Head of Reward – Whitbread PLCLocation: Dunstable (3 days working in the office, 2 days from home or alternative locat...
Head of Reward – Whitbread PLC
Location: Dunstable (3 days working in the office, 2 days from home or alternative location)
Function: People Team
Package: £130,000 - £140,000 + up to 50% bonus + Private Healthcare + bens
Reporting to: Reward, Pensions & Insight Director
Lead Reward Strategy at Scale. Shape the Future of Hospitality.
At Whitbread, we’re proud to be one of the UK’s leading hospitality businesses, with a heritage that goes back nearly 300 years! Whitbread is home to Premier Inn, Bar+Block, Beefeater and more. With a significant multi-million pound investment in reward every year, we’re looking for a strategic and commercially astute Head of Reward to lead our UK-wide reward, pay, incentive, benefits and recognition strategy.
This is a rare opportunity to influence how we attract, retain and engage our 35,000+ team, from our team members and managers in our hotels and restaurants to our support centres in Dunstable and London.
What You’ll Be Responsible For
- Designing and delivering a future-focused reward architecture across pay, incentives, benefits and recognition.
- Managing the annual pay and incentive cycles for both hourly-paid and salaried populations.
- Partnering with ExCo, Operations Leadership, HR and Finance to align Reward with business strategy.
- Driving a recognition culture that celebrates performance, loyalty, and service.
- Ensuring compliance, governance, and financial control across all reward activities.
- Leading a high-performing team of Reward professionals.
What Makes This Role Unique
- Scale & Breadth: Influence the full spectrum of reward strategy across a large multi-sited, hourly-paid workforce and corporate teams.
- Strategic Impact: Shape frameworks that support attraction, retention and progression.
- Visibility & Influence: Work closely with senior leaders and your external Reward networks.
- Innovation & Challenge: Navigate a complex labour market and evolving reward landscape.
What We’re Looking For
- Proven experience managing reward for a multi-site, hourly-paid workforce.
- Deep expertise in pay, incentives, benefits and recognition strategy.
- Strong leadership and stakeholder management skills, with the ability to influence at the highest levels and ability to continue developing team (3 x direct reports, wider team of 6)
- Commercially savvy, data-driven and passionate about creating equitable and engaging reward solutions.
- A natural networker who thrives on external benchmarking and thought leadership.
Ready to Make an Impact?
Join Whitbread and help shape a reward strategy that supports our people, drives performance, and reflects our values. If you're a strategic thinker with a passion for people and performance—we want to hear from you.
We believe that everyone is unique and there should be no barriers to entry and no limits to ambition. We are committed to being an inclusive organisation that values diversity and welcomes your application whatever your background or situation.
Under-represented groups such as women, ethnic minorities, people with disabilities & members of the LGBTQIA+ community (those who identify as lesbian, gay, bi, trans and non-binary or those who use a different LGBTQIA+ term), are strongly encouraged to build a career with us. Speak to us about workplace adjustments, part-time and flexible working. Where possible we will support this.
Job ref: 100570-4492
Advertised: 08 Sep 2025
Application closed: 22 Sep 2025
