What Skills Do I Need As a Bartender?

Bar jobs in Westgate's Food and Beverage department offer a pretty exciting career. Every day, you get to craft works of art in the drinks you make while contributing to memorable guest experiences. 

Social interaction plays a huge part in the day-to-day too as you get to meet people from all walks of life and develop strong relationships with your regulars—they might even tell you a cool story or two!

If you’ve been on the lookout for bar jobs, you might want to understand a bit more about the bartending skills you’ll need when you get a job offer. 

We’re here to help, read on for four key bartender skills that will set you up for success.

Our Top Four Bartending Skills

1. Customer and Stakeholder Management

To reiterate what we said before—as a bartender you get to meet people from all walks of life. 

It’s vital that you can effectively deal with customer complaints and queries, this often requires high levels of patience, tact, and diplomacy. 

Always remember to be calm and collected in tense situations. People might just be having a bad day, and you want them to feel as relaxed as possible in their leisure time! 

2. Basic Math Skills

It might come as no surprise that you need some basic maths under your belt when you’re a bartender. A big part of the role is operating the cash register, taking payments, giving change, and understanding portion sizes.

Don’t worry if the thought of maths puts you off! You’ll pick it up in no time and your team is guaranteed to look out for you as you find your feet.

3. Organization

Working in a fast-paced, busy bar setting really needs someone on the job who’s adept at organization. If you can’t keep the place tidy and ordered, it might end up in chaos if you can’t find things fast to serve our guests!

Always keep things neatly ordered and in the right place, that way, on a busy shift, you and your team will know exactly where everything is.

There are many ways to master organizing, it all comes with practice.

4. Good Memory

Similar to our point above about organizational skills, it will benefit you to have a good memory and a keen eye for detail. 

You’ll need to remember where things are, what people have ordered, how to mix the drink requested, how much change to give, where people are sitting and so much more!

How Do You List Bartender Skills on a Resume?

When it comes to selling your skills on your resume, here is our advice:

• Look at example bartending resumes online to understand what skills employers want you to demonstrate
• Look to highlight relevant soft and technical skills and experience from previous hospitality roles. If you haven’t worked in hospitality before, you’ve almost definitely got some relevant skills from past jobs, hobbies, sports, or education
• Aim for concise yet clear bullet points that are tailored to the skills listed in the job description

Have you recently searched for “bar jobs near me”? If so, check out Westgate Resorts!

If you’ve been searching for a meaningful career where you love what you do, who you do it with, and who you do it for, bar jobs at Westgate Resorts are the answer! 

Our values of passion, integrity, and work ethic tie our team together and drive us toward our mission of providing memorable experiences for our owners and guests.

Browse our latest openings today or learn more about our perks, benefits, and resort locations.