Leadership role helps secure award for Leslie Pena.
Expressing pride in her ethnicity is something Leslie Pena has done now more than ever as her employer, Fazoli’s, recognized her for National Hispanic Heritage Month in September.
In honor of the holiday, the restaurant chain gave its Hispanic staff workers throughout the country the chance to enter their own story about their lives and experiences at Fazoli’s.
The top three winners were awarded with a gift card, one being Pena from the Plant City branch.
“I feel honored,” the 18-year-old said. “I never really thought much of it. I just thought it was something fun…I wasn’t expecting to win. I just wanted to have fun.”
Pena is no stranger to National Hispanic Heritage Month as she has celebrated it with friends, preparing food from different Latin cultures.
Her parents are Mexican immigrants who taught her to embrace her ethnic background.
Although Pena is bilingual, her parents have always encouraged her and her siblings to speak in Spanish at home.
“I only speak English amongst my siblings,” she said. “When it comes to our parents, we have to speak in Spanish.”
Fazoli’s decided to incorporate the month-long event as part of its newly-implemented program – Dare to Excel. Its purpose is to expose the diversity among employees and to encourage potential recruits to join the team. It also was an opportunity for Pena to share her personal testimony about her experience with Fazoli’s and what inspired her to work for the eatery.
At age 16, she started working at the initial Plant City branch before it was closed and relocated outside of town. Her goal was to bring an additional source of income to her household.
Pena worked there for a year starting off as a dishwasher and moved up the ranks to operating the steam table, but her job did not remain secure for long.
One day she received the news that her general manager was moving the restaurant from its location near the intersection of Alexander Street and James L. Redman and settling down in Tampa.
Earlier this year however, she learned that Fazoli’s was making a comeback to Plant City on the very same property as the first one.
The new branch was now under the management of the Keys Group, operated by brothers Rodney and Brady Keys.
As the remodeling of the building neared completion, Pena did not hesitate in responding to the “Hiring Now” sign outside.
“I knew Leslie had the potential to win and I am happy that she pursued it because I knew that she would win…her story is very compelling,” Rodney said.
Pena is now a high school graduate and part of the management crew at the Plant City Fazoli’s restaurant.
She intends to continue her education to become an entrepreneur, and eventually open her own bakery and café.
Her leadership role at the restaurant will only help her ease into becoming a businesswoman, Pena said.
Fazoli’s will be celebrating its 56th anniversary this coming January and like the many years before it, the establishment will continue to support its employees to achieve their goals, Rodney said.
“We have prided ourselves in helping our employees rise from their first position up to business ownership, and it’s our job to make sure that when Leslie’s ready to open her bakery, that she knows how to do it,” he said. “So that’s exactly what we want her to achieve – all of her goals and that’s what we’ve always done at the Keys Group.”
