Developing Hospitality

Talk given by Simon Ouderkirk and Daryl Houston at Level Up Creative Tech Conference put on by Mad Glory in Saratoga Springs, NY on October 9, 2014.

Transcript

1. Developing Hospitality Daryl L. L. Houston Simon Ouderkirk
2. Simon Ouderkirk Daryl L.L. Houston ! ! daryl.learnhouston.com! @dllh! ouderkirk.co! @saouderkirk
3. • Distributed! • Small! • Product plus support! • Close-knit (messing up hurts)
4. Service & Hospitality
5. Hospitality
6. Service and Hospitality in Software Development
7. Software Restaurant
8. External and Internal •Communication tools •Support tools •A working product •Documentation •Maintenance and bug fixes
9. Example External Hospitality Failures • Partial or missing i18n • Partial or failing responsiveness • Partial or missing accessibility • Confusing sign-up flow • Poor documentation • In our case, wp.com vs. wp.org
10. Example Internal Hospitality Failures • Poor/slow search tools • Fragmented documentation • Fragmented bug tracking/response • Crummy UX for tools • Buggy internal tools • Failure to fix the external things,
 resulting in more support interactions.
11. Case Study #1: Spam Referrers
13. Spam Referrers Harmless, right?
14. Spam Referrers • Referrers hidden from reports but not from counts. • No user-managed way to view/delete blocks. • We thought we would be helping both users and support staff. • We confused the former and hurt the latter.
15. Case Study #2: The Interim Editor
16. Case Study #2: The Interim Editor
17. Case Study #2: The Interim Editor
18. Case Study #2: The Interim Editor • Big user outcry • Added Opt-Out • Can think of this as good Service bailing out suboptimal Hospitality WP.com Happiness Team
19. A Framework for Integrating Hospitality into your Launch • The Bigelow Window • Cures, not band-aids • Ownership of and support for crucial things like testing (needs a champion!) • Consider opt-in beta testing for big launches (also good for community)
20. Closing Remarks Q & A Simon Ouderkirk Daryl L.L. Houston ! ! daryl.learnhouston.com! @dllh! ouderkirk.co! @saouderkirk