Group Head of Health & Safety

The Opportunity

The Brownsword Group has created arguably the most iconic collection of historic countryside and city centre hotels, all wonderful properties set within beautiful grounds and cities, all with their own stories to share. Generosity, quality, and welcoming hospitality is what they do very well. Being exceptional hoteliers has been the core of the operation, creating a successful hospitality business.

We are looking for a Group Head of Health & Safety who will be accountable for establishing and maintaining the Group framework for health, safety, food safety and operational risk across the hotel portfolio. Reporting to the CEO, the role provides expert leadership, assurance and challenge so that risks are understood, legal and Group requirements are translated into effective operating controls, and material issues are identified and resolved.

The role leads through General Managers, hotel leadership teams and central functional heads. Operational ownership of safety remains with the managers responsible for each hotel and activity; the Group Head of Health & Safety sets the framework, provides competent advice, monitors performance and holds the business to account for delivery.

This is a practical, visible role. It combines strategic leadership and governance with regular hotel visits, coaching, auditing, incident support and direct intervention where standards or risk require it.

Location: The role will be required to work from our Bath Head Office 2 days per week with regular travel to our hotels.

Hours:  Full-time. 

Bonus:  We have a discretionary management bonus scheme for our Central Support team- for all Heads of Department positions and above, where you can earn up to 20% of your annual salary- we'll chat to candidates about this more at interview stage.

What core things you will be doing:

• Own and continually improve the Group health and safety, food safety and risk-management framework, ensuring policies, standards and procedures are legally compliant, practical and appropriate for hotel operations.
• Maintain a risk-based programme of hotel visits, inspections and audits, focusing attention where risk, performance or change requires it most.
• Own the Group food-safety and allergen-management framework, working closely with Executive Chefs, General Managers and F&B leaders to ensure robust and practical controls.
• Ensure serious incidents, near misses and significant safety concerns are reported promptly, investigated proportionately and used to prevent recurrence.
• Lead or support investigations into serious incidents, identifying root causes rather than simply immediate causes and ensuring lessons are shared across the Group.
• Own the effective Group use of Riskproof as the central compliance platform, ensuring requirements, records, actions and reporting remain accurate, current and useful.
• Build a positive safety culture in which leaders understand that good safety management is part of running a good hotel, not a separate compliance activity.
• Coach General Managers, Heads of Department and central leaders to understand their responsibilities, assess risk sensibly and make sound operational decisions.
• Manage external health and safety, food-safety and specialist suppliers, ensuring their work is appropriately scoped, commercially sensible and delivers measurable value.

What does success look like?

• General Managers and hotel leaders clearly understand and own their safety responsibilities.
• Material risks are visible, prioritised and resolved; overdue high-risk actions are the exception rather than the norm.
• Riskproof contains accurate, current and useful evidence of compliance and supports effective management rather than administration for its own sake.
• Food safety, allergen management and statutory compliance standards are consistently strong across the portfolio.
• Serious incidents and near misses are investigated well, lessons are shared and repeat failures reduce.
• The CEO has clear visibility of the Group risk position, with early escalation and no avoidable compliance surprises.
• Safety systems are proportionate, practical and embedded in hotel operations, with managers increasingly capable of managing risk without dependence on the central function.

 To say thank you, we have many perks:

• Great salary and benefits- we'll chat about these more during the recruitment process
• Private Pension and Healthcare (following successful intro period)
• Working from a newly developed office in Central Bath
• Treat yourself once in a while with lots of retail and hospitality perks through our Perkbox platform.
• Excellent discounts across our family of hotels – you will be entitled to 25% off food & beverage in our hotels plus we offer an amazing staff rate of £25 B&B per person across the group & your friends and family get special rates too.
• We understand it’s OK not to be OK, so we offer an externally run confidential helpline for any support you require about anything you might need as part of our Employee Assistance Programme.
• We like to say a special thank you for every year you are with us - our milestone awards include Champagne, afternoon tea, or dinner for you and someone special. When you reach the big milestones, you receive extra special gifts on top like longer hotel stays, extra days off and a unique gift especially chosen for you

About our family of hotels

We bring a family of hotels together under one roof, ready to welcome guests with open arms, warm hearts and experiences that are simply memorable.

Each of our hotels are unique, individual, and quirky in personality. Quality is fundamental to everything we do, and it is the simple things that matter. We believe everyone should feel included, special and welcome, and that applies to our team and our guests.

We have very unique hotels in very special locations, from the award winning Gidleigh Park in Devon, the 900-year-old Amberley Castle to our stylish boutique townhouse in the heart of Chelsea – to see the whole group, take a look here www.brownswordhotels.co.uk

The Opportunity

The Brownsword Group has created arguably the most iconic collection of historic countryside and city centre hotels, all wonderful properties set within beautiful grounds and cities, all with their own stories to share. Generosity, quality, and welcoming hospitality is what they do very well. Being exceptional hoteliers has been the core of the operation, creating a successful hospitality business.

We are looking for a Group Head of Health & Safety who will be accountable for establishing and maintaining the Group framework for health, safety, food safety and operational risk across the hotel portfolio. Reporting to the CEO, the role provides expert leadership, assurance and challenge so that risks are understood, legal and Group requirements are translated into effective operating controls, and material issues are identified and resolved.

The role leads through General Managers, hotel leadership teams and central functional heads. Operational ownership of safety remains with the managers responsible for each hotel and activity; the Group Head of Health & Safety sets the framework, provides competent advice, monitors performance and holds the business to account for delivery.

This is a practical, visible role. It combines strategic leadership and governance with regular hotel visits, coaching, auditing, incident support and direct intervention where standards or risk require it.

Location: The role will be required to work from our Bath Head Office 2 days per week with regular travel to our hotels.

Hours:  Full-time. 

Bonus:  We have a discretionary management bonus scheme for our Central Support team- for all Heads of Department positions and above, where you can earn up to 20% of your annual salary- we'll chat to candidates about this more at interview stage.

What core things you will be doing:

• Own and continually improve the Group health and safety, food safety and risk-management framework, ensuring policies, standards and procedures are legally compliant, practical and appropriate for hotel operations.
• Maintain a risk-based programme of hotel visits, inspections and audits, focusing attention where risk, performance or change requires it most.
• Own the Group food-safety and allergen-management framework, working closely with Executive Chefs, General Managers and F&B leaders to ensure robust and practical controls.
• Ensure serious incidents, near misses and significant safety concerns are reported promptly, investigated proportionately and used to prevent recurrence.
• Lead or support investigations into serious incidents, identifying root causes rather than simply immediate causes and ensuring lessons are shared across the Group.
• Own the effective Group use of Riskproof as the central compliance platform, ensuring requirements, records, actions and reporting remain accurate, current and useful.
• Build a positive safety culture in which leaders understand that good safety management is part of running a good hotel, not a separate compliance activity.
• Coach General Managers, Heads of Department and central leaders to understand their responsibilities, assess risk sensibly and make sound operational decisions.
• Manage external health and safety, food-safety and specialist suppliers, ensuring their work is appropriately scoped, commercially sensible and delivers measurable value.

What does success look like?

• General Managers and hotel leaders clearly understand and own their safety responsibilities.
• Material risks are visible, prioritised and resolved; overdue high-risk actions are the exception rather than the norm.
• Riskproof contains accurate, current and useful evidence of compliance and supports effective management rather than administration for its own sake.
• Food safety, allergen management and statutory compliance standards are consistently strong across the portfolio.
• Serious incidents and near misses are investigated well, lessons are shared and repeat failures reduce.
• The CEO has clear visibility of the Group risk position, with early escalation and no avoidable compliance surprises.
• Safety systems are proportionate, practical and embedded in hotel operations, with managers increasingly capable of managing risk without dependence on the central function.

 To say thank you, we have many perks:

• Great salary and benefits- we'll chat about these more during the recruitment process
• Private Pension and Healthcare (following successful intro period)
• Working from a newly developed office in Central Bath
• Treat yourself once in a while with lots of retail and hospitality perks through our Perkbox platform.
• Excellent discounts across our family of hotels – you will be entitled to 25% off food & beverage in our hotels plus we offer an amazing staff rate of £25 B&B per person across the group & your friends and family get special rates too.
• We understand it’s OK not to be OK, so we offer an externally run confidential helpline for any support you require about anything you might need as part of our Employee Assistance Programme.
• We like to say a special thank you for every year you are with us - our milestone awards include Champagne, afternoon tea, or dinner for you and someone special. When you reach the big milestones, you receive extra special gifts on top like longer hotel stays, extra days off and a unique gift especially chosen for you

About our family of hotels

We bring a family of hotels together under one roof, ready to welcome guests with open arms, warm hearts and experiences that are simply memorable.

Each of our hotels are unique, individual, and quirky in personality. Quality is fundamental to everything we do, and it is the simple things that matter. We believe everyone should feel included, special and welcome, and that applies to our team and our guests.

We have very unique hotels in very special locations, from the award winning Gidleigh Park in Devon, the 900-year-old Amberley Castle to our stylish boutique townhouse in the heart of Chelsea – to see the whole group, take a look here www.brownswordhotels.co.uk