Wenche Engström & Inga-Lena Eriksson, Färna Herrgård
Wenche Engström, owner and CEO, and Inga-Lena Eriksson, head chef and sommelier who’s worked at the sustainable restaurant at Färna Herrgård in Sweden for seventeen years now, how do you enable your staff to develop their skills and interests?
– They have the possibility to undergo training in for example leadership, butchery and vegetarian food. We have five sommeliers working with us and a further six persons in the front of house who will take a beverage course. Education is really important to us! If I don’t find anything suitable, I may send them to a place where they have the possibility to learn from others. One of the staff recently spent a week practicing at Adam och Albin, while getting a full salary from us. The important thing is that our staff gets inspiration and the possibility to network. After all, they’re colleagues, not rivals.
What if anyone acts in a racist or sexist way at work?
– We’ve never encountered that problem, but if it happened, we would act instantly. We have a policy for those situations. But – we’re a very family-oriented company. During the pandemic, we didn’t lay a single employee off – we know how valuable they all are. This led to a deeper sense of community. We all help each other out, both in the kitchen and in the restaurant, and everybody shares the same goal.
Photo: Maria Lager
On Photo: Inga-Lena Eriksson
