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Each episode of GAIN Momentum focuses on timeless lessons to help grow and scale a business in hospitality, travel, and technology. Whether you’re a veteran industry leader looking for some inspiration to guide the next phase of growth or an aspiring executive looking to fast-track the learning process, this podcast is here with key lessons centered around four questions we ask each guest.
GAIN Momentum episode #7 - | A Great Team Always Triumphs
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Jason Emanis: Welcome to the Gain Momentum Podcast, focusing on timeless lessons from global industry leaders about how to grow and scale a business in hospitality, travel, food service, and technology. I am Jason Emanis here with my co-host Adam Mogelonsky. Adam, how are you?
Adam Mogelonsky: Great as always.
Jason Emanis: today, our guest is Nick Horgan, chief Commercial Officer at Amaze Insights. Hi Nick. How are you?
Nick Horgan: I'm doing great. How are you, Jason and Adam?
Adam Mogelonsky: Good as
Nick Horgan: Really appreciative to be here today. Oh, sorry on
that. Really excited to participate in the Gain Momentum podcast. So I've been following both of you for a long time in the industry, so I really appreciate the opportunity to be in front of you. Just wanna say really what you've given to the industry with the leadership Bringing the fire as they say on that. I just am so appreciative that both of you have made such an investment in helping to grow our industry. So I'm really excited to be here.
Jason Emanis: Well, thank you.
Adam Mogelonsky: Nick, I can't thank you enough. Those are really thoughtful and kind words. Our format for today, we like to keep things short and sweet with four questions that we ask our guests to frame the discussion around timeless lessons, four scale ups and some startups to grow a business in the industries we've discussed, but really for any industry leader, anywhere.
So we're gonna get right into the first question here, Nick, and that is, when it comes to scaling a business, what is the single piece of advice you would give entrepreneurs as a professional in hospitality technology?
Nick Horgan: Sure. So I'd say the biggest thing that makes an impact as you're scaling a business is really focusing on the team. So a lot of things can change with the financial models you have, the product, the offering, everything else. But if you have the right core team in place, then you really are on a path to be successful.
So as the industry trends change, adjustments need to be made. So, As long as you have the right team to bring you to scale, then you're going to be in incredibly more powerful. And so in the example that, that I've looked at here and with Amaze Insights is we really started with the core team that was making the investment.
So Ford Blakely, who was the CEO and founder of Zingle he's a good friend of mine and someone that I've really wanted to do something with for quite some time. So, So Ford and I were looking to make investments in the hospitality industry, and we looked at probably close to a hundred companies to understand really where the opportunities were. and. The reason we chose Amaze Insights wasn't just the tech, which we thought was phenomenal, but it was really the team. So Jamie Job and Mike Kenny, who I've known literally for decades with both of them are just exceptionally strong people, and that's what we looked at and really liked. At the start, and then as we continued our due diligence saw what they had built, we were incredibly impressed with the product.
But what we looked at is how do we want to be spending the next several years as we grow, which really is not a scale up, it's a true startup. So it was a company with a single large customer we made the investment and now it has grown significantly. But we looked at who are the people that
we're going to want to spend a very considerable amount of time with and who we feel that we can add significant value to and with, and really make changes to the industry. So I think when I look at that, if I had to pick a single thing that is, is most important, I would really come back to the team and the people, because that's really how you're going to be spending your time. I have a lot of extremely successful close friends, and I look at the ones who are also happiest. So I feel like that's something that is important, and it is people who truly enjoy working with the people they're working with. And I think what you'll find is those are also the people that are gonna wind up with considerably more successful outcomes
Jason Emanis: Maybe you've got some tricks you can share with me cuz I'll admit I'm not very good. I've had my challenges hiring people
and you gotta be so careful, especially with a startup or scale up. Because one sour grape can really ruin. And I think it was fascinating you brought up happy people because a competent person who's just toxic, let's just say, can just ruin the day for everybody day in and day out.
Tend to focus on skillset. I've always been a part of small companies, so I don't have time to babysit you. I like self-starters and so I focus on self-starters and skillset and I didn't realize it, but I was ignoring some of the other stuff that, you know, really bit me in the rear later down the road in my teams.
And I don't know, maybe you can share with us some tricks.
Nick Horgan: I'd love to, and
I can share from the early days of New Market, so part of New Market as that company scaled from when I joined. It was already I. Relatively large, so less, probably less than 10 million in revenue, and then grew to significantly above a hundred million in revenue. There was a very valuable lesson that Sean O'Neil, who was the c e O of the time shared with me and I've really taken it to heart and new market did this incredibly
successful, and that was to not use a colorful language, don't hire a-holes, and there really is something to it. It seems so simple and it truly is where if you look at the attitude someone has, and you put it really well, Jason, that sour grape can ruin the entire bunch. If you have someone with a bad attitude, it really can permeate an organization and it can chase off really strong
talent. So although it is very important to hire people with the right skillset, what I have found is skills can be taught and learned and positioned. So it is actually easier to upskill a person to do the role that you need than it is to adjust someone with an attitude. Now, if you can find someone that is an A plus across the board with skillset, but also has that
extremely positive, good attitude. Then you are certainly onto something when I personally look at it, I see attitude as even more important than almost any other aspect. Because it is something that allows you to get through the challenging times. And if you're looking at a startup or a scale up, what's not in question is that there are going to be challenging times.
And so you can't control the macroeconomic factors, you can't control what's happening across the industry. What you can control is your own personal attitude and your effort. So it is, it's very simple, but it's not easy. So that's something that I look at with coaching people as well as coaching youth, sports and anything else.
What you have control over is your effort and your attitude. So I really come back to that and looking at the right team, the right people to be able to achieve exceptional results. And an attitude really does make a massive impact. And What I've seen at not companies necessarily where I've worked, but where I've been following in the industry.
And you see some companies that have gained momentum, look at that, the name of the podcast relatively early. And they haven't been able to continue that because the attitude of the people is not what it needs to be. And today I'm in the Kelly Cardenas studio and he's someone that has coached me personally Setting the right vibe, the right attitude, and he's someone that truly just permeates positivity. So that's the type of people I like to surround myself with and I always want to get better. So I want to be with people who also are looking to strive and create truly amazing things,
Jason Emanis: And that's hard at the hiring point, you know, cuz everyone's on their best behavior. So, you know, one thing, I figured out is really emphasize 90 day probationary period, 60 day, whatever it is,
and stay on top of that, you know.
Nick Horgan: I think that's a very important factor and if you can start, especially with a startup or a scale up, if you can start with a contract person and see how they really do and spend the time checking references and what I've also found that it is considerably more effective.
If you're able to reference check a person with people other than the references that he or she provided, and today we're given the right tools to be able to do this. So if you go into LinkedIn and we can see who in our shared network have we worked together and just say, oh, could you give a little background on Jason, and just so you know, Adam and Jason, you guys both pass those with flying colors. And before joining this podcast I knew both of you relatively well by reputation. So, I, I did talk to people to just make sure that this and I've really liked what Gain is doing with Michael C. Cohen and David Millili.
So obviously I had a lot of faith and trust in that. But this is a new format and a new podcast and as we're scaling the company, we're being very careful with even who we choose as customers. We are very intentionally not going after every single company, because I have a lot of experience in the industry and some customers are a little more challenging to work with than others.
And for a small company, some of those more challenging customers, although they would be a great logo to have on your website, they can be challenging from a growth standpoint. So what we've done is we have found. The leaders in the industry who also, know what it is we're trying to build. And we are being very thoughtful about that as well.
That we want to build a company that is amazing to work for, amazing to work with. And part of doing that is really finding the right customers and the right customer advisory board. So we, we've been extremely fortunate at this stage. Two have found really good companies to work with and the right team and people.
So I'm greatly appreciative of that.
Adam Mogelonsky: We're gonna move into the second question, Nick,
Nick Horgan: Sure.
Adam Mogelonsky: and this is totally ties into the conversation about hiring, is what are some of the common pitfalls or failures you have witnessed that business owners should look to avoid when scaling their business?
Nick Horgan: Sure. And I think it really does tie back to that same first point is the wrong person in the organization or the wrong set of people. And it could be processes as well. But what I found is it really does come back to the people because if you have the right people in place, if you have missed a little bit on product or process, those people will be able to adjust both the product and the process. So the successful companies that I've seen that have truly been able to scale up the idea that they had on a napkin and brought together a lot of times is not the end product that they bring to market. But if you have the right people together, then they're going to be able to solve that.
So the pitfall is, sometimes it can be just bad luck. So if you were launching a company in mid 2008 and then you were in an environment where you needed to be fundraising, you were in pretty challenging environment. And I'd say that is also potentially true of the situation we're in right now, where if you were out raising capital in mid 2021.
There was extreme liquidity in the market and people that were willing to put money in back things where right now the environment is a little bit tighter from that. So the a pitfall can be just ensuring you have enough runway to be able to thrive and make things happen in an environment because you can't control the macroeconomic factors.
You can't control what a financing environment looks like anyone who's building a company, Because they want to sell a company is very different than a team that really wants to make an impact in the industry. And that's what I really like about Gain is you are helping companies to be able to scale the right way with the right resources and really understand
the industry, the environment and all of the different factors where if you're just joining hospitality technology, it's one of those industries that it appears relatively simple when you look at it and say, oh, I can do this. I've stayed in a million hotels. You don't understand really how much happens behind the scenes and how many different
players are in the space and how much technical debt some of the large hospitality companies have where even if you build a significantly better product, if it doesn't work in their entire ecosystem, then it's going to be very challenging to be successful then.
Adam Mogelonsky: Yeah, I've never heard that specific term technical debt before, but I think that's a very profound statement to rally behind, just in terms of describing the complexities of a, tech stack with legacy systems.
Nick Horgan: Sure. Absolutely. And I, I didn't coin that. I definitely borrowed it from somewhere. And it is understanding that, and the challenges Adam is something that I, again, come back to the right team and the understanding where if you have, we each have our own worldview. And Ford, who's said the chairman of Amazing Insights and Jamie Job, who's our c e o, and Mike Kenny, who's our chief product officer.
The four of us have very different and distinct skill sets, and kind of fit together like puzzle pieces. And as we were doing the due diligence, we realized that, and we realized that our perspectives were very different. And that turned out to be a really positive thing. So when you think of the pitfalls, we all
we're coming at it with a very different lens and understanding. And then when you combine our knowledge bases together, then you can hopefully get to the right outcome. So each of us want to do the right thing and come together. But we're also coming from our own perspectives and details where when we take the time to review with each other and understand what we're seeing, what's happening, we can usually.
We find the right outcomes for our customers. So that's made a big difference in, in trying to avoid those pitfalls.
Jason Emanis: yeah, with
those different perspectives, how do you, in a practical sense, agree to disagree?
Nick Horgan: So I think we have successfully been able to truly listen to the other people. And so instead of defending whatever our point of view happens to be, Each of us, and this is not just me, it's each of us are willing to take in new information and then adjust our mindset for that to say, you know what? I don't know everything and I at least.
Certainly myself, I know that I don't, so when I get new information, then I will adjust my view on it. So I think that really is the key, is the people that certainly have convictions but are not willing to die on every single hill because they want to be, right. It's far more important for the company to do the right thing than for each individual within it to have been right, is what I'd say on that.
Adam Mogelonsky: a phrase I used to describe that is strong convictions loosely held.
Nick Horgan: I like that a lot,
Adam.
Adam Mogelonsky: on that note, Nick, you know, you're talking about adjusting and pivoting and adapting your mindset, and we've seen so many changes. Just within the past two years, it's mind blowing and who knows what's gonna happen six months from now, two years.
So on that note, our third question is what do you see as the key opportunities and challenges for hospitality technology companies in 2023 and beyond?
Nick Horgan: Sure. And that, Adam, that really is a great question and one that I think, interestingly, the opportunity and challenge I think they're both wrapped in something very similar and that's when I look at AI and what it is doing to the industry where. It's not just the buzzword of it, but it really is a fundamental sea change, which we, in our own lifetimes, we have seen a few of these with.
The internet and what happened and all of the changes that brought forward. And then when you look at connectivity of people. So I think about the early days when I was traveling and selling, I literally had a calling card and I used to have to find a phone booth to be able to get in touch with someone.
So I would pop over and then type in the numbers on the payphone and be able to make all of my sales calls while I was running between different appointments and. I had the Thomas guide for each of the cities I needed to go to. So I would be able to find the meetings, and now you have access to just an unbelievable amount of information, and you can certainly call and reach out to any customer at any time.
I think the greatest time for an outside seller, remote employee was the very beginning of the black berry era when some of us had blackberries, but not everyone did. So if you were able to stay hyper connected when not everyone else could, it was a significant advantage. And I think a similar moment is happening right now with the companies that are utilizing AI in the right
and responsible ways can have a very significant advantage. But I also go back to the phrase, never in doubt, but often wrong. And At least me personally I've seen so far with ai, is you have to be very careful because for instance, chat, G P T, which is a very powerful tool, it will answer a question with
some pretty significant certainty but not necessarily always significant accuracy. And then if you are able to prompt in the right way and then clarify the questions, but if you have just enough knowledge to be able to ask the questions, but not enough domain expertise to know whether the answers truly are right or not.
You can make some relatively wrong assumptions and decisions based on ai, at least today. Now I know that a lot of money is going into AI and a lot of changes there and there are things that capabilities that are there that at least I personally have not seen. But I have been able to look at it and see just with my own experience where.
Some of the things that will come back are not actually accurate, and I know the industry well enough to know where those pieces are. So as we fold AI into our product suite, we're being extremely careful in the ways that we use it, just so that we're sure it's making the right decision in detail.
Jason Emanis: I think startups, especially if you can incorporate AI to expand your work product, you know, in an effective manner, because there's only so many of you, you know, that those who can do that best. and have a good, strong product, that really meets a need, it should win without needing, I don't need three more people. I only need one because we figured out how to do X, Y, Z. So think there's a big opportunity there.
Nick Horgan: I think you're absolutely right Jason, and you said it well, and I think you are a perfect example of someone that does have the knowledge and experience to be able to use AI in the right and responsible way. Where I look at it is so, so like you or you, Adam, you can use these tools and really optimize them.
Where if you have someone though that doesn't have the same. Depth and knowledge and experience base, then those tools can be truly dangerous because they think, well, I know all of this now because I prompted chat, G P T, and this is what it came back with. So these are now facts, although they're not always accurate facts at least in my experience.
Adam Mogelonsky: Well, the word I use to describe the difference between the certainty that might. Be given by A G P T or something else. And the accuracy that we all want is the, I guess, calibration. And what advice would you give Nick for people to properly evaluate these AI tools for their, capacity to properly calibrate and deliver more accurate results?
Nick Horgan: So I come back to having the right team and the knowledge base and understanding so that you can always test the results against real world real data to ensure that what you're getting back from these AI tools is indeed accurate. And then be willing to adjust strategy as new information becomes available.
And what I'll also say is I am speaking to the capabilities as I have seen them. But I even look at the difference between chat GPT three and chat G P T four. It was a pretty huge jump that I saw happen in a matter of months. Now, I'm sure a lot more time went into the different models that were building that. So, What I am seeing from an AI perspective now, it is also growing at an exponential pace.
And the volume of money that is going into this is truly staggering. And as part of that, I think what you're gonna see is that capability set will enhance and adjust pretty significantly. And it's a little bit of an arms race right now with the huge tech players and they're each making these big bets on ai.
So I'll certainly be very interested to see which of those major players are going to be, who you should be really focusing on as you are looking at your startup or scale up so that you're making the right decisions. And it goes back to what we talked about before with the technical debt.
You don't wanna set yourself up. A perfect example would be if you built a tool that leveraged chat G p t three, and it had everything that was driven with the model that it was using, then as soon as that, Is no longer the latest and greatest. It would be challenging if all of your tech were dependent on that.
So I think being highly cognizant of those facts is going to be more important than ever in building your company so that you can pivot as you need. And right now there are so many tools out there that allow you to scale up more, much, more quickly than historically you would've been able to. So for instance, for with us, focusing on Microsoft Azure and being able to scale to very large customers.
As a relatively small startup scale up company, you're able to do that where in the early days of new market, for instance, even if a company were to adopt our technology, they needed to go out and buy a massive server and. And high-end computers for all of the individual people, which at the time, most hotels didn't have computers.
So I'm dating myself for sure. Going back to, I, I was selling technology when really the hotels were using the technology they had was a fax machine. If anything at all, and they didn't have any computers in place, so we needed to justify the investment in the infrastructure as well as the software package that we're selling.
Where today, obviously, really everyone is fully adopted technology and sees what it can change, and you need to be able to build your technology in such a way that it plays really well with others. So we've been hyper aware of that, where we want to build the right partnerships with the right companies because that's how we can truly scale together.
Adam Mogelonsky: And on that note, Nick, we'll get into our fourth question.
What are the key things innovative leaders and entrepreneurs should prioritize and focus on to gain traction for their business?
Nick Horgan: My personal lens is coming from the commercial side, so sales and that is what I come back to, and it is the one where I. A hyper focus on your customers and ensuring you're getting your customers the right outcome is how you really can ensure that your company will stay in business. So where I, I. Personally looked at it as we want to be hyper aware of the types of customers we want to land, because we want ones that are not only going to be great to work with, but they'll help us to scale the solution. So that's what I would say is really, entrepreneurs should be thoughtful about. Which companies they should be going after, and ones that were, are going to help the organization be successful long term.
So even though it can be extremely tempting to go after the largest hotel companies, you have to make sure that you're going to be able to meet the needs of those really large customers as part of it. In fact, where with Amaze Insights, when we first looked at it, we did a total addressable market and we made an assumption that the largest hotel management companies and the largest brands would not need our product, it turns out that was a miss on our side. We thought that companies would want to do this on their own if they had significant scale. But we did go out to some of these large companies just to validate the product as we were doing the due diligence. And what we found is that we do add value even for those really large customers.
But we want to be very thoughtful for how we onboard them. So we're very upfront as far as where we are in our growth stage and what we can bring to the table. So I think entrepreneurs need to be very thoughtful about how they're going to grow and scale their businesses and which customers are really going to help you be most successful.
So a lot are going to look at it as I want to get to a certain revenue number or a certain number of keys or hotels. And I think what is more important is truly understanding that not all customers are the same. So two customers that each pay you. $50,000 a year and have a similar number of hotels. If there's one of those that's also willing to bring you into other rooms and introduce you to ownership groups and introduce you to their other friends in the industry, that is a significantly more valuable customer.
Then the one that is going to. Hammer you on every single point A across the board. And it's not to say that customers shouldn't hold you to everything that you said you did, because they absolutely should. But it's really understanding who are those companies that are really good to work with. And I'm fortunate enough to have had a long history in the industry.
So I, I know a lot of the senior level executives at a lot of these. Different hotel companies so I'm able to have the right conversations and figure out whether we would be a fit. And that is what I would take if you are an entrepreneur and you don't have those same type of relationships, that's where I do think a company like Gain can be so valuable.
So you're able to leverage a really large network of. Senior hospitality executives that truly understand the industry, but not just understand the industry. They're able to get you into rooms to have the right conversations, which if you're coming from outside of hospitality, It can be relatively challenging to get those meetings and have the domain expertise where I think that GAIN is able to pretty much give you a cheat code for that type of business because it is hospitality executives that, and technology executives that have done it and have seen success and can bring that domain expertise over to others in the industry.
Jason Emanis: Yeah. I love the way customers can tell your story. Can sell you better than you can, and if you're able to quickly identify the most profitable customers, which are most likely the ones you're adding the most value to. And you just lean into that and you get them to talk about you, and then they're going to attract the same kind and you just build, you build and build.
And I like the way, you know, you can go talk to the big boys and it's not wrong when talking to the guy knows, you know, and then you, because you're getting feedback from them on where you don't necessarily align today. Where might you in six months, a year and a half, something like that.
Nick Horgan: I love that, Jason. And setting up as you scale, I think you captured it really well in having those conversations. So when you are ready for them, you're not doing it from zero. And then I also think it's important to think about the partnerships that make sense. So on our side, we very thoughtfully chose our investment and we partnered.
Relatively heavily with Rich Viola and the Buy Tech conference, and the reason for that is the smaller scale of that trade show format, so it's around 150 people. We were able to make a much bigger impact than some of the other shows, which I think are fantastic shows. High Tech, HNLA. Both of those are really large, really important hospitality shows.
A company of our size would most likely be a little challenge to make a huge impact there where we partnered with biotech and did the Amazing Insights Awards, and they were willing to, give us that time on the stage and be creative as well. So I had a Tom Cruise impersonator there for photos and it was a fun atmosphere that we were able to do.
And I'd love to do things like that with high tech or HNLA I just don't know that. I would've been as successful in getting them to agree to let me, kind of run with an idea that was a little bit different, where if you can find those partnerships and companies that are willing to help you grow, I think that can be truly invaluable, especially as you're in the startup and scale up phase is being creative in the way that you do your spend because you don't have the same kind of budget that, for instance, where I'm looking at Amadeus, which is an absolutely phenomenal company, and I worked there for a long time. Their marketing budget is going to be a little bit
higher than amazing insights marketing budget. So, so if you look at the booth at High Tech, they're gonna have, it's gonna be absolutely beautiful and it's going to be well laid out and you're gonna have an army of people there. The Amazing Insights Booth if we had one at High Tech, would be a little bit smaller and a little bit lighter.
Where at a format where it is one-to-one buyer interactions, then we're on a much more even playing field with some of those companies. And I use Amadeus as an example, not, they're not a competitor of ours. In fact they're a partner where we would work closely with those solutions. But even looking at the companies that we do compete with, you may need to be able to do it in an asymmetrical way.
So if you are the smaller company in the fight, use that to your advantage as opposed to something that can be used against you. And creativity, I think is the best way to do that. So entrepreneurs really need to be thoughtful about that and how to leverage, again, just like I said, with GAIN, where if you can leverage an entire team that has different people with skill sets and capabilities, then you can be really successful much more quickly than you may have been able to do it on your own.
Adam Mogelonsky: Nick. Any final words to close out here? Again, fantastic insights, and I love what you're talking about with teams. At the core of everything, it applies to hospitality, technology, but also it's the heart of hospitality as well applies to every hotel. So any final words before we close out?
Nick Horgan: I think the biggest thing I want to say is really just to you, Adam and you Jason, is thank you so much for giving me this opportunity to spend some time with you I have massive respect for both of you and what you're doing, so I really appreciate this opportunity and I'd also. Love to have anyone that wants to learn more about amazing insights to certainly feel free to reach out to me cuz I, I truly do love talking about this and doing it.
So I'm looking forward to seeing both of you in Toronto for the high tech conference and really excited to see everyone else in the industry there as well.
Adam Mogelonsky: Awesome.
Thanks Nick.