Meet Michael – Head Barista Tutor

Hi! my name is Michael and I have been working in the hospitality industry for 8 and a half years now. I started my career off at a local five-star restaurant (Cameron house Hotel) with the initial aim of being part time until I went to university. My first role was being part of the bar team and being a 18 year old freshly out of school I was quite nervous about the prospect of the job as I had no prior knowledge or experience of the industry as this was my first job. It was only a matter of months working within this role before I gained a real passion for the hospitality industry, and I made the decision that this was the career that I wanted to follow. I feel I was lucky to have great co-workers and managers around me when I started which not only trained me within the role but gave me the knowledge and confidence to be able to develop my skills and grow as a person. I feel that to this day I have used the positive training experience I received as an inspiration to use my experience and train the next generation of hospitality workers. 

For the first couple of years, I learned all the basics of hospitality and worked between the restaurant floor and behind the bar. My initial passion was for drinks and I often found myself reading up on any material I could get my hands on about cocktails and general spirits. I loved the buzz of a busy restaurant and making loads of drinks whilst getting to meet a wide range of people from around the world. 

After three years in my role, I moved up to the Clubhouse Restaurant located at the Carrick within Cameron house resort to become a food and beverage supervisor. It was within this role my clear passion was found and that was training and developing people. I was fortunate enough to do a number of training courses throughout my time which included achieving the WSET level 2 award and becoming a whisky ambassador, both of which were held at Tennents Training Academy. I got to use my knowledge and skills learned from these courses not only for guests benefit by hosting wine, gin and whisky masterclasses/tastings but I got to hold regular team training sessions for my team to share what I had learned. During my time here I also got the chance to create and develop the cocktail list for the restaurant. This was always a dream of mine to do and loved creating the list from start to finish and seeing positive guest feedback from it. 

During my time as a supervisor within Cameron House I became the resort trainer

for food and beverage Assistants and I would be in charge of training any new employees that joined the company that were working front of house. My love for training people grew and this role I was given really cemented my thoughts of this is what I wanted to do moving forward in my career. The first batch of trainees I received were part of a summer resort assistant role where most of them were still in school and had little to no hospitality experience. I loved being able to impart my wisdom to them and use my experience and knowledge to help train and develop them. I found it really rewarding to see them grow into their role and watch their skill set and confidence grow after taking part in the training sessions. I received the most job satisfaction when I would see some members of the training group I had go on to gain a permanent role and become valued team members.

I then moved into an assistant manager role at Cameron house where I was lucky enough to continue be a resort trainer and my love for training people only grew and grew. 

After a total of seven and a half years at Cameron house hotel I decided I wanted a change and I moved onto become a cafe manager at St Mocha coffee shop and ice cream parlour in Balmaha. This was a totally different role for myself and a completely different working environment than what I was used to with it being more of an informal service within a coffee shop. I loved being part of the team here and was able to gain loads of experience and develop my overall management skillset. I have always loved coffee and I was able to learn all about coffee in great depth within this role including learning and taking part in the coffee roasting process. 

I am luckily enough to work in an industry that I love and I spend my spare time and days off visiting new bars/restaurants and coffee shops. My favourite thing to do on a day off is to find a new coffee shop to go to and plan a walk around it and finish up by getting a coffee and cake. I love going into different coffee shops and seeing how they all do things differently often take notes of any cool or interesting products or methods they use within their shop. 

I also love trying any new restaurants and bars that open up in around Glasgow and enjoy a good night out in a cocktail bar. 

I am absolutely delighted to join the Hub International team I can’t wait to get to get started in my role as the head barista tutor. When I first saw the job role vacancy I thought it was the dream job for myself as I would not only become a full time trainer but I would be helping young adults develop their skills and give them that base knowledge and confidence of working in the hospitality industry. The prospect of being able to tutor the children and see them move on from school and gain work and prosper within the industry fills me with excitement and I can’t wait to get started in my new role.