Every time I’m looking at waiters running in and out, in and out again – while I’m enjoying my glass of cold lemonade in the shade while the weather is scorching hot – someone might think that these guys are training for a Run Croatia marathon.
Then you stop and listen closely, take a better look and you see that it’s not a training session. It’s a very serious job but poorly organized.
The people sitting at the table next to mine make an order, the waiter writes everything down in a notepad, he makes a run to the venue and comes back with a tray full of what they’ve ordered. While he’s placing glasses and bottles on their table, I can hear someone else from afar say something like ‘hey chief, can I pay now’ and the waiter raises his head and makes a nod in that direction. Then, a lady sitting at the table he was attending asks for some ice. The waiter runs to the venue and brings a receipt to the guest that asked for it a couple of minutes earlier, as well as the ice for the lady. It’s a good thing the place was cash-only because if the guest had wanted to pay with a card, that would mean another training session for the waiter.
I can only imagine how tired these waiters feel at the end of the day, and it’s all because of the way they have to work. So, we shouldn’t be angry at them, tell them they are not polite, not being serviceable or that they are too slow. Let’s try to walk in their shoes for a moment, imagine what it’s like to have their job, and see for ourselves how hard their job actually is.
The question is – why not make their job easier? Decrease the number of steps they need to take, how to speed up their delivery process, how to make the staff less tired and in the end, leave a smile on their faces and on the faces of our guests as well.
I am certain when I say this – if you implement devices for remote orders into a venue, the distance waiters have to walk through in a day would decrease by at least one third.
At Utiliter, we were able to develop an app for mobile devices whose user interface looks identical to the one featured on the main cash registers. To save even more time for waiters, we have set up the app with predefined notes for different versions of each meal which can affect the price of the item being ordered, and every one of these features can be instantly edited while you also have constant insight into supply stats.
With solutions like that, communication between departments is quick and easy to follow. A waiter can take a new order at his second, third or fourth table while the first order is being prepared.
By using the AvailIT program, waiters will be happy and satisfied at work as if they were running an honorary marathon! 🙂
