A 125-year-old delivery network that feeds Mumbai
> “We've known this person so long we know he'll do a proper job."> The delivery schedule also has built-in buffers. If a delivery is due at 13:00, the dabbawala will aim for around 12:00 [...] For every 15 to 20 dabbawalas there is also always someone on stand-by in case one of them gets delayed.> At 12:45 a dabbawala races around the corner on a bike and rushes shouting into an office building. [...] The dabbawala was late by his own standards but the customer was probably never aware of the hiccup, he says.> A dabbawalas’ commitment to the job is partly because it pays well – roughly 12,000 rupees (£140) a month, a good salary in India for what is essentially unskilled labour. The fame of the dabbawalas also gives the job a certain prestige.> And as a cooperative all dabbawalas are equal partners with supervisors called mukadams who are elected.It seems like there's no major secret here. The key to achieving such things is... surprise surprise... treating your workers fairly and paying them well so they actually give a shit about their job, and feel appreciated and proud of what they do. The same would actually translate to many other industries.The food delivery startups could achieve the same if they paid their delivery drivers fairly (at the moment most don't even make minimum wage - compared to the dabbawalas’ "good salary") instead of pissing away their money into marketing/advertising or into someone's pocket, whether greedy investors or "engineers" to build a blockchain-based, Kubernetes-powered microservices playground.