Service Is Free to Offer But Incredibly Valuable: Lessons from an Airport Shuttle Driver

At the Hyatt Dulles, my shuttle driver was named Abdullai. He was extremely enthusiastic about welcoming his early-morning travelers on board for the ride to the terminal.

“Ladies and gentlemen,” he said, “Welcome to my shuttle. I’ll be taking you to the Dulles airport this morning. The journey will take exactly 13 minutes.”

Then he opened a cooler and handed us all a bottle of cold water.

A bottle of water! Such things go a long way when jet-lagged at 5:30am.

Midpoint through the 13-minute jour...