Most accurate deliveries in the world – Mumbai dabbawallahs

The Mumbai dabbawallahs have been awarded the six sigma award.

For those who aren\’t familiar with six sigma methodology, in layman\’s terms, a six sigma process is one in which 99.99966% of all opportunities to produce some feature of a part are statistically expected to be free of defects i.e. 3.4 defective features / million opportunities or 3.4 ppm (parts per million).

The dabbawalas make less than one mistake in every six million deliveries!

Most of the companies in manufacturing sector strive to achieve this level of perfection, and there are hardly any Indian companies who have done it yet.

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\”Twelve years ago, some people from Delhi came to Dabbawala and said they  want to do research on Dabbawala; they prepared a project and went back  to Delhi.They called after 3 months and informed Dabbawala about Six  Sigma. Dabbawalas didn’t know what it meant. They told Dabbawala it was a  big honour so Dabbawala asked them to send it across. They were told to  go to Delhi and collect it. Sixteen dabbawalas went to Delhi to collect  the Six Sigma certification. People work so hard for Three and Four  Sigma but dabbawalas got Six Sigma because they didn’t care about the certification and cared only about customer satisfaction. It  is a big achievement especially without the use of technology. Even if  the dabbawalas use technology in the form of mobile phones, they can’t  because both their hands are used in delivering tiffins. Technology is  useless for them for delivery. And after all this, they charge only 400  rupees per month for delivery.