When am I no longer considered a new driver?

See post 14.

 

When wearing Depends undergarments is no longer optional, but actually becomes necessary.

 

You might leave new driver status when you no longer consider turning the ignition as step 1/1 of your pretrip

 

Lord help us then... I dont think I've seen a driver under 40 hold a door open for anyone, and nearly the only time I hear the word "Sir," is when my own voice echos in the shipping/receiving office.

 

Go and see Opus's thread where the dude drives by the DPS performing the slow down maneuver and the DPS crashes into him.

When you no longer do that, you will be on #2.

 

You're either a professional driver or steering wheel holder, IMO. There's no in between and there's no time limit on either. I've run across drivers that claim they've been driving for 30 years that were nothing more than steering wheel holders. And, I've run across drivers that have only been driving a couple of years that were professionals.

A professional takes pride in themselves: their appearance, their work ethic. They conduct themselves in a professional manner whether they're driving the truck, maintaining their logbook, dealing with co-workers, customers, law enforcement, etc... If you can't conduct yourself in a professional manner in all aspects of your job (whatever your job is from a janitor to a doctor), you're not a professional. You're just another mope in the world that got "trained" to do something.

Well, guess what? A monkey can be "trained".

 

You are no longer a new driver when all the following are met:

1. You look, act, drive, and maintain vehicle as if it were your own.

2. Expenses incurred in the duties of your job take into consideration the companies bottom line.

3. Half the weight of all the stuff you have put into the cab/sleeper is from spare parts and tools to fix said vehicle without calling roadside assistance.

4. You have at least once successfully used said spare parts and tools to repair said vehicle on the side of the road, or in a pullout/rest area.

5. You consistently get the near impossible, time sensitive, and all around difficult to complete on time loads... And you complete said loads without complaint, on time... Regardless of weather or mechanical difficulties 95% of the time.

 

This is a question that requires an inward look. Stop looking at titles and burn diesel. When the day comes that you have the ability to spot that trailer whereever it needs to be spotted, you do it consistently day in and out. Safely without harming anything YOU ARE A TRUCKER. All those other lables? That is what seperates the doers from the rest. Some just do and others talk about it.

 

That cop was a new cop.