Humans of Dunzo
Vaidehi Murthy
I have tread both paths — the conventional & the so-called “unconventional” and I think these experiences have pretty much helped me develop what I call “the tilted perspective”. Having studied engineering, I worked as a Software engineer for 5 years at the start of my career. I did the usual “on sites” overseas on behalf of the IT company I was working for and I began feeling as though I’m increasingly conforming to the stereotype. I quit as a result and landed up in Ladakh, volunteering to teach English & Physics in a school. This was back in 2012 when Ladakh was not as mainstream as it is today. It was fairly unknown as a place, freezing with -25 degree temperatures and this wasn’t an easy feat coming all the way from South India.
One thing that I picked up from this experience was my perspective on life. The fact that people were so much happier with much less in possession gave me a lifelong lesson. I went back to working with a medical equipment firm for the next couple of years post which I volunteered again to teach in Vietnam. I was teaching aspects of digital literacy to a certain population who were originally from Laos but settled in Vietnam and are caught between the two countries unaccepted by both. When I was approached by Dunzo, I hadn’t had any experience in brand building or social media. I used to write and publish stories occasionally for Humans of Bombay.
The amount of faith put on me has been unbelievable.
I would say there is a lot of courage within Dunzo to experiment and that’s what has helped to find our voice as a brand that we have today. What I absolutely love about Dunzo, and the reason for me to show up every day is the sheer amount of love and instant feedback we receive about every idea that goes out on social media. It’s a place where my team’s values are aligned with the larger org values and there is complete autonomy and transparency in the way we work.
Getting too immersed into a worldview can sometimes become a barrier to creativity. I’m often an outsider observer, culminating all the experiences I’ve had across my career which has helped me build “the tilted perspective”. It’s what I do when I’m stuck, and I quickly position myself as an outsider, which is most likely what I’m doing if you see me with a tilted head :D
