An Interview With Candice Georgiadis
Comfort and convenience are key to having a relaxing getaway. If the hotel I am staying at doesn’t make it easy for me to receive updated details on my stay, status of the room (i.e., daily cleanings and check-in/-out procedures), it makes it harder to decompress. Specifically, from the technology perspective, the ideal is for a hotel to share all information related to my stay via email or text. This way I can consume the details at my convenience and refer when needed.
As part of my series about “developments in the travel industry over the next five years”, I had the pleasure of interviewing Juan Carlos Abello.
Juan Carlos Abello saw the need for a hospitality-focused solution such as Nuvola after working in the hotel industry for more than a decade. His first-hand experience sparked the notion that there has to be a better and easier way for staff to communicate with each other and with their guests. Abello began his career in the hotel industry shortly after moving back to the U.S. at the age of 17. He has worked in nearly every aspect of hotel operations, but always found himself focused on one thing — elevating the guest service experience. It’s his passion for the guest experience that led him to managerial and director of operations roles with leading hotel brands such as Morgans Hotel Group and DoubleTree. It’s also what made him take an interesting career move into technology that later resulted in the development of Nuvola.
Following his tenure in the hotel industry, Abello was director of operations at a bourgeoning technology company in Italy called ZeitGroup. Discovering the ways in which technology can be used to successfully manage business operations, he was encouraged to take his passion for the hotel industry and his insight into technology to create a new career for himself. Abello foresaw the ways in which a cloud-based software would be able to connect hoteliers and their guests. His unique blend of experience bred the concept for Nuvola and feeds Abello’s passion for its mission to bridge the gap between the hospitality industry and those it serves.
Abello graduated Magna Cum Laude from Florida International University with a Bachelor’s Degree in International Business. He also earned a Masters of Business Administration in General Management from Emory University.
Thank you so much for joining us! Can you tell us a story about what brought you to this specific career path?
Working in the various departments within hotels for more than a decade was both the start of my career and beginning of my passion for the hospitality industry. From guest engagement to housekeeping and more, I was able to gain first-hand knowledge on what it takes to successfully run a hotel. This insight is also what led to the vision of creating digital tools to help hoteliers and staff do what they do even better and enhance the overall guest experience.
Through a series of events, including a lunch with a colleague where we discussed the difficulty in passing along information between staff changes followed shortly after by a hotel guest introducing me to cloud-based technology and my joining the company for some time, I was inspired to find a way for technology to speak to daily task management and guest engagement for hotels.
Can you share the most interesting story that happened to you since you started your career?
It is commonly said that things and people in life tend to come full circle. That has certainly been true in my professional career. Some of Nuvola’s initial stakeholders included contacts I had developed professional relationships with during my first job in hospitality. The same colleagues and front desk agents became supporters in the early development stages of Nuvola’s launch — all of them remain invested to this day!
Which tips would you recommend to your colleagues in your industry to help them to thrive and not “burn out”?
Set your priorities and stay in your lane. As an entrepreneur, it is so easy to get distracted by what other companies and competitors, most of the time that are at different stages with different resources, are doing. It is important to focus on what you can in the moment. Focus on what is in front of you and producing the best work or product possible before jumping to the next step.
Building a strong team, especially in the sales department, is also imperative for companies. Find employees you can trust and then allow them the space to thrive.
None of us can achieve success without some help along the way. Is there a particular person who you are grateful towards who helped get you to where you are?
The importance of finding a great mentor cannot be understated. Nuvola as a company and myself as the founder would not be where we are without the encouragement and advisement of Ricardo Weisz. To this day we still meet every week.
Can you share with our readers about the innovations that you are bringing to the hospitality industry?
Digital solutions that provide a contactless way for staff to create a great guest experience throughout their stay have been our specialty since the launch of Nuvola. Two-way chat services and applications were already in use by many of our hotel partners as a method of enhancing communication with their guests and empowering their staff with digital solutions that help track and manage daily tasks.
The onset of the pandemic led us to expand upon this even further to offer a product we call StayClean that provides hoteliers with tools designed to support COVID-19 health and safety initiatives. Comprised of solutions titled Checklists and Checkpoints, StayClean empowers hotels for reopening, using digital assistance that works together in managing and implementing cleaning protocols.
We are in the process of launching an additional tool, Insights, that will work as a widget across mobile and desktop to help predict guest behavior based on preferences already shared. This enables a more personalized experience for each guest as staff can make recommendations on restaurants, etc. that best speak to specific interests. The same tool will also assist managers in assigning daily tasks by allowing them to easily access which employee has availability or is closest to a particular room or area where a cleaning or other service can be met.
Which “pain point” are you trying to address by introducing this innovation?
Nuvola provides a stable and all-encompassing approach. Working as one comprehensive support line, the platform alleviates the need to deploy multiple solutions. This in turn eases the stress on employees to learn the functionality of different technologies, especially given the current environment where team members are fulfilling a variety of roles to meet the demands of staffing shortages.
As you know, COVID19 changed the world as we know it. Can you share 3–5 quick examples of how hospitality companies will be adjusting over the next five years to the new ways that consumers will prefer to travel?
The past year and a half have brought the hospitality industry a drive for contactless engagement. This will continue to expand as more hoteliers find success in working alongside tech partners that can expand capabilities to reach guests where they are at, on their phone or mobile device.
A component of contactless engagement includes a shift in the way guests are welcomed to a hotel or resort. Expect this to completely change. Gone are the days where it is necessary to provide paper handouts of bills, amenities, weekly activities, etc. This information can easily be provided via digital communication and many guests will continue to prefer this method. Even the check-in/-out process will move to a more digital format. Instead of waiting in line at a front desk upon arrival, the process of gathering all information necessary will be done online.
Guest in-room technology will also be expanded to better provide comforts of home. Currently, the idea of comfort across hotels and resorts refers to the space and view. This is and will continue to shift as more properties introduce modern advances found in most homes, i.e., voice technology for light controls and guest services.
You are a “travel insider”. How would you describe your “perfect vacation experience”?
Comfort and convenience are key to having a relaxing getaway. If the hotel I am staying at doesn’t make it easy for me to receive updated details on my stay, status of the room (i.e., daily cleanings and check-in/-out procedures), it makes it harder to decompress. Specifically, from the technology perspective, the ideal is for a hotel to share all information related to my stay via email or text. This way I can consume the details at my convenience and refer when needed.
Can you share with our readers how you have used your success to bring goodness to the world?
Prior to Nuvola, paper reigned supreme in how various departments across hotels tracked and managed daily tasks. The introduction of digital tracking methods brought a more environmentally sound way to manage daily tasks and progress efficiently and effectively.
Additionally, providing employees within the Housekeeping department with updated systems empowered team members with a new way to communicate task updates and needs. Nuvola has helped individual staff within the department gain a voice by allowing each employee to directly communicate daily progress into an easy-to-use tracking system.
You are a person of great influence. If you could start a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be?
The current method of onboarding new employees is to learn through shadow training a manager or team leader. While this approach provides hands-on experience, it can be time-consuming for team leaders and make it harder for new staff to retain while continuing to grow within the department. One change that would help the industry and all individuals involved would be to revolutionize training methods for employees into an interactive digital format. Modern technology holds the power to work in tandem with the traditional shadowing method of training to provide the specific tools and information necessary to successfully fulfill each role across departments based on the size, location, and amenities of different properties. A digital guide where interactions can be played out and information can easily be accessed would empower individual employees to continue to learn as they take on a new position, or look to move up within a department, by providing training tools at their fingertips. Providing well-rounded training and opportunities to continue to grow and advance is the pathway forward to building a strong work environment, one where employees see the value in longevity.
How can our readers follow you on social media?
You can find Nuvola online across the following:
Website:https://www.mynuvola.com/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/mynuvola
Thank you for these fantastic insights. We greatly appreciate the time you spent on this.
Juan Carlos of Nuvola: The Future of Travel in The Post Covid World was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.