They [the USPS] do a computer-generated route every Sunday, so you show up, and depending on who has ordered packages, they hand you a paper sheet of turn-by-turn directions of what the computer has generated as the most efficient route. It’s wildly inaccurate most of the time. I generally know some of these towns now, so I look at these directions, and I’m like “Well, that’s not even remotely the most efficient path.” But you just have to use it because you can get in trouble if you go off route.
quoting the anonymous USPS worker.
classic case of there being no feedback loop, leading from the actual frontline workers to the software engineers. it's funny that this is something i sought to tackle with MM and actually managed to (ofc, we never really scaled, plus i wasn't exactly solving a pressing problem)