General Manager in Essen

Role Summary:

The General Manager will be responsible for launching and leading the first German restaurant for a well-established UK hospitality brand. This position combines hands-on operational leadership with strategic organization, planning, and a drive to build a new market presence in Germany. The GM will lead all pre-opening activities, collaborate closely with the UK team, and critically build a capable German management team to ensure a successful launch and a thriving restaurant from day one.

Key Responsibilities:

Team Recruitment & Development

• Recruit, train, and lead the full site management team in Germany, including chefs, servers, and a Head Chef.
• Foster a unique and distinctive culture that reflects the brand’s UK success while adapting to the German market.
• Support employee contract setup, onboarding procedures, and HR policies in line with German labor law; liaise with UK HR to ensure cultural alignment.

Operations & Service Delivery

• Lead the team to deliver excellent service across multiple shifts, creating an exceptional workplace and destination for the local community.
• Ensure every customer leaves happy through consistent delivery of food, drink, and service that meet brand expectations each shift.
• Implement and monitor health, safety, and hygiene standards (HACCP and German law compliance).
• Oversee scheduling, inventory, cash handling, and operational controls to meet both brand and German regulations.
• Provide frequent feedback to the UK team concerning opportunities and challenges via KPIs, staff, and customer feedback.

Financial & Commercial

• Take ownership for achieving revenue, profit, and cost targets.
• Support accurate budget planning—factoring in labor and variable costs.
• Provide monthly, weekly, and daily forecasts; adjust ordering and staffing as needed based on business trends.

Pre-Opening & Setup

• Act as the key contact for all pre-opening activities—partnering with the UK HQ team from planning through opening.
• Work with UK commercial, finance, food, people, and property teams to translate operational requirements to the German market or develop new solutions when required.
• Manage licensing, compliance, supplier setup, payroll registration, and other regulatory requirements as needed, with the support of HQ and local partners.
• Own a structured timeline for pre-opening tasks, ensuring launch readiness—from recruitment advertising to logistics coordination.

Skills & Experience

• Proven success as a General Manager or senior operator in hospitality (restaurant, bar, or café); thrives hands-on in busy service environments.
• Experience in hospitality business set-up: pre-opening, new site launches, or entrepreneurial restaurant ownership in Germany.
• Strong organizational and planning ability; capable of structuring tasks and driving projects to completion with excellent communication.
• Comfortable balancing autonomy with collaboration—working closely with UK-based colleagues.
• Fluent in German and English, both written and spoken.

Voceer presents this job opportunity for COREcruitment, a 50 person sized company who are categorized as a Recruitment Agency.

This position is being managed by COREcruitment, a reputable recruitment agency known for placing candidates in desirable positions.