Our new Pune office was inaugurated 3
(or was it 4?) years back, but I got a chance to visit the sprawling complex
(?)only recently and then it’s now become almost weekly, one good thing is the office has provided a shuttle
service between our Mumbai offices and
Pune office. The travel time to and fro
is about 9 hours and there is not much
you can do, but to watch the road
or sleep or listen to music or talk about Projects (L
very interesting), once all the options are over, you think and then you
contemplate. I have now reached the stage of contemplating and have given lots of thought on traffic movement the
road, about life in general and then of
course life in office and then I think if I
really need to travel? Why do I
waste 9 hours of my life each week staring at nothing, looking in the oblivion and get thoughts of writing a book
on the lines of “Zen and the art of motor cycle maintenance” and sometimes as
bright as working in the food mall or as a toll booth operator…
The other day I was chatting with the
driver and got to know him, his life (gosh what has my company made me in to), his
employer and stuff… Then I thought let me rate him, what if his employer takes
his appraisal (at least he must be getting something). So I just did a little recap, The bus timing is at
6:30 in the morning from Prism Tower (Malad) office, he came at 6:20 at the gate went to
the office at 6th floor and the bus left at 6:30, went to the G5
office at Vikhroli, the driver collected the courier for Pune office came back,
more people joined the bus, water was kept and we left in 5 to 10 minutes,
further down the road at LBS marg the driver got down purchased newspaper for
the staff and we continued . He was wearing seat belt, AC temperature was at
24, which was comfortable (the bus is not really much comfortable) and he was stopping at the designated points where more people (from our office of course) hopped on to travel to
Pune. On the expressway he was driving exactly at 80 K.M. per hour, perfectly
normal driving. The bus halted at the
Food mall for 20 minutes and we
continued to Pune. The same story repeated in the evening.
Let me rate him now:
·
The driver was wearing an uniform – expected – 3
·
Arrived on time - expected – 3
·
Collected courier from office -
expected – 3
·
Driving at designated speed - expected – 3
·
Halting at food mall and designated places - expected – 3
He also told me that once his boss
(employer) had asked him to undertake
extra work on weekend and fill in for a driver, since the shuttle is only from
Monday to Friday, but it was so hectic that he could not report to work on
Monday as he returned from the extra shift on Sunday midnight. If a bell curve
is in place he may lose his rating, since he did not take up
oraganisational activity and lacked team spirit, but will still rate hi 3 as of now. He
does not do a single thing extra, does not help people in loading the luggage, does not greet us in the morning,
does not talk much. He does not fight either or compromise our safety,
but that is obviously expected from him so no extra points.
Like very few people here, the driver
one day decided to take a vacation and go to his mulluk (native place)for a month and we had a replacement.
At PT the usual bus came a new fellow
alighted with someone (probably the owner) went up to the office
collected the courier, told something to the driver and went away. The driver
started and asked us the destination (no proper handover, inefficient
transition manager)someone said Vikhroli , he was a driver so knew how to drive, however he did not know the office
address so did not take the office
route, so we had to guide him till the G5 office, explained him to collect the
courier (we were the end users of the customer)
he however did not buy the papers (sigh!) had to be told where to stop
and also the Pune address and the shortest route. Coming back was OK, but he
was not aware which foodmall to stop, but did halt wherever people had to get
down.
Now if we are to rate the replacement:
·
The driver was wearing an uniform – expected – 2 (he was
replacement and does not justify the expense so 3 )
·
Arrived on time - expected – 3
·
Collected courier from office -
expected – 2, he was not aware of deliverables, did not ask and he is at fault, owner will not tell, the employee has to ask and not assume
·
Driving at designated speed - expected – 3
·
Halting at food mall and designated places - expected – 2.5, he must be stopping
at a different food mall, its only because we are used to a certain place he need not stop there.
I wanted now revise and rate my
regular driver at 5.
But thinking again from an HR or
owner’s point of view, did he really deserve anything more than 3? The
replacement one was only expected to drive which he did and was not given a
proper handover, but the regular driver does not do anything extra, spectacular
and mind blowing, did not bring any new customer, no new revenue, I never
hugged him good night nor did I (or as
far as I remember) anyone else called
up his employer to thank him for providing such a wonderful person to
ferry me every day. He has not helped the office boys also (I don’t know what it
means, but he should help people around). He had not created a backup, he
should have foreseen the issue and taken a driver on his own expenses to Pune
and explain the process (contingency plan), so he will barely be able to get
even 3 now.
He may (will) not get a raise, the
diesel prices have already been revised and maintenance cost is high so
whatever the increase of rate if any (usually we offer discounted rate year
after year)that the customer may be offering, the owner would still be making a
loss technically and he is also
expanding his business by purchasing (or acquiring from other
transporters)couple of Volvo busses, so this in turn will benefit the business
and ultimately (and hopefully) make a positive impact on the driver (whatever
it means).
So my friends if I compare “yours
faithfully” (and probably most of us)with the driver, its simple (and business)
logic that we will get a rating of 3 and surely don’t deserve a raise or
increment, since we seldom do anything extra. I am really feeling better after
the analysis and completely understand the way it works, why do we have bell
curves and all the nice stuff. The company is benefiting in the end and in
its growth lies my growth.
You are free to go ahead and chose a
new bus, the existing owner will not be
affected (the end users probably would for some days), but no guarantee
that the new owner will be different than the old one and we also know the
route now, why move when we can still see lot of cheese?
Sagar
p.s.: You can always buy a new bus if
you have the money and the … I can share my
driving license details
