing)), but after 5 days of training you, its 100% possible and has happen, they bring in someone new and now you are stuck training them, when even though you might have been with the company for decent amount of time but new to the position and now you have to try your best to train them, because higher ups counting on you to make sure the new person does a good job.
When
ProsBenefits, seeing the smiles on the guests faces
ConsMiscommunication, no breaks if gets too busy, poor management skills.
This resort is extremely deceiving. It is suppose to be a family oriented environment but that’s only on the outside looking in, only guest get that treatment. As an employee there is so much bullcrap, petty drama, disrespect, disregard for employees well-being, poor management, laziness, favoritism, and NO breaks. The company offers great benefits and decent pay but it does not make up for the headache of working there. They have a at fault point system, which is understandable if someone just calls out because they are hungover or do not want to come in (there are many days I dread going in) but if you have a doctors note, you shouldn’t get points. You get 12 points within a certain timeframe you get fired, don’t ask anyone to explain it to you because the majority of the employees do not understand it them darn selves regardless of how long they have worked there, and management has the discrepancy to give or take away points, again this is due to favoritism. Management does not appreciate or even recognize employees who actually do their job. Management is very fake, they pretend to care to your face but do not actually care at all and will tell you what you want but never follow through with any promises they make you. Coworkers are out for themselves,extremely lazy, rude, petty, gossipy and filled with conniving drama, not to mention miserable. Human Resources is a joke, they do as little as possible and when you go down to get their help, they act as if it’s the bigge
ProsFree food if you work in food and beverages, free access to the waterpark, benefits
ConsEverything else, petty drama, poor management, laziness, lack of concern for employees
Questions And Answers about Great Wolf Lodge
How often do you get a raise at Great Wolf Lodge?
Asked Oct 21, 2020
Lifeguard
Answered Mar 19, 2023
Yearly or when you get promotion
Answered Mar 17, 2023
What is the promotion process like at Great Wolf Lodge?
Asked Oct 5, 2020
It is rare to get promoted
Answered Mar 21, 2023
Slow
Answered Mar 20, 2023
What is a typical day like for you at Great Wolf Lodge?
Asked Jun 27, 2020
Busy, always work to do every day but it keeps the work week stressful as it flies by.
Answered Mar 8, 2023
Horrible
Answered Feb 28, 2023
What is the best part of working at Great Wolf Lodge?
Asked Jan 28, 2020
The fun!!! Gettinf free access to the waterpark and discounts throughout the hotel.
My coworkers are pretty awesome too!! Great environment!
