We’ve shared so many milestones with you, from the official opening of our office in Franklin, Tennessee to our team reaching 4,000 hotels using Quore. And now, we’re about to enter a new decade, which has urged us to look back on the landmark moments that got us here.
This year has been more than ribbon cuttings and celebrations. A lot has happened behind the scenes with our team and our product to make Quore’s 2019 so special—and to set us up for more wins in 2020.
We sat down with members from Team Quore across the organization to reflect on the previous year and chat about what we’re all excited for in the new year.
Making Mobile Strides
Our mobile app has come a long way since its inception. This year alone, we released a new iOS experience, Android updates and multiple login improvements, including face and touch ID login, self-service password resets and and an enhanced user interface.
“Our new login experience on mobile and desktop, including self-service password resets, was a pretty huge win for us! It not only looks better, it’s more functional for users,” says Front End Developer Caitlyn Hawley.
They’re preparing for more mobile improvements in the future as well with our User Testing Program. Beyond the app and behind the scenes, the Mobile Team has simply been enjoying their time together.
“We celebrate all our releases and that’s really fun for our team,” says Product Owner Nikki Hughes. They’ll often do a little snack party or after-hours event to commemorate their big updates and accomplishments, proving they not only know how to work hard—they know how to play hard, too.
The Year in Finance
The finance team has gone through a lot this year to make sure our customers—and our company—is taken care of:
“From a business perspective, I think the best thing we did this year was to implement a new accounting system to better serve our customer base,” says Controller Ryan McDonald.
On a more personal note, Accounting Manager Jan Spencer is simply excited that everyone is together in one office. She’s been with Quore for four years, and she’s gotten to see the culmination of months of planning to get us all to the office we’re in today!
Taking Quore to Market
As Quore’s customer base grew over the past few years, our team’s need for content and customer communications grew, and the Brand and Marketing Team formed! Behind every blog and every campaign, this team has been hard at work. And they have a few favorite projects and moments from this year:
“My favorite moment was the open house, because it was such a milestone to see how the company has grown and just to see all the hard effort that was put into this place,” says Product Marketing Specialist Lyn McGee Twyman.
To celebrate reaching 4,000 hotels using Quore, the Brand and Marketing Team also helped to put together a company-wide celebration, and it was one of Designer Abby Taylor’s fondest moments from this year: “I really loved the 4K party!” she says.
“I feel like the 4K party was the first thing where we all got together as a team, the whole company, to celebrate this big milestone,” Art Director Hayley Bolton agrees.
Developing, Developing, Developing
This year was huge for Quore’s development team! They put new processes in place, formed a new rapid response team and much more—including a pretty major trip out of the country:
“One big accomplishment was when we sent a team to China to pilot hotels in Beijing and Harbin, to see how Quore would work there. And it was a success! The dev team did a lot of work to make that happen. Everyone across the entire dev team was involved, and other teams as well. Everyone should be proud of it,” says Rob Gabbert, VP of Development.
Beyond all the work the dev team is constantly doing to improve our product and make things easier for our customers, they’ve still made time for growth and professional development.
“Several dev team members worked with Nashville Software School participating in mentorship activities. It’s been awesome,” says Bryan Haddock, Solution Architect.
Plus Android Developer Daniel Choi was able to attend the Google Dev Summit. And Product Owner Nikki Hughes was selected to participate in the Nashville Technology Council Emerging Leaders In Technology (ELITE) program.
Making Business Happen
This year, the Business Development Team went to HTNext for the first time.
“It was a different kind of event for us, because it was the first one we went to that was more networking based, talking to other people in the industry,” says Account Executive Sara Wright.
And they expanded their team to better serve our customers:
“I think we did a pretty good job with hiring,” says Senior Client Account Manager Kalie Wilcox, “The highlight of my year was hiring Client Account Manager Caroline Brannon!”
Throughout the year, their team found time for some pretty unique bonding experiences, too. Sara and Caroline actually went skydiving together after the Asian American Hotel Owners Association (AAHOA) conference!
“It was totally a bonding experience. I was jumping out of a plane with a coworker I’d known for a month and her friend that I’d known for 24 hours!” Caroline says.
Product Wins with the Right Framework
The product team has been hard at work behind the scenes this year. Michelle Haft, our VP of Product, shares: “We rolled out the new User Testing Program to make decisions based more on direct customer feedback and further defined our product roadmap so we’re able to track progress against it,” she explains. “We’re trying to just be more strategic and better aligned. I think the big theme this year was big foundational strides that will allow us to make larger product changes and improvements in the future. Our customers might not see or feel it yet, but it has to happen for further improvements.”
The User Testing Program has been a personal win for Product Designer Jay Arnold, who conducted many of the interviews himself. He loves the opportunity to learn from our users.
“I’ve just really enjoyed building relationships with the customers we’ve been talking to over and over again, getting a window into their day to day,” he says.
Supporting Hotel Success
The Success Team is at the heart of Quore, here to ensure that our customers get the most out of our product. This year has been a year full of new team members and new traditions for their team. One of their big accomplishments this year was celebrating the team reaching 1,000 hotels in their new Success Program!
“We did an escape room to celebrate 1,000 hotels in the success program… and we escaped!” says Hotel Success Specialist Coty Heaton.
And in the new year, they’re projected to far surpass that number! They’re already nearly at 1,500 hotels now—and counting. They’ve been rolling out new types of trainings and exploring more educational options for our customers for the new year as well.
Taking Culture to the Next Level
Our culture has grown leaps and bounds over the past year too, and a lot of it has to do with Jena Garrett, our Director of People Operations and resident culture expert.
“We’re all together in our new space, so that’s been great, to be able and go find everybody in one space,” says Jena.
And because of that, we’ve had more opportunities to get to know one another and spend time together: “I’ve loved all the opportunities we’ve had to spend time with each other—game nights, chili cook offs, happy hours. I love getting to spend time with each other outside of a work setting,” she adds.
“I’ve loved seeing all the new people and watching our culture evolve,” Daniel Choi says, “This has been a year of cultural development. We’ve made huge strides.”
And part of that is because, as Nikki Hughes points out: “We’ve made a lot of awesome hires this year!”
Moving Quore Into 2020
Quore has come a long way since our startup beginning. We’ve experienced a lot of growth and development this year as a team and an organization, and we’ve learned a lot about how we work together and how we can best serve our customers next year.
“It’s exciting to see what we’re going to be able to accomplish now that we’re more settled as an organization!” says Director of Marketing, Katie Adgent.
We’ve got product improvements coming, both behind the scenes and visually within our solutions, and the team couldn’t be more ready to take on 2020 with these exciting improvements.
“One of the most exciting things for me was that we doubled the staff at the beginning of 2019, and we planned and executed lots of cultural changes and brought everyone in to set us up for a foundation of success,” says Quore Founder and CEO Scott Schaedle, “And I’m really excited about the culture we have and that we’re growing and scaling in a sustainable and healthy way now. Plus, we finally have a home where everyone can be in the same place.”
