Actually almost a year and have OTR experience back in the good ole days so I know how you should be treated. I really don't have time to sit around and meet everyone. I did sit down with my DM when I first started and she seems like a nice lady. I joke with her sometimes but she just needs to start doing her job that's all.Never an ### to anyone at the windows except I cannot understand why you even have to talk through a window anyways. especially the one in Gary you have to pick up the phone.... I remember my DM from the early 90's and the company I worked for was actually bigger than SWift back then. Every terminal you walked in and sat down right next to the office staff and you got to know people. Here there are only a few terminals where you actually can do this. The people in Lewiston are my favs then lathrop... Yes Inkeeper if you have an attitude at the window they do remember. I see this at many terminals where drivers get extremely upset. I don't go into terminals hardly ever anymore. rather stay down the street at the truck stop.
Im a new guy but what you said as in any job is so true and correct you cant controle the habits of your employer but we can controle our owen. You only get one chance to make a first impression. I think we all forget how many drivers go though thease companys and from reading I get the feeling new drivers feel a company cant survive with out them. Even in construction I always gave respect from the start but had to prove my self to earn it back. Most drivers dont give a 30 day notice to there employers when thay split a sighn of Professionalism yet we expect it from them from the start. Your post is well put Kudos
Believe in Santa and the Tooth Fairy folks...you are just a number here. Do they treat their numbers right? Sure...they do. Swift does everything they say they will as a company.....but you are still a number and that is fine if you don't ever want any personal recognition.
I may be a number to the folks in Phoenix. That doesn't concern me at all. I can guarantee that I am not just a number to the various DMs, FMs, and planners I have worked with. Folks in the shop know me too. They may not all know my name right away, and I don't expect that. But when they see me there is almost always a smile of recognition on their face. Like everything else in life that is good, you have to work at it. You have to sell yourself. Blue you even said it in your post, "you got to get to know them". That takes time and effort. It doesn't take believing in Fairy tales or Santa. If you think it's just going to happen, well that's the fairy tale.
I don't know about your standing with the company, but I'm happy that every time I step into my home terminal, I get greeted, by name mind you, by not only my DM, but by all the safety personnel, security folks, trainers, recruiters, fleet managers, shop folks and even the TM. Daytime or night. It doesn't matter. Guess I'm just lucky. Or I just have that kind of personality.
