Some questions occured to me the other day while driving across town during the rush hour. In Taiwan, rush hour traffic is directed by taxi drivers who park up their cabs and stand in the middle of busy intersections, risking their lives and sanity for the greater good.

On this occasion I was coming from a conversation about motivation and commitment, and how they are often lacking in employees in 'normal' jobs. But watching these guys made me realise that the problem is not universal. There are people in Taiwan who make extraordinary efforts to do a good job, but we often don't notice them. So here are a few observations about taxi drivers directing traffic: 

Firstly, have you ever noticed that these people have to use their judgement and discretion? They may wave you through a red light if it's safe to do so, or insist that you make an inconvenient turn if you're in the wrong part of the road, rather than let you cause a problem for everyone else by doing what you wanted to do. This is not simply "doing things by the book," there's a real focus on getting the best outcome for the maximum number of people - the most efficient traffic flow. 

This is quite a responsible position. If you mess up then there's a possibility of traffic getting snarled-up at your intersection and this can cause problems further down the road for other people. It was quite a refreshing feeling, sitting at the lights and watching someone willingly accepting responsibility and working hard to achieve the best possible result, using his initiative and being proactive about resolving issues as they came up.

And they do this under pretty awful working conditions. It may be 40 degrees out there, or it may be raining so hard you can barely see across the intersection. There are impatient people coming at you from all directions in huge killing machines, and the air quality is appalling. What with the noise, dirt, pollution, danger, and general unpleasantness of the environment I can't help feeling that these people deserve some recognition.

But here's the coolest thing: not only do they get little recognition, I don't see how they can even be properly assessed. How do you measure the "efficiency" or "work-place effectiveness" or "productivity" of someone in this position? I tried to imagine what kind of reward scheme or bonuses I would offer if I was managing this operation, but I couldn't think of any way to quantify the individual contributions being made. How do you know who is working well, and who is taking it easy?

It seems to me that you can't really monitor these guys. You just have to send them out there and trust them to do a good job. And most of them seem to respond by doing a great job. Wouldn't it be great if your marketing manager or accountant would do the same?

So what is the difference between a taxi-driver, exposing himself to hell-on-Earth but doing his job conscientiously and well, and the highly educated guy in the air-conditioned office who has plenty of excuses for non-performance but no real commitment to his job?

As far as I can tell, the difference is that taxi-drivers live "on the edge." They are exposed to the reality of competition in the free market all day every day and have no safety net to protect them. Educated people, on the other hand, grow up pursuing the goal of getting a good job with a good company that will take care of them. They spend their education trying to avoid doing more work than they absolutely have to, due to the demands of teachers and parents who push them to pass more tests, and carry these habits with them when they enter the workplace.

The moral of the story must be that if you want your business to be successful you should hire a taxi-driver instead of a graduate from a good background!