How to Reduce Driver Application Abandonment

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truck driver application

Trucking recruiters are tasked with finding top candidates, matching them to the right jobs, and converting them into drivers for the fleet. That’s why it can become so frustrating when you notice that the number of drivers who apply for your jobs starts to drop. 

There could be many reasons why this is happening, but if you’ve got a solid reputation, great pay, and nice benefits and home time, the real reason could be right under your nose; application abandonment.  

Your carrier could have the best reputation, pay, benefits, and perks in the industry, but it amounts to little if you have an application process that is so frustrating for a driver to get through that they don’t even bother finishing it.  

A recent survey found that 92% of jobseekers who hit “apply”, never actually get through the entire job application. Just think about the great drivers your carrier could be missing out on because of a bad application process. Here are three things that could be causing truck driver application abandonment and what you can do to fix them.

1. Cut Down on the Length

If you’re dealing with high application abandonment, try putting yourself in a driver’s shoes. Most drivers don’t want to spend their limited free time filling out lengthy and complex applications. In fact, this is usually the top reason job seekers quit in the middle of applications. 

If your applications require drivers to answer multiple long form answers, input the same information multiple times, or they’re being asked tedious questions related to small details of the job, most will decide it’s not worth it and move on. Worst case, you may be losing these candidates to rival carriers who have optimized and shortened their applications. 

Ideally, your carrier’s application should take no longer than 15 minutes to complete. Instead of requiring drivers to provide every bit of information up-front during the application, focus on the basics and stick to questions that require simple answers. You can ask more detailed questions later, during the follow-up or in-person phone call.

2. Make Applications Mobile-Friendly

Since drivers spend most of their time on the road, they mainly search for and apply to jobs using their smartphones. In this mobile-first world, recruiters and fleet managers need to make sure they’re able to communicate and interface with drivers this way. Otherwise, you risk a large number of drivers abandoning your application. 

Optimize your applications for a mobile-first experience by using mobile rendering, saved login information, and other useful features. A lot of web providers will give you the ability to look at what a page will look like on a mobile device before you publish, so you can see if there are any issues.  

3. Collect Feedback

driver recruiterWhile you, as a recruiter can create what you think is the most efficient, painless, and all-around great application experience, you won’t really know how it is until drivers start applying. Even when they do start, it can be hard to gauge what’s working and what’s not since gathering data around job application abandonment can prove to be difficult. 

The solution lies in collecting driver feedback. Reach out to drivers who have completed your application process and see how they felt about it. You could offer an incentive to do so or tack it on as the last question during your initial phone screens with drivers. 

This information is invaluable in helping you and your recruiting team understand what’s working and what’s not in relation to your application.  

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Is the Truck Driver Shortage Real?

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For the better part of ten years, the trucking industry has been faced with what’s commonly been called a “truck driver shortage”. The thought is that there’s simply not enough drivers to fill the open positions that trucking companies have.  

Only recently have people started to challenge that narrative and ask themselves, “Is the issue a true shortage of truck drivers, or is it an issue of retaining truck drivers?” 

How did the “truck driver shortage” start?

There are differing accounts of when this issue started, but most agree that the deregulation of the trucking industry in the 1980’s kickstarted what we know as the “truck driver shortage”. Among many other things, less government involvement in the industry meant that carriers could pay drivers less and afford them less benefits.  

This helped to create the conditions that the industry finds itself in today. Fast forward to today, and due to a variety of factors, including the COVID-19 pandemic, there’s a huge demand for moving freight and subsequently a huge demand for truck drivers.  

Couple that with fewer drivers on the road due to tight insurance requirements and suspensions from the Drug & Alcohol Clearinghouse, and the drivers who are left have the upper hand in which company they’ll drive for. Many carriers have already found out that truck drivers aren’t in a position where they have to accept poor working conditions, low pay, and subpar benefits anymore.  

This tight labor market isn’t just an issue known by people in the transportation industry anymore. It’s been making headlines for the better part of two years. Time Magazine, CBS News, the NY Times and more have covered the issue. Late night host, John Oliver even did a 24-minute segment on the “truck driver shortage” in early 2022.


Do truck drivers not want to work anymore?

A common misconception is that truck drivers, like a lot of other workers in our country, don’t want to work anymore and are exiting the industry. The fact is that there are many drivers who do want to work. They just have more options for where they can work and won’t hesitate to make a move if they find a carrier that’s offering better pay, a better work environment, and better home time

This leads to the metric we hear about all the time; driver turnover. Many people talk about it, but there’s a common misconception as to what it actually measures. The American Trucking Association, (ATA) who calculates the metric, clarified the issue in a recent blog post. 

“Turnover is not an indicator of people exiting the industry (we know, because ATA created and tabulated the metric). Rather, it more accurately measures drivers moving between carriers. It captures churn within the industry—not attrition from the industry. While retirements and exits account for a small percentage of turnover, by-in-large that is not what this figure is counting.”

In the trucking industry, turnover (as calculated by the ATA) measures drivers leaving one carrier for another, not drivers leaving the industry all together. 

This means that while there are drivers exiting the industry, it’s not happening at the rate that we’re led to believe. Instead, drivers are switching from one carrier to another for better pay, benefits, and routes. It’s not that there’s a shortage of truck drivers, it’s that drivers are in control of where they can sell their labor to.  

How will the “truck driver shortage” be resolved?

Since the problem isn’t a shortage of drivers, but a problem of retaining drivers, the solution is simple; make working conditions better for truck drivers. If you look at any data around truck driver happiness, you’ll see that there’s a laundry list of issues that frustrate drivers.  

Long wait times at shippers/receivers, lack of parking, little home time, and no input on company/driver policies are just a few of the issues that are causing drivers to look elsewhere for employment opportunities. 

It’s not surprising that the carriers that have an answer to these problems are also the ones with the highest driver retention rates.  

What can recruiters do?

Recruiters should focus on what they can control. This includes knowing your positions inside and out, making sure the driver’s first impression of your carrier is a positive one, and being communicative with candidates from start to finish. 

Another great practice for recruiters and HR professionals is to conduct exit or stay interviews with your drivers. This will give you extremely useful information as to why drivers are leaving your carrier, or why they’re choosing to stay.

While recruiters and HR professionals aren’t usually the ultimate decision-makers for things like pay, benefits, and work perks, that doesn’t mean they can’t influence those decision-makers.  

Do some research on what competitors in the area offer drivers in terms of pay, benefits, and home time. If your carrier doesn’t match up to them, make it a point to try and talk to management about making some changes.

The Bottom Line

Referring to the problem that the trucking industry is facing as a shortage of truck drivers shifts the blame off of carriers and onto truck drivers. Instead of focusing on improving the conditions that drivers are faced with, (low pay, sparse home time, demanding deadlines) calling it a shortage simply writes off the issue as “truck drivers are too picky and don’t want to work.” 

As more and more carriers begin to see that investing in their drivers’ happiness is the way to increase retention, the industry should begin to see those turnover numbers drop.  

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Rethinking Your Minimum Qualifications for Your CDL Jobs

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minimum driver qualifications
The higher the driver qualifications, the better the driver applicants. Right? Not always. In some cases, high minimum qualifications bring top driver leads, but it may also cause you to miss top drivers who are strong candidates but don’t meet your minimum criteria. Especially when you are hiring for several positions in challenging geographies, you may be better off with a high-volume hiring strategy. If you’re having trouble getting good drivers behind the wheel, rethink your minimum qualifications and open your hiring pool. 

Find True Minimums

When you set minimum qualifications, are you starting with the true minimums? Before you modify the job description to fit your internal, company-specific qualification minimums, start with federal and state requirements. Many companies aim above the 21-year-old age minimum for interstate driving or simply displaying a valid CDL. However, it’s important to be strategic about where to raise the bar and where to keep minimums at or near their base level. When you do finalize hires, best practices include keeping a driver qualification file for each driver. 

Use the Job as the Foundation

Before you set minimum qualifications in a job posting, closely analyze the details of the job in two rounds. In Round 1, make a list of the skills and qualifications that you are looking for in a driver. Which ones are “nice to haves” and which ones are essential for a driver to be able to successfully complete the job? Are any of the skills or qualifications that you listed in Round 1 on the list primarily because they are intended to drive up application quality? For requirements that are just “weed-out” criteria, consider lowering your bar slightly to increase the hiring pool for jobs that are difficult to fill. 

Which ones are “nice to haves” and which ones are essential. Distill your qualifications list to the true minimums.

In the second round of developing appropriate minimum qualifications, focus on the “need to haves.” Distill your qualifications list to the true minimum qualifications. Use federal and state requirements as well as the minimums that you determine for your company and the specific job in question. Do not inflate the required qualifications from the essentials. Keep all of the necessary qualifications on the job description skills list. From there, determine your next round of priority qualifications. Decide where to increase your minimum qualifications and where to leave them at their baseline. 

Minimum Qualifications Are Not Static

Once you have reevaluated the qualifications for each job posting, consider those requirements the starting point. Optimize minimum by making them responsive to driver supply and job demand. When applicant volume is low, decrease the minimum qualifications to increase the hiring pool. This is often an effective recruitment strategy when hiring in challenging geographies with limited drivers. Even within a single company, some jobs may mandate different qualifications. 

Qualification requirements are not static. When applicant volume is low, decrease the minimum qualifications to increase the hiring pool. When applicant volume is high and job demand is low, consider increasing minimum qualifications.

On the other hand, when applicant volume is high and job demand is low, consider increasing minimum qualifications. Rapid changes to job postings may cause interested drivers to get frustrated by the perceived changing standards. Increase the required qualifications gradually to find the balance point between a sufficient candidate pool and maximizing driver quality. Then, boost your efforts with other recruiting best practices to connect with the drivers who will be valued members of your fleet.

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Ultimate Guide to Truck Driver Recruiting

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4 Ways to Expand Your Recruiting and Attract Minority Truckers

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4 Ways to Expand Your Recruiting and Attract Minority Truckers

Taking score of your overall recruitment efforts is important. Who are you reaching? What candidates are you obtaining? When you ask those questions, you need to measure the overall demographics of who you’re attracting to your open jobs vs. your goals. Setting out to expand your recruiting reach and get the attention of new prospects should be a measurable goal. When you seek to increase your reach to diversify your pool of drivers, you sometimes need to include new tactics. Here are 4 ways to expand your recruiting and attract minority truckers.

1. Create a Culture of Diversity

Your hiring plan should reflect the applicants you’re seeking. Therefore, it’s important to have a hiring plan that helps you broaden your reach and mix of candidates. Creating a culture of diversity is something that can help you attract a broad range of minority truckers’ applications.

Does the workplace reflect a welcoming atmosphere for everyone? Is your environment welcoming to everyone?

Setting up a culture of inclusivity in your workplace can be a great advantage in bringing in more minority truckers.

2. Use Marketing to Your Advantage

minority truck driverDoes your marketing work for attracting minority truckers? That can mean everything from featuring women and people of color in your images on your website, to showcasing that your benefits package is inclusive across all applicants. Marketing to minority truckers is advantageous and can just take a little bit of adjustments to your current plans.

Take stock of the images and the language you’re putting out in your communications. Is it inclusive to all? If the answer is no, it’s time to adjust!

Don’t forget to include your benefits packages and other HR policies to be inclusive of these objectives. After that, you might find that you’re getting the maximum pool of candidates that you’re trying to reach.

3. Implement Referral Programs

Use your current driver pool to expand your recruiting efforts. This should be an effort to have all your drivers refer a candidate, but it is an opportunity to be overt to your current minority drivers to refer qualified friends and family to your open positions.

If you don’t ask your current drivers to send driver opportunities your way, they will never find you. Research shows that “word of mouth” plays a huge factor for drivers looking for trucking jobs. When looking for minority truckers, referrals can be great.

4. Align with Minority Truckers’ Organizations

There are several trucking organizations geared towards women, or minority truckers. Find ways to get in touch and align your efforts in conjunction with those organizations. Can you find opportunities to sponsor an event or activity? Or simply promote their organization’s badges or messages on your website? Regardless, there are plenty of ways to get engaged.

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Ultimate Guide to Truck Driver Recruiting

Current ways of recruiting truck drivers just don’t work anymore. That’s because recruiting isn’t a transaction. This ultimate guide helps carriers recruit for retention.

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How to Overcome These Trends Impacting the Truck Driver Shortage

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truck driver shortage

There’s nothing that keeps trucking recruiters up at night like the ongoing truck driver shortage. Without a doubt, it’s the biggest factor influencing the transportation industry. Truck drivers and carriers alike know that it is difficult to hire and recruit top drivers for retention when there is tremendous competition for a small pool of drivers. Overcoming the truck driver shortage requires understanding the forces causing them. Here are 4 trends impacting the driver shortage and solutions on how carriers can overcome them.

Trend 1: Not Attracting Younger Workers

As a whole, the trucking industry is currently failing to attract younger workers. Most current truck drivers are middle-aged and have worked in trucking or other industries for many years. In past generations there were more young truck drivers, but those trends have changed. In addition, the industry must comply with the federal rule which requires commercial vehicle drivers to be at least 21 years old. The regulations aren’t entirely to blame for the truck driver shortage. The labor force participation rate for ages 16 to 24 is trending downward. This means there is increased competition for a smaller pool of young drivers today than ever before.

Solution:

If the trucking industry wants to tap into a larger pool of drivers, it needs to start appealing to millennial drivers. Millennials have different priorities and attitudes than their generation X and generation Y predecessors. In order to appeal to younger drivers, recruiters need to evaluate what millennials really want and then make sure a trucking job can provide it.

Trend 2: More Workers Go Straight to College or the Trades

The percentage of high school graduates going to college has increased over the last few decades. In 1984, only 56% of students went to college after graduating from high school. The rest of them went into the labor force including trucking and trades like welding, mechanics, and work as plumbers or electricians.

Today, nearly 70% of students are going to college, which leaves fewer workers for both trucking and the trades.

Sure enough, many of the trades are also experiencing a shortage, and they directly compete with trucking industry for a smaller pool of workers. If these workers find the trades to be a more attractive as jobs, it impacts the shortage in the trucking industry.

Solution:

Recruiters need to focus on making trucking more attractive than the trades. While both of these industry paths have many things in common, there are important differences as well. The biggest factor is travel and the impact on home time. While this may seem like a disadvantage at first glance, recruiters need to turn this into a benefit. By highlighting the opportunity to travel and the independence and flexibility of the job, recruiters can make trucking more appealing. Trade industries don’t offer many of the same perks and benefits that trucking does.

Trend 3: Automation is Hurting, Not Helping

Automation has yet to make a significant impact in reducing the driver shortage. Although many industry analysts had imagined self-driving trucks to be more prevalent on the road today, it is not yet the case. Autonomous trucks are still years or decades away from being a player due to technology, legal, and safety considerations. Instead of helping the driver shortage, autonomous trucks have hurt the industry in another fashion. The looming threat of self-driving trucks is discouraging career-minded people from the trucking profession. If drivers incorrectly believe that autonomous trucks will take their jobs in a few years, they won’t invest the time and money needed to pursue a career path in trucking.

Solution:

Recruiters shouldn’t be waiting for automation to solve the driver shortage. Regardless of the future of self-driving trucks, recruiters need to focus on finding innovative ways to compete for the best drivers and retaining them. Have data and statistics available on how the hype behind self-driving trucks doesn’t stand up to reality. Drivers want to know that they are still needed and that you rely on them for labor.

Trend 4: Most Current Drivers are Men

There’s no doubt about it, there’s a driver shortage because most truck drivers are men and they comprise only 50% of the workforce. There has been a significant increase in women drivers in recent years, but this hasn’t happened fast enough to offset the driver shortage. Most older drivers are still men, while younger generations tend to be less disproportionate.

When only half the population considers trucking as a profession, there’s no wonder there’s a driver shortage.

It’s a myth that trucking isn’t a career for women or that they wouldn’t enjoy the work. Although being a woman trucker comes with its own challenges, women who are passionate about the job and the independence it brings are happy to take on the role.

Solution:

Recruiters can focus on hiring and retaining more female truck drivers. Industry stakeholders can partner with organizations like Women in Trucking to advance and advocate for women in the industry. Carriers can go the extra mile to make sure women are comfortable with their companies. As your reputation as a woman-friendly company grows, more female drivers will consider trucking with your fleet. While there is a long road ahead, growing the number of women drivers will make a serious dent in the driver shortage problem.

ultimate guide to truck driver recruiting

Ultimate Guide to Truck Driver Recruiting

Current ways of recruiting truck drivers just don’t work anymore. That’s because recruiting isn’t a transaction. This ultimate guide helps carriers recruit for retention.

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3 Reasons to Treat Drivers Like People, Not Leads

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As a recruiter in the fast-paced trucking industry, there are many challenges and obstacles in your job. You have a limited budget and need to fill a high number of driving positions within a short period of time. It’s tempting then, to treat truck driver candidates as leads instead of people. Treating drivers simply as a number will lead you to miss important information to help with your recruitment. Worse, it can be very off-putting to drivers who are looking to find meaning and value in their work. The truth is that treating drivers like people, and not just leads, is helpful to both recruiters and drivers. Here’s a look at why.

1. Reach Targeted Driver Matches

Probably the biggest reason to treat drivers as people and not leads is because, well, they are people! Individual people have different skills, career goals, and job preferences. If you’re looking at candidates simply as leads without any specific qualities, you run the risk of believing that you can fill any job with any driver. Most recruiters know that drivers need to be qualified for particular jobs, but it goes beyond just qualifications.

To find the best matches for your jobs, you need to take into account driver preferences, and not just qualifications.

Some drivers may prefer less home time while others need to be with their families at least once every few days. Newer drivers may prefer the newest model trucks, while seasoned veterans would be more comfortable with classic and reliable models. Finding the right driver for each position requires you to get to know the priorities, goals, and preferences of each individual. Your recruiting becomes more precise and accurate when you treat drivers like people. From a driver perspective, it is also helpful because you’re meeting their needs and they’d be more likely to be productive and perform at their best level.

2. Make Recruiting Efficient

Recruiters have limited time and resources to fill a large number of jobs fairly quickly. As a recruiter, you may be tempted to contact an endless list of job candidates to quickly land hires. This may work in the short-term, but you’ll likely lose many of those drivers in just a few months. Focusing on quantity instead of quality will only work for so long, and you definitely won’t find the best drivers for job. As mentioned above, focusing on matches will help you hire the best candidate for each job. Treating drivers like individual people will also save you time by contacting and cultivating only your top matches.

Instead of losing time and money by blindly calling an endless list of candidates, you can invest your limited time on the top matches for each job.

Focus your energies on specific, interested drivers and move them through your recruiting pipeline all the way to onboarding. From the driver’s perspective, they would appreciate this as you can get their questions answered quickly without them waiting around too long. This also keeps the interaction about the specific jobs they want, instead of soliciting them about random jobs they weren’t ever interested in or suited for.

3. Recruit for Retention

Treating drivers like people will help you recruit with more lasting value. Drivers who feel treated like people will be more likely to stick around longer. The trucking industry is notorious for high turnover, and some recruiters forget some of the solutions are this simple. The simple fact is that drivers don’t want to leave their carriers after just a few months. Most drivers would be very happy to find long-term jobs that fulfill all their needs and keeps them gainfully employed for many years. Drivers are simply looking for meaningful jobs that give them a sense that they belong.

Treating drivers like people is the only way they will feel dignified and respected as professionals.

This starts with carefully matching them with jobs that suit their needs but doesn’t stop there. Valuing truck drivers throughout their career means routinely checking in to make sure they are satisfied with the job. Driver engagement surveys and driver appreciation ideas all serve this same purpose. Drivers are sick of hearing empty promises which aren’t delivered on. Instead, be straightforward with them about what they can expect from the job, and what you can hope to realistically deliver to them. This refreshingly honest attitude can win drivers over. It all comes down to taking the time to treat drivers like people, not just leads. When drivers don’t feel lied to and cheated, they are less likely to leave your fleet.

When drivers are fully valued as individual people, you’re more likely to retain them for years on end.

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Ultimate Guide to Truck Driver Recruiting

Current ways of recruiting truck drivers just don’t work anymore. That’s because recruiting isn’t a transaction. This ultimate guide helps carriers recruit for retention.

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How and When to Use Technology to Recruit Truck Drivers

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It seems that we can’t escape technology in our lives, especially in the workplace. As a recruiting professional in a challenging and fast-paced industry, you’ve probably read about how using the latest technology can help you recruit truck drivers. However, having a keen skeptical eye, you also know that using technology cannot solve all problems, and can’t replaced good old-fashioned recruiting methods. In reality, both these things are true. You must use technology for recruiting, but you can’t rely on it blindly either. The trick is learning how and when to use technology to best aid your recruiting efforts.

Enhance and Complement with Technology

It’s true that technology can play a part in all functions of your recruitment efforts. It can help allocate your budget, optimize marketing, capture and manage leads, and onboard new hires. However, if you use technology blindly, that may be worse than not using it at all! You could end up hurting tried-and-tested methods that have worked for ages.

The secret to how and when to use technology is to always have it complement your human efforts, instead of hamper them.

There will always be some disadvantages to using technology, but thankfully your human efforts will be strong in those areas. Similarly, there are areas where humans tend to make more mistakes. Here is where technology can aid or accelerate your process. This way you’re always using technology to enhance your already strong human recruitment efforts.

The Strengths of Technology

Knowing how and when to use technology depends on a good understanding of its strengths and weaknesses. You’ll soon recognize that these usually complement human strengths and weaknesses. For example, one of the weaknesses of human effort is a limited capacity. You only have a limited number of recruiters, limited budgets, or limited time.

Thankfully, technology excels at using limited resources to scale up operations that lead to better results.

Similarly, using human effort leads to low accountability. Bill thought Joan was going to complete that task, while Joan thought Adam was accountable for it. Assigning tasks to technology means that the tasks are track-able and measurable. Human effort can sometimes lack consistency and accuracy. We understandably feel tired, bored, antsy, or unmotivated when tackling repetitive tasks. These are perfect tasks to outsource to technology. Unless it breaks down, it reliably completes the same task repeatedly until you instruct it to stop.

And the Weaknesses

However, don’t be fooled into thinking that there are no disadvantages to relying on technology. One of its weaknesses is that technology will be subject to bugs and glitches. This is when the human touch helps. When your automated systems suffer a technical error and don’t function as expected, you can ask recruiters to step in and cover the missing pieces.

Technology also needs constant monitoring and frequent technical support. Instead, people can be autonomous!

You don’t need to constantly monitor their actions or call in a repair crew when they make an error. If you empower your staff, they are capable of constantly self-adjusting. This is in contrast to technology, which is limited in its programming. If you instruct an algorithm to send a message to contact new leads, it will continue to attempt doing so until you tell it to stop. On the other hand, humans are adaptable. We can see when something isn’t working, and instead of making the same mistake repeatedly, we can flexibly adapt our behavior to fit the situation.

Pair both human effort and technology toward their strengths to efficiently recruit truck drivers.

As you can see, humans and technology both have strengths and weaknesses. Usually, the strengths and weaknesses complement each other. This is the secret to how and when to use technology.

Use Technology to Enhance Human Effort

1. Budgets

As we’ve written about before, you can use data to inform decisions about where to allocate your recruiting budgets. Technology can tell you which recruiting methods are successful for which jobs in which locations. At the end of the day though, recruiters have to use human judgment to make decisions about budget strategy and planning and sell this plan to supervisors to get their approval.

2. Finding Drivers

Recruiters sift through the carrier’s jobs and decide which characteristics are important for each job. You need human effort to decide which candidate looks like an ideal match for a particular job. Technology can then help you target the right candidates and meet them where they already exist online. You can also use lead scoring, or matching services like Drive My Way to funnel the top matches into your recruiting pipeline.

3. Contacting and Securing Leads

Contacting leads quickly is crucial to converting them into hires. Technology can help you automate methods of contact and frequency of contact. Mobile-friendly applications and applicant tracking systems are tools you can use to gain contact information or other important data. But there is a danger in overusing technology here. Nothing can replace the human effect. Once you’ve identified top leads, contacting them with a personalized message adds the much-needed human touch.

4. Onboarding Drivers

You can use technology to measure lead velocity and other metrics to help optimize your truck driver onboarding process. However, once you’ve already converted leads to hires, you don’t want to risk alienating them. Human skills here are essential. Listening to newly converted drivers and meeting their needs with your solutions will go a long way toward maximizing retention.

ultimate guide to truck driver recruiting

Ultimate Guide to Truck Driver Recruiting

Current ways of recruiting truck drivers just don’t work anymore. That’s because recruiting isn’t a transaction. This ultimate guide helps carriers recruit for retention.

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4 Challenges Facing Trucking Recruiters

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Trucking recruiters are invaluable to their carriers. Recruiters find and interview leads, identify top talent, send them job offers, and shepherd drivers through training and orientation. Without strong recruiters, truck driving jobs would remain unfilled and trucks would be sitting idle. Recruiters are especially important for a tough industry like trucking which faces unique obstacles. Here are 4 challenges facing trucking recruiters.

1. Driver Shortage

Let’s get the obvious stuff out of the way: the biggest challenge for anyone in this industry is the driver shortage. The truck driver shortage has increased, and the industry is lacking about 60,000 drivers. The driver shortage will continue and grow over the next few years, even taking into account a rise in autonomous trucks. While the driver shortage affects the entire industry and economy, it’s a major challenge for recruiters. Finding the best talent for your carriers is extremely difficult when the pool of candidates is narrow. Worse still, these candidates are courted by many carriers simultaneously, so it’s difficult to entice them with something the top carriers can’t match.

2. Unqualified Leads

Even when you find drivers in the midst of the shortage, about 50% of your leads will not be viable. Recruiting is a matching game—you can’t just pick any driver for any kind of trucking job. While sorting through dozens of candidates you’ll find that over half are unqualified, uninterested, inexperienced, or otherwise inappropriate for the job. Meanwhile, you’ll have wasted time and precious recruiting budget on pursuing dead leads.

Instead of recruiting blindly, what you really need is a stronger matching or screening system.

3. High Turnover

As if the driver shortage wasn’t enough, trucking recruiters also deal with high turnover. Once a carrier finally lands a top driver, it’s not as if they will always stick around for long. In fact, many fleets are losing more drivers than they recruit each year. Carriers can use incentives like signing bonuses, but those aren’t geared toward retention. Strong retention starts with strong recruiting, so it helps if you only hire drivers who are a good match. Survey your drivers to better meet their needs and match their values will also help reduce the chances they are enticed by job offers from rivals. Still, building a solid company culture which nurtures driver loyalty can be a long-term investment that is easier said than done.

4. Budget Allocation

You only have so much money you can spend on recruiting. What and where to spend that money on are challenging questions facing all trucking recruiters. Today there are many more recruiting channels than ever before and carriers want to spread a wide net, reaching as many drivers as possible. At the same time, you may be wasting money if you allocate it toward recruiting methods that just aren’t effective. Measuring your recruiting effectiveness is an essential task that can help you allocate your budget efficiently, reach more drivers, and save money. Nevertheless, spending that kind of research is time-consuming in itself.

What recruiters really need are strong tools which help them recruit very efficiently through different channels suited for location and job type

 

ultimate guide to truck driver recruiting

Ultimate Guide to Truck Driver Recruiting

Current ways of recruiting truck drivers just don’t work anymore. That’s because recruiting isn’t a transaction. This ultimate guide helps carriers recruit for retention.

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Average CDL Driver Salary: How Do You Stack Up?

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CDL truck drivers have many things to consider when taking on a new trucking job. Routes, benefits, work-life balance, and certainly driver pay are key factors. And pay is usually at the top of that list. From Indeed.com:

The average CDL driver salary is $1,074 per week in the United States.

This is based on over 1.6 million self-reported salaries, for a driver with just under 1 year of tenure. Using this as a gauge for the average CDL driver salary: how do you stack up?

Driver Salaries

This average is derived from a range of salaries, from $200 per week at the low end, to almost $3,000 per week on the high end. It also includes rates reported from both owner-operators as well as company drivers. Likewise, salaries for drivers who have additional endorsements on their license are included as well. So it’s easy to see that here’s quite a range from the low to high end of the scale.

It’s worth noting that a CDL driver salary alone does not account for total compensation.

Total compensation includes salary PLUS things like medical benefits, bonuses, paid time off and 401K / retirement programs. All of these things should be looked at when considering a new trucking job. Truckers could get lured by big signing bonuses upfront, but over time, those become less important vs. pay rates and longer-term benefits. Total compensation is the more meaningful number to understand when working through financial planning.

Our Approach

In an effort to be competitive, many of carriers who partner with Drive My Way access driver wage data through The National Transportation Institute (NTI) to evaluate and update their compensation packages based on today’s market. Drive My Way offers consulting for how your organization and jobs are performing based on driver interest and decline feedback. In addition, we often refer those that are struggling to compete in particular markets to NTI for a competitive market data analysis of their pay and benefits offerings.

ultimate guide to retaining truck drivers

Ultimate Guide to Retaining Truck Drivers

You work so hard to recruit the best truck drivers for your fleet. The trick is retaining them. This guide is packed with tips for retaining your fleet.

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6 Best Truck Driving Companies to Work For

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best trucking companies to work for

Truck drivers are constantly bombarded with information by companies about why they are great to work for. They also hear about companies through their reputation with other drivers. Both seasoned drivers and rookies want to hear about the best truck driving companies to work for. The top companies have some of the best salaries and compensation, benefits, and other perks. But more importantly, they also prioritize home time, have a strong company culture, and are known for respecting their drivers.

Ultimately, the best truck driving companies to work for are the ones that suit the individual needs of drivers, including that of region, type of runs and hauls. Nevertheless, there are some companies that consistently rank high, regardless of preferences. Here are 6 of the best truck driving companies to work for in 2019, in no particular order.

Walmart Trucking

Walmart has their own private fleet and pay their drivers extremely well. The average full-time driver with Walmart earns about $86,000 per year and works 5.5 days a week. Walmart’s benefits include medical, dental, vision, pharmacy, and life insurance. Drivers also have the opportunity to enroll in a 401(k) plan and a stock purchase plan. Since Walmart is looking to hire the best of the best, drivers need considerable experience before Walmart will consider hiring them. Apart from a great compensation package, the company makes sure drivers are home once a week and get reset hours off the road. They pay for activity, mileage, and training, and drivers won’t have to load and unload freight. Walmart’s private fleet has one of the lowest turnover rates in the country and for good reason.

Old Dominion Freight

Old Dominion has been around for over 85 years is the official freight carrier of Major League Baseball (MLB). They have club partnerships with many of the MLB teams, and serve the West Region, Midwest, Northeast, Southeast, and Gulf Region of the country. Old Dominion consistently gets high ratings from drivers and Glassdoor. According to Glassdoor, the average salary for long-haul drivers is $82,354 per year. Old Dominion offers medical, dental, vision, and life insurance. In addition to a 401(k) plan, drivers have the option to enroll in employee wellness programs and employee assistance programs. The company has been ranked best LTL National Carrier in 2017 (it’s 8th consecutive year) and received the US EPA 2017 SmartWay Excellence Award (it’s 3rd consecutive year). Paid time off includes both vacation days, sick/personal time, and an addition paid “birthday holiday”.

NFI

NFI IndustriesNFI is a fully integrated supply chain solutions provider headquartered in Camden, NJ. At NFI, truck drivers benefit from dedicated, local, and regional routes to give a variety of home time options with predictable schedules, consistent weekly pay, and career pathing opportunities. Drivers become part of a team that helps move goods the world relies on every day. NFI values family, integrity, safety, customer, teamwork, and social responsibility.

Ward Trucking

Ward Transport and Logistics cover the mid-Atlantic region and cover through Truckload, Flatbed, Reefer, Expedited, and Containers. They offer Less than Truckload (LTL), Truckload (TL), Logistics (3PL), and Brokerage services throughout the US, Canada, Puerto Rico, and Guam. According to Glassdoor, average salary for delivery drivers is $32,078 per year, but for truck drivers is $50,129. Ward will offer medical insurance for eligible employees and dependents with premiums discounts based on years of service with Ward. Dental and vision plans, along with flexible spending accounts are also available for eligible employees and dependents. Ward also boasts an employee wellness program, employee assistance program with professional counselors, and a personal health partners (PHP) program to assist with medical questions, claims issues, and treatment options. The company will cover paid holidays and up to five weeks of vacation per year.

Melton Trucking

Driver development and support for students are hallmarks of Melton Trucking. The company welcomes recent CDL school graduates and drivers who have not had any over-the-road driving experience. Each new driver takes part in the Driver Development Team to transition into the job and lifestyle. Melton also offers a Pre-Hire and Tuition Reimbursement Program for those who don’t yet have a CDL-A license to transition into a CDL certification program.

Melton offers competitive compensation. There is a $1500 sign-on bonus and referral bonuses ranging from $250-$1000. Melton will offer performance incentive bonuses as well, including for tarp, over-sized loads, layovers, and clean DOT inspections. According to Glassdoor, average salary is $52,595 per year for flatbed drivers, and $53,573 per year for OTR truck drivers. In addition to medical, dental, vision, and short-term disability insurance, Melton offers a 401(k) plan and employee assistance program. The company seems to value driver preferences as there is a pet and rider program and profit-sharing programs. Melton also guarantees that all employees will be at home on Christmas Day in addition to 6 holidays a year, and 1-3 weeks of vacation.

Watkins & Shepard Trucking

Watkins & Shepard (now a subsidiary of Schneider) offers many kinds of trucking including over-the-road (OTR), Team Driving, Regional, Intermodal, Tanker, LTL, and Straight Truck. They mostly transport home furnishings and over-dimensional goods including products from overseas. OTR drivers for Watkins & Shepard, can expect about an average of 600 miles per haul. Regional drivers on the other hand will stay close to home and have more consistent routes and freight. According to Glassdoor, the average salary for truck drivers is $61,956 per year. Benefits include medical, dental, vision, and life insurance, as well as accident insurance. After five years of service to Schneider, driver associates are admitted into the Advantage Club which allows attending sports events like NFL games or NASCAR races. The company prioritizes health and safety, boasting a CDL defender plan and family legal plan as well as performance bonuses based on safety.

ultimate guide to retaining truck drivers

Ultimate Guide to Retaining Truck Drivers

You work so hard to recruit the best truck drivers for your fleet. The trick is retaining them. This guide is packed with tips for retaining your fleet.

Get the Ebook