Werner Orientation in Allentown PA 4/2011

June 18 2011





Hello Mr. V. and the Group:


I realize that I am obligated by company policy to write a review of each of my Trainers that I have been connected to and to submit a copy of my impressions about them to the local Werner Terminal Safety department to access. I am writing a review about my last or 3rd Trainer within the last 4 weeks for Your records.

I am not sure at this time whether ---- filed an "unsafe driver" report about me before he called to have reservations made for me at the local Indianapolis IN Werner Enterprises Terminal Hotel (The Indianapolis Ramada Inn) facility.

I have a few Good things to say about ---- and a few negative things to mention about him in respect to his Training. I have been instructed by ---- for the past week or 6 1/2 days since last Saturday June 11 2011.

Mr. ---- came to the Hotel 7 1/2 hours late with another Student who wanted off of his Truck and to pick me up at the same time. The other Student, his last one before me was an ex COP from Maine who was interested in doing a poultry account with Werner since he had some Truck driving experience in the poultry field before. As the last Student was leaving ----'s Truck I asked him about ---- and he told me that ---- told him that he felt insulted about his driving. I asked ---- previous Student if ---- was hard to get along with and he said No, It's just that ---- felt insulted when the Student criticized his driving. I replied and stated that It's OK, I never say things like that out of an abundance of caution.

As soon as I met ---- I liked him even though our backgrounds and cultures are completely different. ---- is a full blooded Mandingo Tribal African raised in Liberia, Africa (on a farm), and a dual citizen of the USA, I suppose. ---- and I are from the Philadelphia PA area and we both have Traveled widely ---- has a brother in England, an American family and most of his relatives live in Liberia or the middle East in various places. ---- seemed to enjoy their company so much that he was constantly conversing with them on his Blackberry phone for the 6 1/2 days that I was with him in his O/O Truck he would also spend a lot of time texting and reading Internet articles on his phone. ---- seems to me to be an African centered political and social activist and an intellectually gifted type of a person.

---- and I are similar in that we are healthy, clean and sober individuals and we share a Love for Truck driving and that we are highly conservative about our driving style and we both like to talk about proactive Safety practices and have very clean MVR's with our CDL's.
---- and I mostly talked about Commercial Motor Vehicle (CMV's) Safety practices while we were together in the Truck and we made a lot of observations about the other drivers on the road as we passed the time. We both have very clean motor vehicle records and I think that we both consider ourselves to be very proud of our knowledge of Safe driving practices.

I came to the table a 51 Year old 25 year Motorcycle rider and a Class B motor home driver for 6 years, a camper and a hiker etc. I preached to ---- about eating regularly, getting enough sleep and about health foods and how these things affect my diabetes.

---- seemed to be easy to get along with in about the first 2 1/2 days that I got to know him and I think that he was especially glad to see that I had a lot of "can do" spirit", a solid determination to work and 8 weeks of recent driving experience for the FFE. I told ---- that I Loved doing Truck Driving work for the FFE and that I would normally do 600-650 miles per day for them and that I was there to help him to make some miles and to help him to make his money.

I did all of the backing and coupling work at the shippers and the consignees and I also ran a lot of the paperwork in and out of the various shipping offices.

It was a great honor and a privilege to drive straight down to my old home base in Dallas Texas on my 1st run.

I felt like ---- and I were getting along wonderfully right up until the last day that I was Training with him. He was smiling and smiling on the first 2 1/2 days as I drove the rig without any hesitation or anxiety. I believe that after 8 1/2 weeks of driving Tractor trailers from coast to coast and in the Winter weather conditions with the FFE and then some 2 weeks with Werner that I am as confident driving a Tractor with a 53' trailer as I am in driving my Ford Chariot Class B motorhome. I do It Safely.

There was only one situation where I knew that ---- would always become frustrated with me and then go into a conversational state and an emotional state I would compare to someone pacing the floor back and forth...and this was when I would miss the gears, mostly due to trying to do progressive shifting too quickly, or by not waiting for the ground speed to match the shift point speed. At these times, ---- would start to seriously scowl and to look really sad and to frown and then he would get as angry as hell and to start to verbally slap me by saying "You have to work on your composure" and then say over and over loudly: "relax and do It" "don't be tense all You need to do is to work on Your composure!" and then he would loudly and sarcasticly ask me "why are You so tense?" "don't You see that You can shift the gears easily when You relax?!" ---- just could'nt stop himself from saying this over and over and over again.

I have not had any serious issues about missing gears or recovering gears if I missed one or two of them. I have at my worst recently missed one or two gears while taking the rig out to the highway or one or two gears while coming off of the highway. I have mostly been able to drive quite well and shift gears almost perfectly, some people have called my gear work "fancy shifting" because of the fact that I can do progressive shifting quickly and some other people have said that "You can do It perfectly most of the time, but then You regress" I have found myself "floating" the gears occasionally but It works well for me either way. I would say that It was my gear shifting that has frustrated ---- the most. ---- is rather obsessive/compulsive.

On my first 6 1/2 days on the road I have learned (3) important lessons from ----:

1. How to hook up the trailer and pull away with It super smoothly.

2. How to take serious 6% grades in 5th gear (25 MPH)

3. How to operate with the "bird" hood ornament on the hood for lane cntrl.

I must say that ---- is basicly a Good Trainer and that he will only get really upset in situations where he believes that Your emotions may or may not cause You to make mistakes that can have serious consequences, for instance changing lanes in dense, rush hour traffic or possibly in the case of shifting gears completely smoothly. How much of this is realistic is open to question.

The one negative point that I really don't accept at all about ---- is his paranoid driving style and of course in the way that he trys to teach his methods about proactive Safety. I have been in City traffic with him where he would ask me to shift all of the way down from the top gear to 5th gear (on the nine speed) on the freeway or beltway around a few different urban areas for up to a mile and a half. ----'s problem was It seemed not knowing how much of a following distance that he needed, at any given point in time. In rush hour traffic the congested speed will vary between a full stop at times until as much as 35 MPH. Varying the speed and the following distance is fundamentally necessary to prevent the rig from becoming an obstacle on the road. I think that ---- would just choose one speed or one gear's speed for too long a time and then completely ignor the space around the Truck.
I just think that his over concern for slow speeds alone was pure ridiculous. I have been on Farm roads with him as well where he has asked me to just travel in 5th gear for up to 2 Miles! This would be the perfect illustration of paranoid driving.

I guess that I would still be with ---- if he was'nt so insulting, obsessive/compulsive and paranoid about driving on the highway at slow speeds etc. He is just too much sometimes.

These are only a few other negative points about ---- that I really have to mention and include here in my review:

1. He seems to have a high turnover with Students. The only problem in this
regard though is that his truck was not cleaned (the blankets) in between
the Students. Yes, and his sleeping berths are lined with woolen blankets
in June tempratures.

2. He has no working APU and only slightly functioning air conditioning in his
2006 Freightliner classic.

3. He will not regularly stop for showers under these conditions and for food.
He seems to be anorexic and he himself will not rest often so I think that
this affects his moods detrimentally. He also wears the same clothing all
week. The Truck never seems to get the inside of It cleaned.

4. There are multiple air leaks in the brake system and the driver's seat and
the driver's door handle won't completely lock the door closed at highway
speeds so he stretches bungee cords to the driver's seat and this prevents
It from moving backwards to allow Your feet room under the dashboard.
The seat Itself is completely worn out and leaks air and It is painfull to sit
in It for more than a few Days.

All in all, ---- is really not a bad Trainer. I suppose that most people would only be capable of dealing with him for about a week and I think that he expects this too because of the facts:

1. He does not want to do any paper logs. The are required for the first 2
weeks.

2. He does not care about the backing logs. He thought that they were kept
by the Student in a personal notebook. He will not even ask You to do
any backing at all, You have to ask him.

3. He does not carry any evaluation forms with him at all in the Truck.
"not nesecarry" he said.

I think that ---- realizes that he probably made a mistake by asking for me to get off of his Truck because he has nicely told me again and again that "I CAN DRIVE" and I have done everything well but...he just feels that "I have to work on myself" or something to that effect. I can't really understand what he means to say.

Thank You for reading this.

 

June 19 2011





Hello Mr. V. and the Group:


I thought last week before I started out with Sharif that I had 175 hours of (entry level driver) Training origionally with about 30 of them less due to the other Trainers I have had, Kevin and Allen. This week with 6 1/2 days of about 70 hours I should have just about a Week to a Week and a half left in Training.

The Dollar store route Training for a prequalified Werner Driver should only take about 1 week according to Sharif.

I don't know what is going to happen again Tomorrow, but maybe they will just add up all of my previous Training hours in the past Month to get a total.
They may just flunk me out or give me the credit for the time that I have worked. It is sometimes up to the Safety examiner at the terminal to "test your driving" between Trainers.

I have just had my dinner with a Werner driver who said that It took him a Month to get in just 100 hours and he looked so sad like he was getting ready to go home. I never promised to quit and I am Hoping that things are still OK.

 

June 20 2011





Hello Mr. V., Whoosedog and the group:


I went to the meeting room here at the Airport Ramada Inn in Indianapolis for the morning Safety meeting and the terminal Safety representative was a no show. This happens a lot in Indianapolis, or It is just a quick roll call and no meeting. I thought that It was allright considering that they don't make You go to one too early in the Morning.

I caught the 12:00PM shuttle van out to the terminal just to meet with a Safety representative and to get in on another "Driver's confrence call" with Tim in Student Safety out in Omaha. Everything went fine with the meeting and then (of course) Tim asked for me to take a Driver's qualification road test.
I passed it Thank God, and then I did another couple of Log Book CBT's on the terminal's computer console.

It was a productive afternoon and I am now passed the Safety hold and I am on call for a Trainer again. I probably got some credit for the hours that I gave them already. I will just have to find out.

The examiner or "testor" as they referred to him did'nt have much negative to say. He asked me if I thought that I was ready to take one of his Bobtails and to go to work and I told him that I would be happy to but I am cautious of course about everything and I think that I would rather buy a Truck GPS beforehand. The Testor, a real Gentleman, then told me that I am being a little bit too carefull and operating the Truck too slowly and cautiously and that he thought that I could use some more time with a Trainer before I go to the Bobtails for full qualification as a driver. He said that I drive like an old guy that he had in there once who just had to go back and do training to get more used to the Truck. He said that I can drive it well, but I just need to lose a little bit more fear of operating the rig fast on the highway. So I went back into the office and the Safety manager just said to try to stay with the next one longer because it would look better on my file or something like that.

I really try to not snub someone who gets to be personal with me about my skills, but this Liberian man was starting to get me a little bit annoyed. I am sure that this happens a lot with his students, and I don't even think that he noticed it or really cared a lot about It. He probably could have used the work that I had planned to give him for his time though. I had no idea what he meant when he was telling me to "work on myself" though, so what the f---.

I am really interested in doing some easier work, like the Dollar General where You only have to operate the truck within about 200 to 300 Miles per day and only about 3 deliverys per day as well. I told my Student Driver Manager this right after I finished at the Terminal Driver skills qualification meeting. I also left it open for the Driver's choice and OTR work in the meantime.

 

June 22 2011





Hello Mr. V. and the Group:


Today was a lot better a day than It ordinarily might have been in Indianapolis.

All I felt that I needed to do was to continue with working on doing some more CBT's or computer based training modules, which I did like I was doing yesterday, when I did about 30 of them. I did probably about 10 or 15 more of them Today, catnapped twice and I went out to the Waffle house once and then over to the Speedway market once, just to get a little bit of power walking on.

The Waffles are fairly cheap and I got a Chipwich Ice cream bar at the end of the day just to celebrate doing most of the CBT's. I got just about every one of Werner Enterprises CBT's finished, and I signed up for at least 60 of them, but I still have to finish the "Train the Trainer" and "Flatbed operations", which is just a review of most of the basic things on the courses.

I tried to do the ones on the Trip Planning, but I suppose that I would need one of Werner's books about their fuel stops and a Rand McNally Commercial Atlas to completely finish that particular set of (3) courses.

I am Hoping to have another day here at the Indianapolis Ramada Inn with their free WiFi Hot spot in order to finish the few remaining CBT's that I have enrolled in myself, in order to better make use of my head knowledge and my time at Werner.

It just reminds me when I am doing things like this what I really got started in Trucking for anyway, a Good opportunity in order to fund other distance learning and College level studies that they have and I started to do before out in the State of Utah. Utah is a good distance learning state from what I have heard and a lot of what they do is to study nature, which is cool with me.