Learning work ethics from a Kachra wallah

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We don’t stop learning. We can learn anytime, anywhere, from anyone. That is what is expected from us in our lives.

We all have heard a lot about the Dabba wallas of Mumbai. The Dabba wallahs deliver Tiffin boxes at the right places with six sigma accuracy. Some days back I came across one person, who made me learn a thing or two on work ethics.

By Kachra wallah I mean the guy who every morning collects garbage/wastes from door to door in our residential apartments and discharge it to the municipal garbage collection vehicle.

My first encounter with him was interesting. I was taking my morning bath and here some one starts ringing call bell. I needed some time to come out, but hey! He now starts knocking at the door; thinking may be the call bell is not working. After a lot of knocks and some speedy efforts from me, I open the door and find the hero of this story standing there.

He had put up T-shirt and knickerbockers (trousers ending above knees). Is he a cool dude? Let us go in detail….

He was a thin man in his forties, but looking much older. His rickety legs were visible from the knickerbockers. But he had an expressive face. I become annoyed to find that the guy was a kachra wallah.  Before I could speak, he starts off in a loud voice, “Kachra do naa. Kitni baar darwaajaa khatkhataya” (“Give me the garbage. How many times I have knocked at your door!”).

What? I lose my cool and tell him that if I don’t turn up, he can’t force me to give it to him. I smiled at my own statement. J But he is not convinced and asks me to hurry up.

From that day onwards, he comes to my door and knocks until I appear; either I give him his beloved kachra or I tell him that I didn’t generate any! Now onwards, I will call him GMan – Garbage Man (this is different from Gmale/Gmail J ).

After some days, he observes that he is not able to collect garbage from my flat, as by the time he comes to the ground floor, collecting garbage from all the upper floors, I am out of the house (for office). To my amazement, now he started collecting garbage from lower to upper floors! He continued in this absurd manner (he has to carry the load upwards) for one month. Then one day, some one from the society scolded him for doing that the unconventional way. He asked our guy to collect downwards only. Our GMan found merit in that and now I see him only 4 times a week.

One day, I saw him carrying his garbage basket out from our housing society. Then suddenly he stopped. There were some plastic wrappers lying at some distance. He collects them and put them into his basket. Then he carries on. This I not expected, because cleaning the lawn is the responsibility of some one else! This makes me think a little more about him…..

When I think, I can easily count several traits that make his case a perfect example of good work ethics:   

1. He is punctual at his work, and never absent.
2. He is passionate for his job. He is ready to argue and will get the job done at any cost. GMan stays at my door, unless I appear.
3. To satisfy his customers, he is flexible, even if that cause him some pain. GMan carries the garbage up the ladder, so that he doesn’t miss one flat on the ground.
4. He listens to others and is ready to change if he finds merit in that. GMan changed his path again upwards, because that was the efficient method.
5. He goes beyond his defined job responsibility. GMan is ready to pick up the garbage from the ground, which is actually assigned to some other person.
6. He doesn’t want to be praised. He is content with the timely completion of his work. No one praises GMan for his good work.

Am I going too far, in extracting something called “good work ethics” out of our GMan? What is a work ethic? “The work ethic is a cultural norm that advocates being personally accountable and responsible for the work that one does and is based on a belief that work has intrinsic value.” Read this definition, and I am proud to come across this GMan – a perfect example or good work ethic.

I still don’t know his real name. But now I do some Googling. Do you know what they call our Kachra Wallahs in the US? In the US, he is also called Waste collector, Garbage man, Garbage collector, Trash collector, or Sanitation engineer. The last name will provide our GMan some inspiration.

[Kumar Rahul, Monday, December 11, 2006 7:17 PM]

PS: I wait for your views on this piece.