A busy man has time for everything whereas a lazy man has time for nothing !!

Sagar, 40 years old, is the car washer in my residential building. He charges Rs 500 per car, per month from various apartments as his fee for services rendered. Apparently he has a contract for a few apartments which takes care of him and his family's survival. Everything was good, until Covid happened.

Everything under lockdown

No outside workers/ help allowed in apartments

No cars being washed and some apartments refused to pay his fee, citing that there was no cleaning done for the lockdown period, hence no fee.

Like thousands others, Sagar and his family were suffering. Sagar is smart, proactive and thoughtful. He got an idea.

He called every flat and said " If you need anything during the lockdown, anything, groceries, milk, ice cream, cigarettes etc, just call me and I will deliver it at your apartment reception, ensuing contactless delivery. You can pay me online.

In April he even managed to find and deliver 10 boxes of acrylic paints which I ordered, as I was bored at home and wanted to try my hand at painting.I never asked him where did he manage these from especially at this lockdown time.

In other words he expanded his job profile vastly to include the following -

Taking orders from people on phone

Finding this items in lockdown 

Standing in queue to get those items

Deliver those items at the building reception

Collecting and Tallying online payments.

Now comes the best part of the story.

In exchange for his extra curricular job, he didn't ask for tip or delivery/courier charges but he just requested people to pay the actual cost of the item secured AND to continue paying his car cleaning fee. This is the time when people were panicking, totally reluctant to go out, looking for a reason to smile and Sagar took this onus on himself to give them some relief. You will agree that in April we all were scared to even step out . As expected all the people who used his services not only paid his car cleaning monthly cost but on their own tipped him everytime he brought something which they wanted. 

A few things to learn from this episode - 

1. Crisis is temporary and we need to learn to manage it to survive 

2. Thinking out of the box is essential. Don't be afraid to wander and try new things, even if temporarily 

3. Don't shy away from hard work. It seldom goes waste

4. Making customers satisfied never goes out of fashion, and continues to be No1 success formula

Sagar didn't change his goal, he only changed his path.

He survived the lockdown, his family proudly looks upto him

Sagar is a Hero, real Covid hero !

 A busy man has time for everything whereas a lazy man has time for nothing.!  

PS - When i asked Sagar for his pic, he said " I want to give my best pic, since i also have a life beyond car washing"