What Waiting for a Table Taught Me about User Experience
Date nights are important. Successful marriages thrive on such dedicated time, especially in families with young children. My wife and I are lucky — with my mother-in-law nearby (read: downstairs), we usually get at least one night out per week. This past weekend, however, Gran made plans — it happens, she’s entitled. So we did what other people without childcare support do so often: we took our 3 children out to dinner with us—an act probably just behind air travel in the list of things I prefer to do without kids.
We buckled everyone up and went to one of those loud, upscale chain places where parents can feel like they’ve gotten a night out while kids are saturated by sounds, screens, and the worst quality crayons on planet Earth. Now as moms, our expectations for this dinner weren’t particularly high — we knew that the whole thing could end in a meltdown over whether the cheese on the macaroni was quite cheesy enough. But when the restaurant directly sets a user expectation and then fails to meet it such that the only recourse is to leave, any mom knows it’s time to reframe that as a learning opportunity.
While we were en route, I went to the website for this particular restaurant and was able to join the “call-ahead seating” list — a nice feature that sets the user expectation as to wait times. In our case, for a party of 5, the wait time was 25–36 minutes. I got a confirmation email and felt secure in our choice.
When we arrived at the restaurant, I knew right away that they were under water. The entire entryway was packed with parties waiting — some in line, some with pagers, some picking up takeout— all from the same check-in desk. I felt secure, however, email confirmation for the call-ahead seating pulled up on my phone, ready to answer questions. The host asked if there were any children in my party — this, I felt, was a good sign. Surely if the restaurant wanted to know about the makeup of my party it was so they could make an informed decision about the type of table I would need or what zone within the restaurant would be best, maybe even thinking that if there are hungry children in a party that would make them likely to seat us more quickly. Ultimately, pager in hand, I shuffled off to the corner my wife had secured for our wait. “Don’t worry,” I told her, “they’re telling other people the wait is an hour and a half, but we’re on the call-ahead list. She said 20 more minutes.”
While waiting, I couldn’t turn off the part of my brain that sought to apply some sort of strategy to this cluster. If the restaurant patrons were the “users” and the staff was the “team” in this example, the manager was the “product owner” — and he was terrible. I don’t mean this to sound like an angry yelp review. I actually felt sorry for him. At the end of the day, I don’t think he could have felt positively about the team’s performance or his own. He was simultaneously answering the phone, assembling menus and place settings, and directing his staff on seating arrangements as they fought the tide of waiting people. I wanted him to get out of the way and let them self organize.
The number one change, however, that would have impacted the 90-minute wait my family endured, would be to change the way the manager dealt with user feedback. While I was waiting, I noticed many people approach him with pagers not yet buzzing. They would ask him about the wait and look for him to circumvent the process. And he did. Those squeaky wheels got the grease, and those special requests by the product owner on behalf of users with negative feedback derailed the work of the team. Despite the amount of time I had waited, I vowed not to be one of those people.
I patiently stood in the host’s line again, approached the desk and asked, “we’ve been waiting for over an hour — any idea when our table will be ready?” “You’re number 3 on the list — and I have a bunch of open tables being cleaned right now. No more than 10 minutes.” I gave them 15. I watched the manager interfere with the team’s work several more times, seating more than 3 other groups during that time frame. I apologized to my family, promised them ice cream, and approached the manager.
“I know you’re busy,” I said, “but we’re leaving, and I need you to know why.” He of course offered to seat us right away, but I said, “No thank you, please seat the next party on the list, my problem is with your time estimates. If we had known it would be over an hour, we would not have waited, but we might have come back another day.” Ok, so I wasn’t quite that eloquent or controlled, but that was the gist, and it stuck with me when considering my own team’s feedback mechanisms. This wasn’t simply a breakdown in the workflow or a complaint about the way the product works — this was about communication and setting user expectations.
#1 — Center the User Expectation
The convenience of the call-ahead seating, the inquiries into our type of party, and of course the time estimate itself, all of these things gave me a sense as a user that we would be seated within 36 minutes of arrival. At the very least, when I checked back in with the host and got a 10 minute update, that was an opportunity for them to refine my expectations as a user — to reflect on the error in the original estimate and respond.
#2 — Let the Team Drive the Work
And what of our product owner — if he had dedicated his energy to making the waiting experience better, not trying to circumvent the process, he could have walked away with a sense that it was a busy, but productive night. Instead he prioritized the needs of a few users, who gave negative feedback, and lost other users in the process.
#3 — Place Limits on Negative Feedback
When we only collect feedback through passive channels, we miss out on the opportunity to effectively enhance the experience for all users. Active user engagement can take many forms that are more valuable to overall design and development than a negative feedback form or angry patron interaction.
In our case, we left the restaurant and walked across the street to a favorite pizza place with counter service and self-seating. Even there, we still had to wait, but the expectation was very different. There were only 2 slices of cheese left, and again 3 hungry children who wouldn’t be persuaded by loaded baked potato pizza or bratwurst pizza (too gourmet by half). The server stated that she would get us the first two slices of cheese, but refused our offer to pay for all 4 ahead of time. She only charged us for the first 2. By doing so she set the expectation for us that it might be a wait — a wait long enough that we would want to start with 2 slices. She didn’t go back and check with the line cooks — she didn’t make an exception. She set the expectation that we would have to wait, and we did, happily.
Oh, and my children ate, and my wife filled out a comment card at the pizza place suggesting that the server behind the counter receive a big raise.
Now that’s actionable user feedback.
