I work for a global hospitality technology company called Profitroom. In my role as commercial director I’m responsible for accelerating our growth along with our CGO. This involves planning, developing and implementing commercial strategies based on company goals and objectives.
How big is it?
We have a global sales team of more than 30 experts, which I help mentor. We cover 32 countries just now with six market directors and a dedicated team of 25 marketing and business development managers and representatives.
Where are your teammates located?
I live in the UK in Cornwall, which means my nearest colleague is Rachel in Bristol, with the furthest away being Carolina in Bogota, Colombia. Although the team is spread across four continents we have a fantastic work culture.
What does your team do? What are you responsible for?
My team is responsible for revenue, with the acquisition of new hotel partners and the retention of current ones. Primarily we help hoteliers become more profitable by supplying award-winning technology. This includes a range of products, such as our highly converting online Booking Engine, Sales Automation tools, CRM, Websites, Channel Management, Revenue optimization, Meta search and digital marketing. We also host one of Europe's largest hospitality conferences, the Hotel Marketing Conference. You can see the highlights from 2021 here.
To maintain a strong work culture it’s important to be transparent with business goals, to show where the team has contributed to the success of the company and to make time for fun along the way.
Strong remote cultures are built on strong connections.
Strong connections are built with Hailey.
Keeping a team engaged remotely is no different from office life except you can’t always see when people are struggling. Constant communications, one internal CRM for transparency and flexible working hours are all really important. We work in sprints, which gives us daily touch points with the team, regular reflection on our work and room for continuous praise to celebrate success.
To maintain a strong work culture it’s important to be transparent with business goals, to show where the team has contributed to the success of the company and to make time for fun along the way.
Not being able to see when an individual is struggling or needs additional help. We work hard to ensure our team members don’t feel isolated or lonely.
We have a fantastic work culture at Profitroom. In fact, in September, we flew everyone to our HQ in Poznan, Poland, and had a week-long get together. You can see what we got up to here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ON0JY08mq1s
Yes, most recently in our Christmas quiz we played a version of The Price is Right – with the winner getting to choose a prize from the list.
Yes, we love a good icebreaker. One that springs to mind was the marshmallow challenge. There was a very good lesson learnt and it was a lot of fun. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7BExiT0JFGg
Yes, we use all of our CRM modules including Zoho Cliq, Connect and People to keep the team engaged and accessible remotely. We also conduct annual surveys and have even recently welcomed our new Head of Culture, Lidia.
We have quarterly meetings with an external advisor who supports the executive and senior managers. These sessions have really helped me grow into my latest role. One of the biggest challenges is managing different cultures. The Culture Map book was a fantastic read which really helped me become a chameleon when managing not just different personalities but nationalities too.
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