Lessons learnt from Uber Drivers

Yes, there are lessons from Uber drivers. There is no doubt Uber brought in a workforce who can work independently, at their discretion and bring-in different type of customer service in that industry. Their success has brought in many competitors including Google’s proposed use of Waze app in carpool program.

Started Uber when I had flat tire at home to begin a business trip and used often during my trips at project cities. There are amazing stories from the drivers, if we get into conversion mode. There are times when the driver is playing radio and I pretend to be busy with email to avoid any conversions.

Jan is the registered nurse who works early morning shift at a big hospital. After the shift she does the Uber for few hours before the dinner time. Her main reason to do Uber was ‘like to have some normal adult conversion’ & ‘get refresh from hospital environment’. The extra income goes into her retirement plans! Her brother, few of her cousins are also doing Uber and they exchange stories about passengers’ behavior.

John is a busy college baseball coach and referee! Even after a long game, he could be on road in Uber. He keeps saying he likes driving and meeting people. He is never late, mostly 10 minutes ahead of the scheduled pick or drop. If he can’t make it, he calls his friend for the trip and ensure the communication is complete. I was thinking why this can’t happen in any regular work life?

Debbie is the smartest driver I have ever seen. When she decides to log-in to be available for Uber, she scan the place for other Uber drivers. Then she drives few blocks away to ensure that she gets busy. She has so many regular customers every day that she can’t afford to take a vacation during work week.

Jim has a full-time job as IT support technician. His wife works in another city. Once he is at the company’s parking lot at 5pm he starts Uber. Does travel till 8pm, have a dinner at nearby place and goes home for sleep. He says Uber work pays most of his bills and he intend to save most of the salary towards his daughter’s education. His daughter is just three years old!

Once, I took regular taxi at an airport since it was very late in the night for my regular Uber person. The taxi driver mentioned he has been waiting for 3 hours for this pickup since there are not that many takers for taxis & Uber is there in his city. But he never complained about his lack of business and the wait. He said technology changes business & he need to update his skills for some other type of job locally!

Lastly, I had a long and tiring day of meetings and endless project scope issue discussions. John picked me up from work and there was a phone call which he requested whether he can answer. It was from the Doctor’s visit he had earlier in the day. The office confirmed he has cancer and need to start Chemo soon. He smilingly responded that he was expecting this given his parent’s past medical history. After the call, he started talking about my work and travel. I told him, here I am thinking of complaining about my day’s work and you’re taking major medical issue so easy! His answer was ‘let us take one day at a time in this life time!’.

Matt Ravikumar does independent consulting in the Oracle’s JDE ERP software implementations. He is also a writer and cartoonist. His works are available in www.cartooncartons.com. He is based at Santa Clara, California and can be reached at mattravikumar@gmail.com