dan-menard.com

A couple of things happened over the weekend that made me wonder about rules. More specifically, they made me wonder about why rules exist and how strictly rules should be enforced. Let’s look at these two stories and see if we come to the same conclusions.

How I scored a free bus ride.

On Saturday, my fiancée and I attended a wedding (not our own). By a miracle of convenience, the reception hall was a 10-minute bus ride from our humble abode, and the reception included an open bar. This meant neither of us had to worry about driving or finding a ride home, we could simply take a bus that ran until 2am.

And so, shortly after 1:30 in the morning, the two of us stumbled out to the bus stop and caught our bus. I have a monthly pass, so I walked on as usual, but when la fiancée went to pay her fare, the bus driver stopped her and told her not to worry about it. I’ve never seen this happen before, and I’ve been taking buses in Ottawa for over ten years. The rule has always been pay your fare or get off the bus.

Why did he break this rule? My working theory is that the driver saw two young-adults making the responsible but unusual decision of taking a city bus home from a wedding in the early hours of the morning, and decided to mark the occasion by breaking a rule and saving us a few bucks. More on this in a moment.

How I spent half an hour at the airport.

On Sunday, I went to the airport to surprise my parents with a ride home. Their flight was delayed… for about two hours. So to kill a bit of time, I thought I’d grab a drink at the bar (yes, the day after the wedding; no, I don’t have a problem).

I sat down and ordered a gin and tonic. When it arrived, I realized that I didn’t have any cash on me and began digging through my wallet for my credit card. The bartender told me not to worry about it, and to just let him know when I’m ready to pay. I was a bit surprised here. Usually the rule is that the barkeep brings you a drink and you either hand him some cash or start a tab.

He didn’t know if I had any means to pay for my drink. In fact, he completely left the bar for about ten minutes to make a club sandwich for another patron. I could have nonchalantly up and left if I were that type of person (I’m not — I watched a bit of baseball, and paid for my drink when I got up to leave).

Why did he break the order-your-drink, pay-for-your-drink rule? Because it was convenient. I was fumbling through receipts and business cards, and someone else had just ordered a meal. Why make the hungry gentleman wait for me to sort out my payment details?

Let the over-analysis begin.

The first point I’d like to make is that both cases were great examples of good customer service.

On the bus, the driver likely recognized that I take the bus frequently on account of my pass, and may have deduced that I talked my date into taking the bus home. Maybe the bus line wants to encourage wedding-goers to benefit from its services, or maybe the bus driver just wanted to make our ride memorable so that we would tell people about it (mission accomplished). The price of a single fare on this one rare occasion was a small price to pay for those goals.

At the bar, the bartender managed to please two people by not requiring me to pay for my drink immediately. He trusted me, even though I was a total stranger. He had no idea that it was my first time at the Ottawa Airport Bar and Grill, or that I had a blog and might mention it in passing. He was just doing his job, and making a positive impact on his customers.

The second point I’d like to make is that this sort of behavior is probably actively discouraged (and that sucks).

I seriously doubt either the bus driver or the barkeep would have broken their respective rules if “the boss” had been watching. It’s way easier to enforce the rules (all passengers must pay, no exceptions! all drinks must always be paid for immediately!) than it is to flexibly provide great service.

I’m not going to say this should be actively encouraged, as that could get chaotic very quickly in both cases, but every once in a while a situation presents itself where it’s ok to break a rule or two. It makes the interaction feel more human, and we like that about it.

And the final point I’d like to make is this: are there any rules you strictly follow that might be ok to break every once in a while?

Ladies and gentlemen, allow me to share with you a tale of two photographers.

My fiancée and I were featured in a piece for our local newspaper a couple of weeks ago. The columnist wanted an image to accompany her content, so a photographer was sent to my apartment to take a photo of me and my bride-to-be.

This went down about the same way I expected. Some nondescript dude with a camera walked in, looked around the room for all of about six seconds, arranged a semi-interesting shot involving a mirror, snapped a few pictures and left. This took around ten minutes.

A few days later, the writer for the aforementioned article called back and asked if she could send over another photographer. Apparently the shot the first guy had lined up was too similar to a shot the newspaper was running on another article, on the same day, in the same section, so they needed a new one.

The second photographer was Christopher Pike.

Christopher ran things a bit differently. After introducing himself, he spent a few minutes looking around my humble abode and the surrounding area. He then asked my fiancée and I what we thought of a few potential shots, and started taking pictures. A lot of pictures. We posed on our balcony, on a bench, near a wall, next to a fence, under a tree, and probably in other places that I’ve since forgotten about. Every time Christopher noticed something that might make for a cool photo, he asked if we wouldn’t mind posing for it. In total, this process took over an hour.

It’s important to note here that the first photographer and Christopher were both freelancers hired by the newspaper. They were probably both paid the same amount. But while the first guy spent ten minutes taking a picture he had decided upon in advance, Christopher spent about seven times that long experimenting and looking for the perfect shot.

What does this have to do with programming?

Just like photography, programming is a craft.

That first photographer, the one whose name I can’t remember, was just in it for the job. The editor wanted a cute photo of a cute couple, so our unremarkable photographer took one and took off.

This is how a lot of equally unremarkable coders look at programming. You need a function that converts X inputs into Y outputs? Sure. Let me whip up a quick algorithm that does that. Done. What’s next?

Christopher, on the other hand, was there to take great pictures. He was passionate. He approached photography as a craft. Yes, the output was a photo that he could sell to a newspaper, but believe me when I tell you that’s not why Christopher is a photographer.

This is how I look at coding (and hopefully how you do too). You need a function that converts X inputs into Y outputs? Ok, let me consider the context, ask a few questions, then create a solution. Functionally, it will be the same as Joe-first-photographer’s solution, but as a programmer that cares about his craft, I took the time to:

• Verify that yes, a single function is the best solution.
• Keep future maintenance and extensibility in mind.
• Write clear, reusable code.
• Add useful comments where necessary.
• Refactor my function to be as simple as possible.
• Change all my spaces to tabs to match the existing code-base.

Which photographer would you rather hire? Which programmer would you rather have on your team?

There’s a mall near my apartment called Billings Bridge. It’s a pretty nice place with a nice variety of stores, and up until about six months ago that’s all I would have had to say about it. But six months ago I started following their marketing director on Twitter, and since then I’ve come to the conclusion that Billings Bridge is a great case study for how to promote a mall in the year 2010. Here’s a look at some of the awesome things they’ve done since I started noticing them in December 2009:

Give-aways just in time for Christmas.

I found Billings Bridge on Twitter after reading the tenth or eleventh tweet about how they were giving away extra products they had lying around to their Facebook fans and Twitter followers. I know first-hand how awesome it was for them to do this, because I won an iPod Touch. On December 23rd. (That’s two days before Christmas.) So for the next three weeks, whenever anyone asked my girlfriend (now fiancée) what I got her for Christmas, she’d have this great story about how because Billings Bridge is super-generous and using modern communication channels that are easy to follow, they gave this to me so that I could give it to her.

There are probably about fifty other stories like this, plus all those tweets, and now at least one blog post. Word of mouth sells.

$50 for every 50 fans.

I don’t know when they started doing this or when they’re planning to stop, but every time Billings Bridge gets fifty new fans “likes” on Facebook, they give a $50 gift-certificate to one of their.. likers? (What do you call people that like things now? I miss fans.) This is brilliant because the sooner they get another fifty “likes”, the sooner they’ll give away another gift-certificate. This means that they have a steady stream of excited new mall-enthusiasts, in a very powerful social networking environment, constantly trying to get their friends and acquaintances to pay attention to that mall that gives stuff away. Motivate people to say something nice in a conduit for viral messages, and you’re going to get a lot of attention for your brand. Textbook smart marketing.

Sex and the City month.

Lately I’ve been seeing a lot of tweets about various fun things Billings Bridge is doing related to that new Sex and the City movie that’s coming out soon — things like that trip-for-four to NYC that they’re raffling off at the end of May. This is a fantastic topic to promote around, because it’s a movie that glorifies shopping. It allows them to catch interest through the popularity of a trendy, upcoming film, and convert on that interest because the film is about shopping. People that like to shop probably like the movie, so bringing them into the mall is obviously a good idea. Simple. Genius.

This is how every mall should run promotions. I’m sick of billboards and radio advertisements — I ignore them. If you want my interest, meet me halfway and spend time where I spend time. Give me incentives to pay attention to you, and better yet, incentives for me to get other people to pay attention as well. Try new things with new tools, and create a feedback loop so that I can tell you what works and what doesn’t. It’s working for Billings Bridge.

§

Oh, and did I mention that they’re giving away an iPad when they hit 2010 “likes” on Facebook? Because they’re about halfway there, and if you could “like” them too, and then tell a few friends, that would get us both a bit closer…

Note: This article was re-editing and re-posted on the Macadamian blog.

In Canada, right around when the first major snowfall hits, all the last-minute drivers bring their cars into Canadian Tire to get their snow tires put on. Pop Quiz: If you were managing a Canadian Tire, what would you say you’re selling?

The obvious answer is “winter tires”. Someone brings their car in, you put some winter tires on it, then the driver picks it up. This is the naive answer. Yes, ostensibly you’re trading tires for money, but what you’re really doing is providing a service. Anyone can put winter tires on cars, but the people who will be most successful at doing so will be the people who take this opportunity to show off their customer experience skills.

This year, I needed new winter tires and new rims. Let me tell you about how this went for me at Canadian Tire, and as I go, explain some of the ways in which they could have sold the experience of getting winter tires, rather than just some rubber and steel.

I did a bit of research first to make sure I knew what I was doing ahead of time. I got my tire size, the bolt pattern for the rims, looked into which brands of tires they sell and figured out which ones I want. Then I called the store’s automotive department. The conversation was pretty straightforward; juggle the auto-answering system, tell the tire guy my specs, and hear that yes they have tires and rims in stock for me. Good start!

I drive over to the store about 20 minutes later, and walk up to the automotive desk. I mention that I called not long ago, and the guy asks me for my phone number, then does some work on his computer, then asks me what size the tires are.

Why didn’t the guy on the phone enter the tire size into whatever record the behind-the-counter guy pulled up with my phone number? In fact, I’ve been here several times before, including 6 months ago to get my old winters thrown out and summers put on; this data should have all been there already. This would have saved time and a lot of trouble if I hadn’t known my specs off the top of my head.

After mentioning that the rims need to match a 4-bolt pattern and making sure I point this out because the 2008 model of my car is much more popular and has a 5-bolt pattern, the service rep disagrees (!) and insisted we look it up in some book. Lo and behold, it’s a 4-bolt.

Why didn’t the service rep trust me? Again, this could have all been avoided if they’d recorded this information last time they worked on my tires. This is at least the third time I’ve mentioned my tire information to this store, shouldn’t it be worth writing down?

After asking what brand of tires I would like (it didn’t occur to him that I might not know? good thing I did) the service rep informed me that I would have to leave my car there for a day and a half for them to get the tires installed (why didn’t the guy on the phone warn me about this?), then told me the price and that they’d call me when my car was ready. I pulled out my wallet, but he said payments are done when the car is picked up.

By waiting until pick-up, I have to come back into the store and wait in line again to get to the register. Not efficient. I should have been able to complete the transaction right then and there.

The next day, about five hours past the estimated time the service rep gave me, I still hadn’t received a call. So I reluctantly called the store, dialed through the auto-answering system, got transferred from Auto Department: Tires to Auto Department: Service and was finally told that yeah, the car is ready to be picked up.

Gee, thanks for letting me know! Why did they not call me when it was ready like they promised? Why did I have to jump through so many hoops to get a simple answer? If the store is this busy, and calling people back is too much of a hassle, maybe it’s worth investing in some sort of “dial a number/enter your license plate/find out if your car is ready” system.

I ended up walking to the store because it was late and I had no one around to drive me out of their way in the middle of a snowstorm. File this in the over-and-above category, but if they know I don’t have my car, maybe they could run a service offering to pick me up and drive me to the store? I’d gladly have paid them to avoid a 40-minute walk, knee deep in snow. Hell, if they’d let me pay for the tires when I bought them, they could have driven my car to me!

So I get there, half-frozen and covered in snow, wait in line to get to the register, pay for stuff I technically bought yesterday, and they hand me my keys, telling me the car is in the lot. Thanks. Have you seen a parking lot during holiday shopping season? This particular location shares its parking lot with a Starbucks and a Best Buy. It’s massive, completely full, and somewhere in there is my car, covered in a foot of snow.

Rather than having me wander about aimlessly looking for my car, they could have simply noted where they had parked it and told me that when I’d picked up my keys. Better still, they could run a valet service where an employee finds my car, brushes off the snow, then brings it to the front entrance.

I now have my car back with new winter tires and rims, which are working great. So in one sense, you could say that Canadian Tire sold me some great winter tires. That’s true, but what they didn’t even attempt to sell was a great customer experience.

To sum up, the next time I need new tires I’ll be looking for a store that:

• keeps the guy on the phone and the guy behind the counter in sync.
• warns me right away if it will be a long wait to get the tires installed.
• trusts me when I know my specs, or better yet doesn’t expect me to.
• keeps a history of previous work they’ve done on my car, and uses it to avoid unnecessary questions.
• eagerly explains the differences between the various tires it carries.
• lets me buy and pay for tires in one transaction.
• calls me back when it says it will.
• offers an easy way to check if my car is ready.
• brings my car to me, or at least tells me where it’s parked.
• sells great tires.