Budding Business: Why Xero Calls Denver Home

As a member of the Colorado Tech Recruiting Coalition, putting my support behind the Pivot to Colorado initiative was only natural. I moved my family not across the country, but across the world to join Xero’s Americas team nearly two years ago. Relocating our lives was not a decision we took lightly, but the lifestyle I knew Denver could afford our family outweighed any concerns we had about moving halfway across the world. 

There are multiple parallels between my family’s decision and the choice to base Xero’s Americas headquarters in Denver. The city is ranked in the top three best cities to live in the US. It’s easy to see why quality of life is so great in the Mile High City. Maintaining a healthy, active day-to-day cadence is made incredibly enticing – there are a variety of outdoor activities available year-round with the Rockies right on our doorstep. The city is making important investments in infrastructure and transit to accommodate intense growth. All these factors and more make Denver an increasingly attractive destination for tech talent looking to build a career. For the city’s thriving technology ecosystem, it makes it easier to attract this talent and build a happy, healthy workforce. 

Xero is on the leading edge of developing technology that is transforming the accounting industry and connects small businesses with advisors – knowing that this is the most effective way to increase the odds of success. This product mindset is applied internally, using collaborative technology to connect Xero’s growing global team of more than 2,000 people. 

It’s this philosophy that has enabled Xero to expand from New Zealand to one of the fastest growing technology companies in the world – with 1.4 million subscribers in 180 countries globally. Much like this video – minus the dancing –  on any given day before lunchtime I can be replying to an email that came in from a colleague in Melbourne overnight or meeting with a teammate based in London over Hangouts Meet. I often end my day in the connecting with our teams across the Americas or problem-solving on Slack with our teams in Wellington or Auckland. 

Where possible, we encourage our people to participate in flexible working arrangements. Technology is the enabler for people to get their work done effectively, no matter where they are. We have offices across North America in San Francisco, New York City and Toronto. Centralizing the administrative operations of our Americas business in Denver enables us to improve communications and support these important hubs that are building products and supporting our customers not just locally, but around the world. 

Our teams across the Americas are growing steadily and we’re constantly on the lookout for new talent to join us.

We originally opened an office in Denver as a small customer support and sales site, but it quickly became more than that. We realized we could access talent here and expanded upon those teams to include development and operations. When we were looking to cement our Americas’ HQ, we looked at a number of places throughout the U.S., considering factors like cost, availability of talent and time-zone compatibility; but the clincher for us was that we already had a footprint in Denver where we had a team of talented people and a thriving culture was already budding. 

We have called the Denver Tech Center home for more than five years, but after a while it became evident we would soon outgrow the space. To house our growing team and make us more visible in the local accounting and small business community, we made the decision to move to a larger space downtown. We recently moved to a brand-new office in the Circa Building on Platte Street – just a 10-minute walk from Union Station. Here, we are centrally located in Lower Highland, a mixed-use neighborhood with tons of restaurants, bars, and shops. It’s right along Confluence Park, where on Platte River you can white-water kayak, stand-up paddleboard, fly fish or run or hike. 

We are excited to be in the heart of Denver’s thriving small business, accounting and tech scene and look forward to being here for years to come supporting these important communities.

Andy Burner is the vice president of people and business operations at Xero Americas.