Minute Enrico Tanuwidjaja, William Guo, Joshua Perline, Brandon Maushund, Paul Tawfik CS160 UI Design Fall 2014
SUMMARY Our project is a task management system for restaurant waitstaff. Waiters and waitresses have multiple tables they are required to manage, each requiring a unique set of tasks to be attended to. Our app aims to take the mental strain off the wait staff by creating a series of timers for each table that alert the staff member when a particular table should need attending to. In this manner, we aim to enable restaurants to consistently provide excellent service and reduce the learning curve for new staff members. BRAINSTORMING PROCESS Our quest for our optimal idea began during our first meeting as a group in the Wozniak Lounge. We started with a blank poster board, an assortment of sticky notes. Every time one of us had an idea for an application that would benefit from a smartwatch interface, we would put that idea on a sticky note, number the note as the nth idea, and stick the note onto the board. Our goal was to put 50 ideas on the board before we moved on to the filtering process and idea selection. Halfway to reaching our goal, we decided to group the sticky notes under the general categories they fall under in order to be more conscious of the type of ideas we were thinking of. By seeing what type of ideas we were more prone to thinking of as a group, we were able to learn and discover individual and group interests, allowing us to connect as a team and see what we would find interesting to pursue. Originally, we had decided on three ideas we would be interested in developing idea involving controlling PowerPoints with a watch interface, but upon learning that another group was going to be pursuing the same 1
idea, we decided to shift our focus elsewhere, namely to an application involving the restaurant industry. Our first version of our restaurant app had customers using a tablet device or smartphone at their table as a sort of buzzer system, allowing them to communicate to their wait staff, notifying when they wanted to order, get a refill for a drink, or check the status of their food. Upon further consideration, we decided against our idea as we felt it dehumanized the service industry, and started thinking of ways to make improve the service experience without turning waiters into robots. That s when we thought: instead of developing a tool for customers, why don t we create an application for the wait staff themselves, under the assumption that if your server is happy, you will get better service! INTERMEDIATE AND FINAL DESIGN SKETCHES, VARIATIONS, AND IDEAS We went to multiple iterations and improved the design in every iteration. These improvements were not just small changes; we reconsidered every aspect carefully in every iteration, and we did not hesitate to change the design radically. In a nutshell, Minute went through four major iterations, which we will discuss in this section. 1. THE FIRST DESIGN Our first design employed a very different concept. We designed the app to let restaurant customers call their waiter by sending a notification to their watch, as illustrated below. Thus, on each table, there would be buttons to send bill request, refill request, or to call the waiter for any reason. These requests would be sent directly to the waiter s smartwatch. The waiters would be able to see these requests in a queue-style fashion, and they could swipe a request to remove it from the screen. 2
However, after receiving feedback, we found that this concept would be dehumanizing the waiters. The waiters might argue that they were being treated like machines, as they would be controlled by buttons. Therefore, we decided to rethink our concept and redirect our focus to finding new ways of solving the same problem. A NEW CONCEPT, DESIGNED FOR THE QUALCOMM TOQ We rethought the concept to avoid dehumanizing waiters, and we came up with the idea of using timers to remind waiters to do their tasks. Instead of letting the restaurant customers pressing buttons to send requests to their waiter, we decided to use timers to notify the waiter to do certain tasks. We believed that these notifications would help the waiters to perform a consistent service that would satisfy all of their customers. Since we needed to implement the app in the Toq smartwatch, we created the design while considering the limitations of the Toq. As a result, the interactions would only use plain texts and buttons, as can be seen in the illustration above. This interface would allow the waiters to create new tables and new reminders. They would need to create new tables for each table that they were serving. Then, they would be able to create new reminders to perform a task for a table. We also included a tip counter, since one of 3
our interviewees mentioned that he liked counting his tip as he was working, especially on weekends. According to the feedback that we received, this design was quite complicated and not very efficient. The waiter would need at least five taps to accomplish their main task (creating a reminder to perform a task for a table). Furthermore, as can be seen in the illustration, the waiter would need to pull out their phone at certain times in the interaction, which would be a hassle. We also realized that we were supposed to design for a general smartwatch, so we should not have constrained our design to match the capabilities of the Toq smartwatch. For these reasons, we decided to further rethink our design, and we came up with another interface. 4
IMPROVED DESIGN We changed our focus to a more general smartwatch instead of just the Toq watch. Thus, we removed the constraints that we previously had. We introduced colors and bigger buttons, as well as new interaction possibilities such as holding and swiping. We decided to use three pages: task page, table page, and tip page. In the task page, the waiter can see all of their upcoming tasks. In the table page, the waiter can add new tables. After adding a table, they can tap the table to create a task for that table. After a task is chosen, they can adjust the timing of the task. In the tip page, the waiter can increment or decrement their tip counter by simply tapping the increment or decrement buttons (they can increment or decrement by 25 cents, a dollar, and five dollars). 5
We received useful constructive feedback during this iteration, since this was presented in the class and everyone had to write some comments. Some said that the color gradient in the buttons distracts the visibility of the labels. Some said that this would still hinder the performance of waiters as opposed to improving it, since they would need to see, tap, and interact with the watch many times during their service. We agreed with the feedback. We found that the app would require the waiter to tap at least three times to perform the main tasks. Ultimately, we took all of the feedback very seriously and used it to design our final interface. FINAL DESIGN By employing all of the feedback gained from the previous iterations, we created a design that we believed to be much better than any of our previous design. We focused on minimalist design and efficiency of use. We gave away the three pages, and instead, we decided to use just one page that has all of the essential properties to enable the most common interactions. By sacrificing a little bit of control, this design enables the waiter to glance through all of the table quickly and perform the main tasks with only one tap. We will explain this design in a great depth in a later section. 6
COMPETITIVE ANALYSIS Our app, Minute, solves a very specific problem that no other app addresses: Waiter and waitresses constantly rely on their oftentimes imperfect memory to decide which table help. Minute is an entirely unique concept not only because of the specific problem that it addresses, but also because it assists restaurants in a way that differs from any other app on the market today; Minute exists as a personal assistant for restaurant staff without creating any technological barriers between staff and the customers. Similar apps allow customers to view the menus or order online, but we believe that those functions can be difficult to learn for some people, and that they depersonalize the restaurant experience. Minute also uses a smartwatch to assist restaurant staff who are on the go and might have their hands full carrying plates or wiping down tables. Most of the related applications that already exist focus on the customer and oftentimes add benign functionality like the ability to pay ahead of time using the app or the ability to view the menu after downloading a specific app for the particular restaurant. Not only do people seem to prefer to avoid paying for things ahead of time, but it s more comfortable for the customer to interact with a staff member rather than new technology which may or may not be secure or bugged if it belongs to a mom and pop restaurant. As a result, we decided that it would be best to improve the customer s experience by designing an app that increases the efficiency and effectiveness of waiters and waitresses without requiring the customer to adopt any type of new technology. 7
WIREFRAMES This is the table menu where the user can add and remove tables. When adding a new table, a drop-down menu appears for the user to select the table number that he or she would like to add. 8
The smartwatch interface. This is the main menu where the timers can be viewed. The routine menu where users can customize the default tasks and notification timers. Cancelling a table. 9
Tapping a table drops down a submenu where the user can skip to the next task or cancel the table entirely. This is what a notification would look like. PERSONAS When designing for the user interface features in our application, we generated various personas in order to better focus on making the ideal application for our consumers. More specifically, we determined the primary persona to be a member of waiting staff at a restaurant, and the secondary/customer persona to be the owner of the restaurant. First, we considered our primary persona, our primary target for this application: the wait staff of restaurant businesses. There is no age restriction on the wait staff who would be using this application, and its primary purpose is to help facilitate restaurant service protocol. There are no requirements regarding using the application (besides for having access to a smartwatch and smartphone, of course), although prior experience with smart devices or openness to learning how to use smart devices is a large benefit. The application would prove to be particularly helpful to wait staff in relatively busy restaurants who tend to manage multiple tables at any given time. In addition, the application is geared towards waiters who often have their hands full during service and perhaps have a large flow of requests to handle. In addition, the wait 10
staff may have a regular pattern by which they service tables, and for this reason, we have customizable routines which allow for the waiter to set up schedules ahead of time. Next, we considered our secondary/customer persona, the restaurant owners. Although they do not directly use the application, the usage of the application by their wait staff may influence the efficiency/productivity of the overall business. For this reason, we also considered design aspects that would be beneficial to the owners of the restaurants. The form factor of the watch is small, and hands free, eliminating hassle during service. We implemented the system of notifications by which the wait staff would receive notifications upon time expiring for a task, greatly decreasing the amount of management needed on behalf of the owner on the wait staff. Additionally, creating a table customizability screen helps to cater to the specific layouts of individual restaurants, personalizing the experience. Finally, we also thought about a negative persona, the customer of the restaurants. The customers should not have to worry about the design of the application, as it should help serve as a tool to enhance their experience during a night out/dinner. They should be able to enjoy the service provided and should notice a significant improvement in their experience at the restaurant utilizing this application. SCENARIOS Minute is a smartwatch-smartphone integrated application that provides a medium for restaurant wait staff to greatly facilitate service routines and request handling. Unlike other applications currently on the market, Minute utilizes the smartwatch form factor as the main point of interaction, eliminating the risk of further complicating the service routine by providing too much hardware to deal with. Wait staff are expected to provide optimal service, but there is a limit when it comes to the mental strain and stress of having to record all requests and tasks in memory. Minute makes it easy for the wait staff to customize table settings/names as well as routine tasks/expected times for completion for each task. These settings may be modified at any point in time, and the settings should be present when a new table service routine is initialized. With easy swiping features and dragging motions, waiters can pick up the skills necessary to use this application quickly and without much effort. Notifications by the application serve to remind the 11
12 waiter if a task has expired or is overdue, and with the vibration setting turned on, the waiter will never miss a task again! Restaurant owners will be pleased to note that they do not have to perform as many management tasks, as the Minute application will keep waiters accountable. Once the waiters begin to employ the application during service, they will experience a noticeable decrease in stressful events and most likely, an increase in the amount of tips received from restaurant customers. With customer satisfaction comes high ratings, and everyone benefits, from the restaurant customer to the wait staff and the restaurant as a whole!