A day at a courier company staffed entirely by deaf people Run by a 29-year-old Oxford MBA and staffed almost entirely by deaf people, Mumbai-based 'Mirakle Couriers' is a unique company whose internal operations we were long interested in. So we got PaGaLGuY's Lajwanti D'souza to spend a day at Mirakle Couriers and accompany a hearing-impaired delivery boy through the concrete jungle of Mumbai's commercial Fort area and witness for herself this miracle of social entrepreneurship. The Mirakle Couriers office at Churchgate, Mumbai with its huge stacks of parcels and loads of paper, employees busy handing over documents and packages to each other, looks like any other busy courier delivery service outlet. The only difference is that Mirakle Couriers operates in almost a deadly silence. With all its employees deaf and the CEO and founder Dhruv Lakra conversing with them in sign language, the only sound is that of paper crunching and packages being thumped on the floor. Dhruv, an MBA from Said Business School, Oxford University has kept upright the lessons he learnt on social entrepreneurship at Oxford and put them to practice by starting this unusual company. For Lakra, while there are 60,000 deaf people in India, the disability has been the least focused one. "That's because you don't know a person is deaf by simply looking at him," he says. Unlike blind or physically challenged people, whose disabilities are more visible. It was a chance witnessing of local bus conductor argue with a deaf commuter that spurred Dhruv's eureka moment to start a company with deaf people. It did not take much time before Dhruv moved out of a zooming corporate career with a premium investment bank to complete his MBA at Oxford and start this unique venture in 2008. With no precedent of this kind anywhere, he had to start from scratch, which meant liaising with NGOs and visiting sites where he was likely to meet deaf people. "Deaf people are usually well-connected so by word of mouth, I connected to a lot of them," said Lakra. Today this 29-year-old operates a company employing 55 deaf people. Deaf men do the package delivery, while deaf women work on package sorting. For Lakra, it is like running any other company, only that at every corner, he has to bear the sensitivities of his employees in mind. Recruiting a deaf workforce This has always been the most difficult part for Lakra. Recruitment companies, job websites and HR stalwarts are of no use for him. Lakra started the outfit by scouring every place he was told he would find deaf people in Mumbai, from street corners to NGOs and following leads given by people in the know-how. After Lakra got his initial set of people, the later recruits approached him on their own and thus started the young man's unusual tryst with social entrepreneurship. After meeting people, Lakra conducts a round of interviews with his prospective employees. It's important for Lakra, as soon as he is handed over a resume, to do a thorough background check on the candidate's family background and the places he has worked at before. "The employee's background should be good and also his past employers should have a good opinion about him. It's very important for me in this profession," said Lakra. Once the background is checked into, an interview follows. Here Lakra gives good attention to the candidate's appearance and confidence his personality exudes. It's important for Mirakle Courier employees to feel good and automatically like looking good for the job. A check is made whether the prospective employee likes to display a neat and clean appearance. Once the candidate passes this stage, he is recruited. The same goes for the female deaf employees who work in the office. Many come from troubled backgrounds and this company has come like a whiff of fresh air for them, as many have earlier been known to forcibly take up jobs at artificial jewellery-making and other such small units. When PaGaLGuY.com spoke to Lakra, two of his employees had left the company all of a sudden. For both, their families did not want them to work as courier boys. They would rather have them sit at home or choose softer career options like making candles. For Lakra, this is the biggest challenge. "Not only the public at large but even with families of deaf people, the urge is to sympathize with the disability. Families prefer that the deaf sit at home rather than work. The fear of putting them in society is major," said Lakra. A workday, Key Result Areas Punctuality, speed and concentration on work are some of the prime attributes Lakra expects from his staff. "They have to report on time to work and that means they would report to their destinations too on time," said Lakra. Speed plays a big factor for the courier company and it is because of the speed proposition that the company has bagged lucrative bulk orders from corporate clients, including a recent one from Vodafone which is keeping the little company on its toes right from 10 am to 6.30 pm at one stretch. While the men have to work in top speed on the field, the women have to keep up with the pace at the office while sorting the packages. The company delivers packages between Churchgate to Borivali on the western corridor, CST (VT) to Mulund on the central corridor and CST (VT) to Mankhurd on the Harbour Line (all suburban local railway lines in Mumbai). For nearby areas such as Nariman Point, CST (VT) and Churchgate, the Mirakle boys tread on foot. While for suburban areas, the train is the travel mode. Like many courier companies which make their mark in specific types of packages, Mirakle Couriers hopes to be the best at ferrying fragile packages. Keeping in mind the nature of its employees and that closely-knit nature of the setup, Lakra thinks that they will be best suited to transport packages which require extra care. Part of the article here, full report click on the link below. http://www.pagalguy.com/news/day-courier-company-staffed-entirely-deaf-people-a-6671 Pass this to your friends and relatives. Ravi
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