I wanted the job but I faced a major dilemma! This is exactly why we need…

It was about 8 pm on a cold Boston night when I got the phone call I had been eagerly anticipating for quite some time. It was a recruiter with whom I’d been going back and forth over a job application. And it was good news — they’d accepted my counteroffer and were extending a sign-on bonus. I was excited but I didn’t let it show in my voice as I requested a week’s time to read the revised written offer and talk things through with my wife and family.

This is a job I really wanted, and it felt fantastic to come out on top of what had been a fairly long and tough interview process. Over the next few days, I discussed every aspect of the job and what it would mean for my career with my wife, my family and people who were familiar with my prospective employer. I heard only good things. One of these conversations was with my father back in India, who was supportive of the choice I was leaning towards, but before hanging up, he said to me: “This means that you will need to lease or buy a car”, to which I replied matter-of-factly, “No, I plan to take public transport”. We exchanged goodbyes and hung up.

Later that night, before going to bed, my wife asked me how I had planned to get to work at my new job. I got a little irritated at the question because we had already discussed that I would take public transport, but she was asking specifically which bus/train I would have to take in order to get to work at 8:00 a.m. I reached for my phone to check Google Maps. I fed in our home address and the exact address for where I would be expected to report to work and hit search. I was shocked to see the search results — there were so many options to get to work: driving myself; taxi services like Uber and Lyft; walking; biking. But no public transit option. Take a look for yourself:

Needless to say, we were both deflated. We had assumed, as silly as it may sound, that with all the people commuting between Boston and Woonsocket, there would surely be a public transit option to make it a manageable commute. To add to this, we had just sold our car a couple of months earlier, because lo and behold, parking where I live costs $500/month. Selling the car seemed like a practical choice because Boston has extensive public transport options, with the ‘T’ and the buses and ferries that the MBTA (Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority) operates. Getting a car would mean incurring a significant cost: around $700/month. Add to this the cost of the commute itself (55 miles one-way). I was easily going to be spending over $800 a month commuting to/from work. This wasn’t practical. So we did the obvious: we began to look at alternate options, including carpooling.

I logged onto a popular carpooling website and entered my origin and destination addresses and was disappointed to see only three results for people wanting to carpool along my route. And all listings were requests for rides, and not people offering them. This again meant that I would have to get a car. So, now the job that I really wanted seemed like it wasn’t necessarily a practical choice. I know I am not alone in facing this problem. Car ownership is expensive. Don’t trust me? Check out the AAA’s estimate of what it costs to own and operate a car on average: https://newsroom.aaa.com/auto/your-driving-costs/. Bear in mind, this does not include parking costs (which, if you live in a major city, is ridiculous).

Beyond owning a car, let’s think about the quality of the commute. Traffic costs the United States (cities, companies, and individuals) over $300 billion annually, with the average commuter spending close to 42 hours in rush hour traffic. It isn’t surprising then that we see so much road rage and tend to arrive at work feeling like we have just fought and survived a battle. I wanted the job but not if the commute was going to be so painful. The problem isn’t cars, but the fact that most vehicles are operated as single-occupant vehicles. Again, don’t just take my word for it. The U.S. Census Bureau published a study in 2013, which found that 76% of people commuting to work drive alone. This is what primarily contributes to the traffic gridlock.

So, what’s the solution? Carpooling is a great one and offers several benefits, such as reducing traffic, saving time and money, and helping conserve the environment. The problem though is that since the 1970s — when carpooling peaked — it has been in decline. And there’s good reason for that: when people think of carpooling in the traditional sense, they think of it as something that is inflexible, inconvenient, and unsafe. Beyond this, people think carpooling can often feel forced and lead to awkward interactions.

This is why we created SEET, a mobile platform enabling you to flexibly and conveniently share a commute with people you like and can trust. Yes, in addition to being a management consultant (at least till I start at my new job), I am also the co-founder and CEO of a start-up. SEET was created because my co-founder and I were challenged with the problem of finding an affordable, convenient, and flexible way of getting around; something that felt safe and helped experience a sense of social connection. We knew that we couldn’t build something based on our assumptions, and so we did a whole lot of customer discovery. This involved creating user personas and speaking to over 300 people to validate the problem around carpooling and understanding their needs when it comes to developing a solution.

Now that our iOS and Android mobile apps are near-ready, we are excited about the prospect of sharing our solution with the world! We know that SEET can make carpooling an obvious choice for those that currently commute alone. And I can assure you this is not traditional carpooling repackaged (in fact, we’d be stupid to offer you that because there is a graveyard of failed carpooling start-ups)! Instead, we have turned traditional carpooling on its head. I could share all the great things about SEET right here, but I’d rather let you explore that yourself (only a click away at www.getseet.com).

Now, it’s one thing to create something awesome and another to get people to use it. Admittedly, we are only getting started on this journey and there will surely be a few wrinkles to iron out, but we are committed to listening to and learning from the experiences and feedback of our users. This is where you come in. Do check us out at www.getseet.com and please sign-up — it’s as simple as leaving your name and email address — so that we can notify you when our app is available for download. We’d love to learn what you like and dislike, as well as what you would like to see included.

Finally, I hate to be left hanging. And so, I am not about to do that to you. Let me complete the thought that I started this story with:

I wanted the job but I faced a major dilemma! This is exactly why we need