TLA61_AllPages

Like freight, however, the availability of drivers can vary
based on economic and other factors. Doug Drier knows
the cycle well.
“This industry, it’s just crazy,” he said. “A year ago, carriers
were calling almost daily, looking for drivers. Fast forward
12 months to today — nobody wants drivers, and the
pendulum swings.”
Drier is the founder and CEO of Right Turn Recruiting, a
driver procurement firm that has supported carrier recruiting
efforts for 15 years.
“Last September, I’d say we started kind of really noticing,
OK, this is finally going in a negative direction,” he explained.
“So, it’s been about nine months of not-so-good
recruiting weather for us.”
The upside? When things are “not so good” for Drier,
they’re good for carriers. When driver applications are plentiful,
many carriers are more able to handle their recruiting
needs through in-house efforts.
Recruiting success is often a consolation for slow freight
and lower rates. In the spot freight market, owner-operators
who are no longer seeing the profits they did when rates
were high are surrendering their authority and either parking
or selling their trucks while they look for jobs as company
drivers.
At the same time, company drivers who experience a
decline in miles or the loss of a favorite run start thinking
things might be better at another carrier.
Whatever the market for drivers, most business analysts
would agree that it makes sense for carriers to hold on to
the drivers they have. Unfortunately, recruiting advertising,
sign-on bonuses, and other factors have created an environment
where drivers are bombarded with incentives to
leave their current carrier and move to another company.
“This industry has made it incredibly easy to hire drivers
from one company to the next,” Drier said. “You can be
running for Company A today and Company B by Friday in
almost any market. It’s just the littlest thing that can get a
driver to leave.”
In such an environment, getting drivers to stay with a
carrier can be difficult. Although drivers changing jobs is
the basis of his business, clients often ask Drier for advice
about retaining drivers. This is a task for which he’s
uniquely qualified: Drier’s recruiting team visits with drivers
every day, and those drivers usually share their reasons for
wanting to move away from a company.
“The big thing is just to communicate with your drivers
(about) the current state of the market,” Drier said. “I don’t
think carriers do a good enough job of speaking about the
current environment we’re in, and how it’s so different from
six months ago or 12 months ago.
“Drivers need to know, ‘(The problem is) not just us. Our
competitors and everybody else are seeing a huge drop in
rates, which are 70 to 75 cents lower today than they were
last year at this time. That’s not just us. That’s everybody,’”
he continued.
While some drivers read industry publications and stay
up to date on current conditions, most are more concerned
with their day-to-day jobs. The first indication something is
amiss might be a spouse complaining about smaller paychecks.
That’s where a bit of carrier communication with
drivers can make a big difference.
In weekly staff meetings Drier holds with his team of recruiters,
they discuss what drivers are saying.
“There are plenty of drivers out there that are completely
blind to the market and environment we’re in,” he said.
“They just think, ‘Wow, my paychecks aren’t as big anymore.
I gotta get out of here!’”
While drivers may be looking for new jobs right now,
there aren’t as many to be found. Many carriers use times
when there’s an abundance of drivers applying as a chance
to improve the quality of their driver group, and there may
be several drivers competing for a single spot.
“Almost everybody we work with has taken that approach,”
Drier said. “Without question, carriers are tightening
up their hiring guidelines. The companies that were
taking six months (experience) drivers now want one year;
the companies that were taking (drivers with) three tickets
now will only take two; the companies that would take (drivers
who have had) 10 jobs in three years now will only look
at five.”
Such improvements can help bolster a carrier’s safety
record and could impact insurance rates.
“It’s a common theme,” Drier said. “(Retaining the best
drivers is) the one easy adjustment to make to strengthen
the overall quality of your fleet.”
Sign-on bonuses are still being advertised, but some carriers
have either suspended those programs or reduced the
amounts offered. Doing this reduces the cost of recruiting
as well as the total cost of driver employment without reducing
per-mile or other pay.
“A lot of companies have eliminated those,” Drier remarked.
“You still see them advertised, but I haven’t seen a
huge sign on bonus offered this month.”
Reductions in pay are, obviously, a reluctant effort on the
part of a carrier to hold its losses to a minimum. Obviously,
though, reducing pay can be detrimental to both recruiting
and retention. After the recession of 2008-2009, some carriers
found it difficult to replace drivers lost to pay reductions.
“I know of only been one carrier that’s decreased pay,”
Drier said.” I think everybody else is hanging on as tight as
possible to not have to do that. But I think some are getting
close.”
Perhaps the best way to retain drivers is to simply work
to preserve those personal relationships.
“Drivers don’t leave a company,” Drier explained. “My
feeling is, they leave a dispatcher. They leave a maintenance
person or a manager. It’s often not the name on the side of
the truck; it is ultimately the people they work with. And in
any market, (a good driver) is going to have a pretty easy
time getting a new job somewhere else.”
When drivers are hard to come by, Drier gets more business
from carriers as they work to keep trucks rolling. But
as he and his team remain ready to help carriers find more
drivers, he knows the most efficient policy is to keep the
drivers they already have.
TCA JULY/AUGUST 2023 www.Truckload.org | Truckload Authority 23