Student details:

Name: Tanya Taneja

Class and Section: MBA 1-B
ERP Id: 0161MBA120
Subject: Organisational Behaviour
Submitted to: Dr. Ritu Bali

Ques. What are the main learnings of the case?

Ans. The dabbawalas carry tiffins for the employees which contains two main committees of the
contractors who run the business. From the case we can learn that why the tiffin carrying service

has been successful in Mumbai.

Following are the learnings of this case:
Better understanding of the logistical system that survived due to the cultures in various places.
How can human resource management be used in this field.
How the food is delivered and what are the other things involved in this service.
Their extreme discipline; which helps them in maintaining accuracy despite such huge
transactions per day has the capability for error free working even in difficult situations.
Flat hierarchy of the dabbawalas and how well they deliver the services:
They have a well coordinated mechanism in which they work. Therefore, if there is a well

structured system in place, desired objectives can be achieved easily.

They are labor intensive and technologically unsophisticated. But despite that they work in a

very efficient manner that too without any error.

Consumer satisfaction driven: Customers are their primary focus and since they are satisfied with
the service they receive that is why the operations of dabbawalas is such a big success. So, in

order to gain success a company should focus more on consumer satisfaction.

Low operating cost: In contrast to other well established identifications these dabbawalas provide
more accuracy without investing huge capital and expensive technology. But they deliver
reliability and customer satisfaction. Therefore, what we learn from this is that it is not necessary
that huge amounts of capital and extensive technologies should be for an organization to prosper,
but their main focus should be on being reliable to its consumers and being consumer satisfaction
driven always.

Ques. What team and inter-team processes are reflected in the operation of the dabbawala
system?
Ans. The essence of this whole system is the trust that is there between the employees and the
contractors.
There are two committees:

The Mandal committee

The Trust committee

Both of the Mandal Committee and the Trust Committee includes:

11 elected contractors
It is mostly flat hierarchy

5000 workers called carriers

800 supervisers
11 members in the Mandal committee
In total there are 5800 members in this system

What makes their system work?

They have a common plan and purpose
They each have a specific goal to be achieved.
They have team efficiency.
The inter team process is between the carriers and the delivery address:

Carrier will pick up tiffin at 10 am labels the essentials about where it is to be reached.
Special carriers are those who take up area wise service.
All the tiffins are then taken to the railway station where another carrier arranges them and puts

them on a 2.5 m long wooden cart carrying upto 40 tiffins at a time.

After that he ascends the train and reaches specific destinations where another carrier collects

them at different places.

This carrier who picks up the tiffin will deliver it to the office of the customer.
The tiffins are collected later on and the same chain is repeated backwards.

Ques. How has dabbawala system responded to the changing context of the life of officegoers in Mumbai?
Ans. The dabbawalas main feature is the trust that runs along in their system.
Employees who go for work cant return back for having lunch and hence they miss their home
food and had to spend unnecessary money on eating outside food.
By doing that they have preserved the essence of serving home cooked Indian food.
In addition to that they provide hot clean and inexpensive food alternative.

Dabbawalas give the employees what they want at the right time HOT HOME MADE FOOD.
It helps them in saving lot of money and also time.
Ques. Which behaviourial sciences are relevant for understanding the dynamics of the
dabbawala system?

Ans.
PSYCHOLOGY: They all believe in their values and trust upon each other. Although all the
workers are not educated, their main motto is same i.e. customer satisfaction the trust and the

behavioural science is the reason why the dabbawalas are successful in their work.
SOCIOLOGY: This behavioural science is depicted in the management and time management
and also the punctuality that dabbawalas have. The way they carry out all the work given is all
through simple communication and labels that are stick to the tiffins. The trust and the

punctuality are the main reasons for the success of dabbawalas

SOCIAL PHYCHOLOGY: They have a well built communication system. There is trust and
loyalty amongst them. Since it is a group process, they form good bonds and relationship along
the line.