The cost of driver turnover in the trucking industry has seen numbers in the billions of dollars in recent years. Some surveys indicate that more than 50% of drivers leave their jobs within the first six months. The annual turnover rate for the trucking industry in 2021 was 90%.
Driver turnover is an expensive problem that many companies struggle to manage. Working in maintenance, Tim Smith saw a lack of care helping those on the frontlines and decided he would be different. He co-founded Pivotal Retention, a company dedicated to helping trucking companies address driver turnover successfully and sustainably.
“I wanted to base my career on how I can help these [trucking] companies as best I can and recognize that the driver’s problem is my most important problem at that minute,” said Smith, the president of Pivotal Retention.
In 2020, Smith started a consulting program known as Pivotal Fleet Solutions. This program has focused on helping carriers and third-party providers best improve their processes and driver experience as well as mentoring young and new talent.
In consulting with these companies, Smith saw that the largest issue among many was driver turnover – an issue that needed to be addressed above anything else.
“We have to be smarter than the problem. We have to take the big problem that is driver turnover and break it down into smaller bite-sized pieces in order to address it completely,” Smith said.
Pivotal Retention breaks down employee retention starting with providing managers talking points and delivery recommendations for situations such as general introductions, expectation exchanges and payroll discussions. This allows companies to implement effective communication processes and measure how effective these processes are to help them reflect and improve over time.
“If we do not have good, positive communication, we are not going to address any other problems proactively and productively,” Smith said.
Pivotal Retention also offers process improvement strategies for onboarding, on-time performance, fuel economy and safety. It also can help measure effectiveness over time.
About our sponsor
Netradyne creates solutions for real-world problems using computer vision and deep learning technologies. Its mission is to transform road and fleet safety through advanced vision technology to change the way drivers interact with the road around them, creating safer roadways in the process.
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