Full-time | Hands-on management role | Boutique hotel environment
The Square Townhouse is a highly regarded 20-bedroom boutique hotel in Brighton, known for its elegant interiors, personal service, attention to detail, and strong guest reputation.
We are now looking for an experienced, commercially aware, and hands-on Hotel Manager to support the next stage of the hotel’s development.
This is not a purely office-based management role. The successful candidate must be comfortable leading from the front, working actively within the day-to-day operation, and supporting the team wherever required. In a boutique hotel, every detail matters, and no task should be considered beneath the Hotel Manager where the guest experience, standards, safety or smooth running of the hotel are concerned.
The Role
The Hotel Manager will work directly with the owner to oversee the hotel's daily operations, maintain excellent standards, support the team, and help drive the business forward.
The role requires someone who can combine strong guest-facing skills with operational discipline, commercial awareness, and practical flexibility.
Key Responsibilities
Guest Relations and Front of House
You will be responsible for ensuring an excellent guest journey from the first enquiry through to post-stay follow-up.
Responsibilities will include:
- Acting as a key point of contact for guests
- Managing guest enquiries, bookings, arrivals, departures, and special requests
- Ensuring guest communication is warm, professional, prompt, and accurate
- Overseeing and supporting Front of House duties
- Managing the PMS and relevant sales channels
- Supporting direct bookings and room enhancements
- Handling guest feedback, complaints, and service recovery professionally
- Ensuring smooth handovers between shifts and departments
- Supporting breakfast, bar and room service where required
Operations and Standards
The Hotel Manager will oversee the day-to-day running of the hotel and ensure all areas operate consistently and efficiently.
Responsibilities will include:
- Coordinating Front of House, Housekeeping, Food and Beverage and maintenance priorities
- Ensuring bedrooms and public areas are presented to the required boutique hotel standard
- Supporting Housekeeping where needed to ensure rooms are guest-ready
- Monitoring maintenance issues and ensuring they are resolved promptly
- Conducting or overseeing Health & Safety, Fire Safety, Food Safety, and compliance checks
- Ensuring staff presentation, punctuality, conduct, and service standards are maintained
- Supporting rotas, staffing levels, and daily operational planning
- Maintaining calm, visible leadership during busy periods
Food and Beverage
The role includes active involvement in breakfast, bar, and guest service.
Responsibilities will include:
- Supporting breakfast service where required
- Assisting with bar service, room service, and guest refreshments
- Working with chefs and team members to maintain food and drink standards
- Monitoring stock, wastage and purchasing where appropriate
- Supporting functions, private events, pop-ups, and special packages
Commercial and Business Development
The successful candidate should understand that a Hotel Manager in a small boutique hotel must also contribute to the hotel's commercial performance.
Responsibilities will include:
- Supporting occupancy, rate awareness, and revenue opportunities
- Working with Mews, sales channels, and dynamic pricing tools
- Encouraging direct bookings and repeat business
- Supporting room enhancements, upselling, and packages
- Helping develop low season offers, events, collaborations and guest experiences
- Maintaining awareness of competitors, local events, and Brighton’s hospitality market
- Supporting review generation and online reputation management
People Management
The Hotel Manager will support, motivate, and guide the team.
Responsibilities will include:
- Leading by example
- Supporting staff training and coaching
- Encouraging accountability and high standards
- Helping manage rotas and daily priorities
- Ensuring staff are polite, professional, punctual, and well presented
- Promoting teamwork between Front of House, Housekeeping, kitchen, and support staff
The Person We Are Looking For
We are looking for someone who is:
- Experienced in hotel, boutique hospitality, guest relations, and operational management
- Hands-on, practical, and willing to assist wherever needed
- Confident with guests and able to deliver warm, polished service
- Commercially aware and interested in helping grow the business
- Organised, calm, and able to manage several priorities at once
- Comfortable with systems, reservations, and daily reconciliations
- Standards-driven, with excellent attention to detail
- Flexible with working hours, including mornings, evenings, and weekends
- A natural problem-solver
- Positive, mature, and professional
- Able to work closely with the owner while gradually taking ownership of daily operations
Experience with Mews, dynamic pricing, OTAs, boutique hotels, breakfast service, bar service, housekeeping standards, or small hotel operations would be advantageous.
Working Pattern
This is a full-time role requiring flexibility across the hotel operation.
The hotel requires management cover across breakfast, daytime, afternoon/evening, and weekend periods. The successful candidate must therefore be prepared to work a flexible rota, including early starts, later shifts, and weekends.
Salary
Salary will be dependent on experience and the agreed working pattern.
A six-month probationary period will apply, with regular review meetings.
To Apply
Please apply with your CV and a covering note explaining why you believe you would be well-suited to a hands-on Hotel Manager role in a small, high-quality boutique hotel.
Pay: Up to £45,000.00 per year
Benefits:
Application question(s):
- How many years experience of working in a small Hotel?
- Our working days commence at 08:00 and finish at 23:00: Do you have the flexibility to work a shift within these hours?
- The Hotel is open 7 days per week; are you available to start work early, finish late and work weekends (on a Rota basis)?
- The role requires strong IT and administrative skills. The successful candidate must be confident with hotel PMS systems, Outlook, Excel and Microsoft Office, and able to work accurately across reservations, guest correspondence, reports, reconciliations, sales channels and online booking platforms. Experience with Mews, OTAs, dynamic pricing tools or similar hospitality systems would be highly advantageous. Can you confirm that you have these skills?
Work Location: In person
