Rookie No Longer - One Year Under My Belt With Roehl

"Bang on somebody"? If the shoe fits. I may have overgeneralized, but the fact is; there are too many "trainers" that have no business training. I drive my truck in a very professional manner and have been doing so for a very long time. I teach those that ask or look like they might need some pointers and don't give me attitude when I try to help. I don't have an in you face attitude toward those with experience as you appear to. I do my best to conduct myself in a manner that has as little negative impact on others as I possibly can. The same cannot be said about newcomers to the industry or even some with experience, but most of the experienced drivers worth their salt conduct themselves the same way I do. I do my damndest to portray us in a positive light, which is more than many noobs do, since they either don't care or are too dim.

Here are a few questions for you; How long were you in law enforcement, in what capacity and why aren't you in it now?

 

Actually, Scott did. Read his post.

If you have to ask, it helps explain why there's an EX in your experience.

No data, just a lot of years experience. Oh, that's right, I forgot that experience doesn't count in the opinion of those "in the know".

See above.

Now you're just being facetious.

I learn every day. The day you think you know all there is to know about this business is the day you should quit (Hey, is that why there's an EX in your experience?) because you're a danger to yourself and everyone around you.

Well, there's that, then.


Look, I'm not saying all training companies are bad and, from what I've heard and witnessed myself, Roehl is one of those that tops the good list. Unfortunately, my opinion is jaded because there are so many bad ones out there.

 

Roehl has trainers with 6 months experience bc the driver turnover is really high for one, and the little left experienced drivers either want to stay solo or moved on to greener pastures. Everybody for the most part is asked to train after a while. They have school and orientations at many locations and the demand is high for trainers so students don't have to wait for a trainer. It's about $$$$ not a stout training program. My trainer had 9 yrs experience, I learned a lot but also learned a lot myself bc of how short and sweet the program is. I guess it's why they micro manage us to death, buzz our qualcomms constantly with messages about anything and everything that's been covered over an over again. In this industry experience is the biggest thing that defines a driver period end of story. Other employers only care about experience and MVR, dac, etc. Even if it's something I don't like with this company on how they do business I understand, it makes sense. Somebody will have to train the massive amount of newbies that come through roehls doors.

ATX congrats keep up the good work

 

This is irrelevant to our discussion. Look, I'm not going to spar with you on here. You disagree, that's fine. I don't really care honestly. We'll agree to disagree and move on. Don't be a complainer, be a fixer. If you don't like "rookies" training, then become one and put your experience to use. Be safe out there.

 

My various dispatchers at Roehl tried for years to get me to be a trainer. I thought about it for the longest time but decided against it. I don't think I would be comfortable with another driver in the truck regardless of how much experience they had, zero or hundred years.

The last straw was a video I saw on YouTube. In the video a rookie driver thundering down Donner Pass blows by another truck and drives over the edge of a cliff. It's all caught on camera. There were two fatalities in the accident; the rookie driver and his trainer who was asleep in the bunk. In all the years I've driven truck not once have I ever had somebody ride with me in the passenger seat that wasn't testing me.

I think the safest thing for any driver to do is to always consider themselves a rookie. You always stay in that learning mode. You never get to the point where you feel like you should be the teacher and not the student.

We need good trainers! Tragically, one of the reasons why inexperienced drivers are used as trainers is there's just nobody else and somebody is has got to do it.

Even though by many accounts I would be considered an experienced driver, I don't consider myself as such. I am still a student. I'm still trying to learn everything I possibly can from the ground up.

I believe, if you're willing, you can learn from everybody. The good drivers teach us to be good drivers too. The bad drivers teach us what not to do. Learn from everybody. Don't make their mistakes. Do follow their good examples.

To be a good driver for Roehl you really need only to follow the safe seven, drive when you should drive, stop when you should stop, rest when you should rest, and be ontime!

Let's all humble ourselves and admit something else too; after one year there are some drivers out there who are pretty good at this. There are some who really should be teaching. They understand safety, backing, driving down the road, etc. These are the people that should be training. While they may not have seen all the things that a veteran driver has seen in his or her years on the road, they do understand the basics. Let's face it, that's pretty much what we're going for in a training situation.

There is no substitute for experience. In a perfect world only experienced drivers with many years on the road would be trainers. That's not the world that we live in. Someone's got to do it. If experienced drivers won't do it then good first year drivers are the next likely candidate. I don't look down my nose or sit in judgment on any driver. I've made mistakes out here and I've learned from them. I am however, more comfortable around drivers who consider themselves rookies and willing to learn no matter how many years they been out here as opposed to the super truckers Who know it all.

You don't get a job hauling double and triple trailers with zero years of experience and yet how often do we see those exact trailers in the ditch, in the median or smashed up against some other foreign object? In my mind FedEx has the most unsafe drivers of any company out there on the road. A high percentage of the accidents you see involve FedEx trucks/trailers and yet these are some of the most experienced drivers on the road.

I know we see a lot of Swift trucks and other various large carriers involved in accidents quite often but my money is on FedEx for being the most unsafe drivers out there. Anybody disagree with that? Anybody think that FedEx drivers should be trainers? I'm not getting in the passenger seat with a FedEx driver.

My other question is if one year drivers can't be trainers, then who is going to do it? Don't just say that certain drivers shouldn't be trainers because of a lack of experience unless you've got a better idea. Someone's got to train the new guy just coming out of class. There aren't enough drivers like myself willing to do that. I'm just not comfortable with somebody else in the driver seat. By the way I would say that's true of my personal car and truck as well. I don't like riding with my wife or kids as a passenger.

if one year drivers can't be trainers, then somebody tell me what the alternative is.

You're probably thinking "if you're so smart, why don't you stop griping and offer a solution!"

What do I think we should do about the problem?

What follows is what I believe should be the first step in fixing the trucking industry.

Stop voting for big government.

As experienced drivers get fed up and leave the industry we're only going to see this get worse. Perhaps the first, most immediate thing we could do would be to start voting for driver friendly conservative politicians who will quit making this job impossible to do. Stop voting for liberal progressive socialist anti business Democrats and start voting for conservative business friendly politicians. One of the reasons why there are so few experienced drivers out there is they are leaving the industry because government has made it too hard to make a living out here. Experienced drivers are leaving at an alarming rate.

Let's stop voting for antibusiness liberal progressive Democrats and start voting for politicians regardless of party, who will make it easier to make a living out here on the road. I started in this business on the ground floor and worked my way up to the point where I now own my own trucking business. I fervently wish we could just throw all politicians out and start completely over. It would be the best thing that could possibly happen for the trucking industry. Get rid of all the current Republicans, all the current Democrats and anything else and start from the ground up.

Business creates jobs. The ability to make a profit creates jobs. Government destroys both of those things.

The trucking industry has a shortage of qualified experienced trainers because government has made it too hard to make a living and we're left with the driver shortage. We're left with toddlers training babies!

All of the trucking industry ills would be cured by getting big government out of our way.

 

From Dirk Steel
"Let's all humble ourselves and admit something else too; after one year there are some drivers out there who are pretty good at this. There are some who really should be teaching. They understand safety, backing, driving down the road, etc. These are the people that should be training. While they may not have seen all the things that a veteran driver has seen in his or her years on the road, they do understand the basics. Let's face it, that's pretty much what we're going for in a training situation."

"There is no substitute for experience. In a perfect world only experienced drivers with many years on the road would be trainers. That's not the world that we live in. Someone's got to do it. If experienced drivers won't do it then good first year drivers are the next likely candidate. I don't look down my nose or sit in judgment on any driver. I've made mistakes out here and I've learned from them. I am however, more comfortable around drivers who consider themselves rookies and willing to learn no matter how many years they been out here as opposed to the super truckers Who know it all."

The above is very on point statement. Although I'm not an OTR driver and may never be this can be said about many other jobs as well. It's easy to be judgmental and I didn't know Roehl had drivers with under a year of experience training until following this thread. As some have said they don't want to be trainers and I understand that. Not everyone is cut out for it or desires to do it. To the people that have bashed on here, don't be the guy that's seen everything and been everywhere that's impossible and you know it. I guarantee there are things you haven't seen and experienced and that's life. As far as training with less than a years time in it would depend on the person. Some people carry themselves well and some don't. That same thing can be said about the old hands. Don't forget some of these drivers that you like to complain about dragging the industry down may very well have a million miles under their belt. They also may be the type that would make a terrible trainer and fill a newbie with bad habits. Joetro in your eyes that'd be all right though, because they got the "experience" so they must know everything.

 

Excellent post Dirk...

 

The answer for more trainers at whatever level is pay, dollar bills, dinero, cashola. Pay our trainers more, make it so when they ask anybody if they want to do it hard to refuse with the pay increase. Simple, money talks ######## walks. However much it is now, it was more and consistantly has gotten less.