What does a Porter do?
A porter is responsible for managing the building's cleanliness and orderliness, together with the cleaning maintenance team. Duties of a porter include ensuring the premises' safety, operating cleaning tools and equipment, and performing basic troubleshooting for defective machines. Other tasks include assisting visitors with their inquiries, leading clients to the appropriate departments, adhering to the highest safety standards and procedures, and answering maintenance calls. A porter must have excellent time-management and multi-tasking skills to ensure daily smooth operations.
Porter responsibilities
Here are examples of responsibilities from real porter resumes:
- Wash down all kitchen walls, and cleaning stoves, fryers and also ovens.
- Operate vehicles and power equipment, such as movers, tractors, twin-axle vehicles, snow blowers, and pruning saws.
- Operate cardboard compactor to recycle boxes.
- Put tenant's dishes away in the office.
- Record mileage and VIN numbers of customer vehicle.
- Clear dish rack & bring dishes down to dishwasher.
- Clean and rake shrub areas; shovels mud when necessary.
- Perform all shampoo or extraction of carpets in assign area.
- Remove trash from trash bins, recycle bins and any waste.
- Maintain safety on property through parking, pet and storage policy adherence sweeps.
- Used materials such as shovels and snowblowers to maintain areas clean of snow.
- Carpet care utilizing vacuuming, shampooing, bonneting, and hot water extraction techniques.
- Follow planned landscaping designs to determine where to lay sod, sow grass or plant flowers and foliage.
- Mix and spray on fertilizers, insecticides onto grass, shrubs and trees using hand or automatic sprayers and spreaders.
- Clean driveway and sidewalks, removing debris as necessary and maintaining cleanliness.
Porter skills and personality traits
We calculated that 24% of Porters are proficient in Excellent Guest, Dexterity, and Customer Service. They’re also known for soft skills such as Interpersonal skills, Mechanical skills, and Time-management skills.
We break down the percentage of Porters that have these skills listed on their resume here:
- Excellent Guest, 24%
Provide excellent guest services thru knowledge of the exhibits and grounds.
- Dexterity, 11%
Demonstrated ability to lift and move heavy objects owing to exceptional physical dexterity.
- Customer Service, 8%
Provided excellent customer service to both internal and external customers, and received positive feedback by customers and management.
- Cleanliness, 8%
Maintain cleanliness and appearance of building Ensure safe and proper operation of machinery and equipment
- Good Communication, 5%
Demonstrated good communication skills and helped ensure communication with residents, visitors and team members.
- General Maintenance, 3%
General maintenance involved cleaning and sanitizing, dusting, vacuuming, emptying receptacles handling recycling and hazardous materials when necessary.
Common skills that a porter uses to do their job include "excellent guest," "dexterity," and "customer service." You can find details on the most important porter responsibilities below.
Interpersonal skills. The most essential soft skill for a porter to carry out their responsibilities is interpersonal skills. This skill is important for the role because "janitors and building cleaners must interact well other cleaners and the people who live or work in the buildings they service." Additionally, a porter resume shows how their duties depend on interpersonal skills: "team player with excellent interpersonal and customer service skills. "
Mechanical skills. Another essential skill to perform porter duties is mechanical skills. Porters responsibilities require that "janitors and building cleaners need to understand general building operations and should be able to make routine repairs, such as to leaky faucets." Porters also use mechanical skills in their role according to a real resume snippet: "assist in maintaining of all mechanical equipment and conditions of facilities, order supplies as needed, provide quality customer service"
Time-management skills. Another skill that relates to the job responsibilities of porters is time-management skills. This skill is critical to many everyday porter duties, as "janitors and building cleaners must plan and complete tasks in a timely manner." This example from a resume shows how this skill is used: "cleaned class rooms cleaned deskscleaned windowsswept and mopped floors came to work on time always good attitude"
Physical strength. porter responsibilities often require "physical strength." The duties that rely on this skill are shown by the fact that "janitors and building cleaners often must lift and move heavy cleaning materials and equipment." This resume example shows what porters do with physical strength on a typical day: "assembled and maintained physical structures using hand tools or power tools. "
The three companies that hire the most porters are:
- Carrols Restaurant Group1,275 porters jobs
- TravelCenters of America462 porters jobs
- Culver's225 porters jobs
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Compare different porters
Porter vs. Custodian
A custodian, also referred to as janitor, is responsible for maintaining cleanliness and helping protect all facilities. Custodians make sure everything is clean, neat, in order, and free from clutter and safe. They perform routine maintenance tasks and heavy cleaning duties. They do everyday things to sweep floors, mop, scrub, vacuum, collect and empty trash, dust furniture, walls, and equipment. They mix solutions and chemicals in containers based on proportions for disinfecting windows, mirrors, and other partitions requiring cleaning. Some also do minor building maintenance and light repairs, while others are exposed to biohazardous materials.
These skill sets are where the common ground ends though. The responsibilities of a porter are more likely to require skills like "excellent guest," "manual dexterity," "good communication," and "grass." On the other hand, a job as a custodian requires skills like "minor maintenance," "ladders," "class rooms," and "floor care." As you can see, what employees do in each career varies considerably.
Custodians really shine in the education industry with an average salary of $31,075. Comparatively, porters tend to make the most money in the retail industry with an average salary of $30,781.On average, custodians reach similar levels of education than porters. Custodians are 0.1% less likely to earn a Master's Degree and 0.4% less likely to graduate with a Doctoral Degree.Porter vs. Custodian/substitute custodian
A custodian is primarily responsible for maintaining the cleanliness of a particular area, including preparing and setting-up equipment for public or private use. Although their duties depend on their area of assignment or industry of employment, those duties often include conducting routine maintenance checks on facilities, performing basic repairs, cleaning floors and windows, replacing fixtures, monitoring supply inventories, and ordering new supplies as necessary.
Each career also uses different skills, according to real porter resumes. While porter responsibilities can utilize skills like "excellent guest," "dexterity," "manual dexterity," and "customer service," custodians/substitute custodians use skills like "ladders," "hallways," "minor maintenance," and "fire hazards."
Custodians/substitute custodians may earn a higher salary than porters, but custodians/substitute custodians earn the most pay in the education industry with an average salary of $31,734. On the other hand, porters receive higher pay in the retail industry, where they earn an average salary of $30,781.Average education levels between the two professions vary. Custodians/substitute custodians tend to reach similar levels of education than porters. In fact, they're 0.2% less likely to graduate with a Master's Degree and 0.4% less likely to earn a Doctoral Degree.Porter vs. General cleaner
General cleaners are responsible for maintaining the cleanliness and orderliness of all the facilities of the company premises. A general cleaner also monitors the adequacy of cleaning materials in the storage area. They also respond to the visitors' inquiries and concerns, directing them to the appropriate personnel and department for their business needs. A general cleaner must be highly-organized, ensuring the safety of the establishment by following strict sanitary standards and cleaning procedures. They report defective items, inspect office equipment, and request additional supplies.
There are many key differences between these two careers, including some of the skills required to perform responsibilities within each role. For example, a porter is likely to be skilled in "excellent guest," "dexterity," "manual dexterity," and "good communication," while a typical general cleaner is skilled in "break rooms," "safety regulations," "commercial property," and "ventilation."
General cleaners earn the highest salary when working in the construction industry, where they receive an average salary of $27,073. Comparatively, porters have the highest earning potential in the retail industry, with an average salary of $30,781.When it comes to education, general cleaners tend to earn similar degree levels compared to porters. In fact, they're 0.5% less likely to earn a Master's Degree, and 0.5% less likely to graduate with a Doctoral Degree.Porter vs. Office cleaner
Types of porter
Updated January 8, 2025
