General Manager

The Talbot is a food‑led pub in Brockley, built around proper hospitality, great drinks and a buzzing local atmosphere. We serve seasonal, produce‑driven food, an incredible Sunday roast, and a bar that champions both brilliant classics and neighbourhood favourites. From relaxed lunches and lively evenings to long garden afternoons, we are a place for good food, good company and the kind of warm service that keeps people coming back.

The Role

To lead The Talbot as a high performing, food‑led pub with a brilliant local reputation. You will own the day‑to‑day operation, develop the team, drive sales and profit, and deliver consistently warm, professional hospitality. You set the pace, protect standards, and create the kind of culture where the small details are done properly every day.

Key Accountabilities

• Guest Experience and Standards: Deliver an exceptional guest journey across bar, dining, garden, events and private bookings. Lead from the floor during key services, ensuring pace, presence, and personal touches. Maintain excellent site standards throughout the day and week, including front of house, toilets, garden, back of house visibility points and entrances. Handle feedback and complaints calmly and confidently, turning issues into loyalty building moments.
• People Leadership and Culture: Recruit, train, coach and develop a stable, high‑performing team. Run structured pre‑shift briefs, weekly comms, one‑to‑one sessions, and clear performance expectations. Build a culture of accountability and pride, with consistent execution of SOPs and checklists. Create strong relationships with kitchen leadership to ensure one team, one plan across service.
• Commercial Performance: Deliver agreed weekly and monthly sales, labour and gross profit targets. Drive growth through local marketing, community engagement, events and smart reservations strategy. Maximise garden and seasonal trading opportunities, including effective staffing, flow and speed of service. Use reporting and KPIs to identify trends and act quickly to improve performance.
• Operational Excellence: Own rota planning, scheduling and labour deployment to match demand, protect service and hit targets. Ensure consistent opening, mid‑shift and closing routines with sign‑off and follow‑up. Maintain strong stock control across food and beverage, including ordering, stock takes, wastage control and margin protection. Deliver excellent reservations management and table planning, including peak capacity management and group booking controls.
• Compliance and Safety: Maintain full compliance across food safety and health and safety, ensuring daily completion of all legal records. Ensure team training is current and documented, and standards are audit‑ready at all times. Manage incidents, maintenance issues and contractor visits professionally with clear communication and minimal disruption to service.
• Systems and Admin: Confident use of operational systems including SevenRooms for reservations and CRM, S4 Labour for payroll and rota, Quadranet POS, and compliance tools such as Alert65. Accurate weekly reporting including labour, sales mix, GP, feedback insights, and action plans. Maintain clear internal communication and trackers so priorities do not drift.

What Success Looks Like in the Role: Guests return regularly, review scores are consistently strong, and the team knows their roles and standards. Labour and GP are controlled without compromising hospitality. The site runs smoothly with clear routines, great communication, and few surprises. The Talbot is known locally for excellent food, warm service, and a lively but well‑managed atmosphere.

Required Experience and Skills: Proven General Manager or strong Deputy General Manager experience in a busy pub or restaurant environment. Strong food‑led service knowledge and the ability to lead high‑volume periods confidently. Excellent people leadership: training, coaching, performance management and recruitment. Strong commercial understanding: sales drivers, labour planning, GP control and stock management. Calm under pressure, highly organised, and obsessive about standards and guest experience.

Personal Attributes: Visible leader with genuine hospitality and a hands‑on approach. High attention to detail and pride in the environment. Clear communicator who holds people to account and supports them to improve. Commercially minded and proactive, not reactive.

What We Offer: A supportive senior team with clear standards and ambition. The opportunity to lead a standout local site with big seasonal trading moments. Training and development, with real progression across the group for the right person.