I have to play the devil's advocate here...

Road there may be something wrong then. When I click his name the drop down menu does not have a PM option like everyone else does. I just assumed he couldnt recieve them until 50.

 

I just checked the other poster who had 3 more posts than the other. I believe it may be because of the way the one poster is set up. They may not have allowed private messages from anyone.

 

Makes sense. I hadnt thought of that. Thanks

 

After reading this thread, which was very interesting, I feel like I need to relate our experiences. D/H has been driving for 20+ yrs, from local to regional to OTR. I started in airfreight and have done everything from load planning, routing, cutomer service and dispatching. About 8 yrs ago we got our authority and started our own biz as O/O's. We had up to 8 trucks at one time. Had good drivers and bad ones too. We've had loads/trucks abandoned, blown engines (due to driver neglect), you name it, it happened. Because we are so small we couldn't offer all the fringe benefits so we made up for it in the per mile pay, way above the JB's and such. D/H talked to every prospective driver and doesn't ask anyone to anything he wouldn't do himself. I run the ppwk and such at home. Every Friday I would run upwards to 5 diff banks for "direct deposits", load prepaid Visas, whatever needed to be done to take care of the drivers. Even handled sending child support payments and the like. But there were some drivers that did NOT take care of our trucks the way we took care of them.
A few yrs ago we dropped the authority, sooo many headaches, and leased trucks/drivers on with a company. Gave us better access to checking out potential drivers and other resources as well. Found out one driver had 14 diff. employers in a yr's time. Talk about a red flag!
What I'm trying to say I guess is that problems can come from either side. Don't know if you have a probationary period but we have found it does help.
One thing we do know is, for us, "Failure is not an option!"

 

Uncommon Belief, one suggestion I might make is to take full advantage of drivers in the niche I find myself in.
ie; 18+years with ZERO MV issues/ never even a misdemeanor, let alone a felony...
Stable marriage to the same woman. Kids grown and gone. No booze, no dope.
No BS either...
But, to one of the big guys, because someone like me had moved into management and found himself behind a computer screen for years, he is as good as the wet behind the ears 22 year old with the "Korn" shirt, green hair, about six pounds of metal in his face and a one year old drivers license.
Open yourself to this. You would be shocked how many experienced guys there are who have been away for a while. A little rusty...maybe. Grind a couple? Yeah, but it's like riding a bike.
My point is, a 40+ year old who wants to return to the road, even if they have been off the road for many years...is a much smaller risk to take. (Not talking about losers with 10 jobs in one year.)
Give them decent treatment and you will find a niche of great folks. Including myself, there are more than 5 on this forum right now...and they do not move up into management (in my case responsible for 2600 units) because they are stupid.
Some have just been burnt by the stress, or lost out when the people they worked for got "absorbed" (like my employer got absorbed by Ryder) or both.

A great pool of talent and level headed intelligence exists out there. You need to find ways of circumventing the mistakes and oversights of the big boys to make yourself better.

An injector looses a head and floods the jug...or the head gasket pops and locks the motor up...who do you want in your truck>???? The kid who "has to make that next run or I will lose my Harley" or the more mature person that would no more think of destroying a piece of machinery than pimping out his own daughter?

So many times, being in leasing, I saw drivers ruin 25,000 worth of gear for a load that would make them 150.00. Two of these, in a fleet of 20, can ruin your business.

I wish you the best. Were my PM active, I would have sent you a message. I am in Southern VA, about 3 hours from Parkersburg, WV, and I would love to talk with you.
JD

 

Oh...and BTW.
Taking out a few favors you do for people who work well (as suggested in a previous post) is not likely to win loyalty.
Your example of keeping a driver home for a sick child is one of the reasons why one of the big guys will never see me behind the wheel of their trucks. We have lost a great deal of polite humanity in treating the workforce. I think we need it back.
You reward your good workers if you can. You can tell those who will appreciate it the most by the rare occurrence of the repeat requests. It also is great when you need that little extra..."come on now team player...we are in each others corner, remember?"
JD

 

You're So Right on that, Failure is not an Option,,, But......, Stress can do you out!
You can have a driver that may not take care of the equipment, but can be a Very Good Sound Driver, and at the same time have a driver that takes well care of the equipment but drives carelessly. It's a chance that we take, in putting a driver on. That's a very good idea using a probationary time for the newly hired on, which we never applied. At that time, drivers were scarce.

Yet being a small company, what we encountered, was drivers who could not get hired on with other companies came to us looking for work.

I don't judge them by their past mistakes. There are exceptions though.
People do change and some were looking for that second chance.
It's knowing if they click, obey, and fit in with the company.
I've seen through the years,
Good Drivers going bad and Bad drivers doing good!

I've Seen Bad People changing and wanting to better themselves in Life!

We use to pick up guys from the Mission and put them to work, unloading trucks. They were very good workers looking to make money! It wasn't a steady everyday thing. We purchased our own watermelons from Southern Farms and when the trucks came up, sometimes we needed them unloaded to be distributed for other customers besides the grocery stores.
Some of them ended up getting out of the mission and getting themselves an apartment., getting their families back again. I love seeing that and making a difference for them. When they did well, I did a Barbecue for them. They never had that and Loved it.
One guy slipped and wrote us from jail , apologizing for slipping and thanked us for all that we did for him. And here we thought he was the better one out of all of them. And the roughest dude, that my husband didn't care for, ended up being the baby out of the crew. He did really good that we were proud of.
What I'm saying is,,
It's All a Chance that we have to take ! !
.
Yet, I believe the key to having " Good" drivers, is,, if they "FIT IN" with your company.

Ha, Ha, CherokeeRed, Sounds like the same Scenerio! My Husband also dropped the Authority and threw his hands up and Leased on with a Company so everyone could leave him alone.
But Now, as of Today, as we speak, he says he's sorry he let go of all that he had, and wants to have nothing more to do with Leasing with Large Trucking Companies. You can't get ahead , leasing under them.
He wants to get back to where he once was. We Miss those times.,!

Not to far from where we live, there is another small company asking us to go in with them and help develop their business.
That may be a start to help us get back on our feet and moving again. I already by accident , found a customer looking for a Carrier. That tells me something.,

Heck, there are Large companies merging, so why can't we? LOL!

 

Hope the info above helps you out somewhat. Now if you were "Next door to me", Uncommonbelief, I wouldn't give out this information. But since you're way over there, who cares? There's plenty of work to go around... ha, ha, .. "jokingly." Have a Good One!