Hire Truckers Podcast

00:00 - 00:10
Aaron Craddock: Welcome to the Hire Truckers podcast where we interview experts in driver recruiting. We provide industry insights, marketing trends, and motivation to help you level up your recruiting game.

00:10 - 00:36
Ginger Craddock: Welcome to the Hire Truckers podcast. I'm your host, Ginger Craddock. Today, we're diving into stories of resilience, leadership, and excellence. Real experiences from people in our industry who inspire, challenge, and remind us what it truly means to lead with integrity. So I want you to grab a cup of coffee, settle in, and let's hear what they have to say.

00:38 - 00:53
Ginger Craddock: The first clip I wanna share with you today comes from Dawn Erickson at Waste Management. True resilience starts with choices. Dawn's a great example of someone that I know who consistently chooses integrity even when it's hard.

00:54 - 01:19
Dawn Erickson: I really like being able to do the right thing and make sure that I'm taking care of our employees. Sometimes that right thing is not the comfortable thing. In HR, you have to make those decisions. You have to sit there and say, I would do this for my best employee, and I would I would do this for my most questionable employee. And that's that's really what brings the integrity to HR.

01:19 - 01:45
Ginger Craddock: When you lead with integrity, every decision becomes a foundation for trust. In our second clip, Ellen Voya, founder of Women in Trucking shares that clarity and candor build that foundation of integrity. Ellen is also the author of From Dispatcher to Disruptor, One Woman's Journey to Drive Gender Diversity in the Trucking Industry. Here's what Ellen had to say.

01:45 - 02:07
Ellen Voie: One of the things that people always say that, you know, when they hire someone, they're looking for someone with the communication skills. And so I think candor falls under that. It's the communication skills. And I've always been interested in communication. And I have my my undergrad is journalism communication, and my graduate degree is actually in interpersonal communication.

02:07 - 02:35
Ellen Voie: So I I feel that I've always been that kind of a straightforward say what you're thinking, which couldn't be be offensive to some people who aren't used to that kind of of being forthright. But also, I think that when you're in a job that people don't normally see someone who looks like you in that job, you have to be straightforward. You have to state what it is that you're looking for or what you need because if you beat around the bush, they're not going to get it.

02:35 - 02:57
Ginger Craddock: That candor, that honesty, it clears up confusion. Our next highlight is from Caleb G. Honesty is more than a philosophy. It's a process. Caleb breaks down some of the ways Nussbaum Transportation uses radical honesty to prevent surprises and build long lasting driver relationships.

02:57 - 03:21
Caleb Gee: I think the issue is still omission. Right? Where if a driver doesn't ask, then you don't say anything. And part of that, that's a two pronged problem, is you have the driver not knowing what they should ask and and asking the right questions. But then you have a company that's going, here's something that's not great.

03:21 - 03:56
Caleb Gee: I know it's not great, and I know other people didn't like it, but they didn't ask, so I'm not gonna tell them. That's a waste of everybody's time. The company's time, the driver's time, everything. And so here, I don't think we've ever we've never phrased it as radical honesty, but very yeah. That's that's a perfect way to to phrase it is we have a list of dozens of items that whether a driver asks about it or not, you're going to sit and listen to us go through this list so you know every little detail about working here.

03:57 - 04:37
Caleb Gee: That's everything from equipment to how the bonus works to what size dog you can bring to health insurance to how many miles you're gonna get a week, how those miles are paid, everything. That way there is no and then multiple times during that conversation where things are sent to them in writing. So, okay, you've got it in writing. We've literally now gone through it on the phone together. You can ask any question you want and we're gonna get an answer for you because we want to know that it's a good fit for you and it's a good fit for us versus surprise, you got here and for two weeks, you know, two weeks in you realize, oh, this is nothing what what I was told.

04:38 - 05:08
Caleb Gee: And even in still doing that, I would say the average conversation with the driver before hiring them is an hour. And that's after you've done all the, you know, excuse me, basic questions for just getting an app filled out and everything else. Right? So that that phone call, anywhere from forty five minutes to two hours, and you still will get drivers that will come in and go, no, that's not what I was told. I said, well, here here it

05:08 - 05:08
Keith Stelzer: is in

05:08 - 05:21
Caleb Gee: writing. Or, yeah, that's exactly what you told me. I've I've literally had this happen before where, yeah, that it's exactly what you told me. I just thought it would be different when I got here. And you're always gonna have that.

05:21 - 05:52
Caleb Gee: But at that point, if you know, well, we've done everything we possibly could to mitigate that situation happening Versus, hey, I'm only gonna tell you the answers to the three questions you asked and we'll see you when you get here, right? And they show up with a 90 pound Pitbull and it's like, oh, we're going for a ride. No, not in our truck, right? So yeah, having those conversations and forcing those conversations. So yeah, somebody that calls in and just says, hey, yeah, I'm ready to start, when can I come?

05:52 - 05:57
Caleb Gee: Woah, woah, woah, Let's slow down and and talk about this to make sure it's a good fit for both of us.

05:57 - 06:20
Ginger Craddock: When expectations are clear, service becomes meaningful. That brings us to our very own Alexander Christman who frames service as making every interaction better. I know this because I have the great privilege of working with Alexandra every day. Alexandra doesn't just talk about client success. Alexandra embodies it.

06:20 - 06:51
Alexandra Christmen: I always find myself serving others and that's always kind of my what I say is kind of what I feel like I was I was made to do was to find ways I can make others other people's lives better. Anyone that comes across my path, how can I make their life better after we interact than it was before? And that's kind of what the client success thing is. You know, I know some people may think that I'm being, like, overly I'm overly, like, sensationalizing in that way, but I really do look at my job as how can I make this better for our clients? How can I make it easy?

06:51 - 07:08
Alexandra Christmen: How can I make it, you know, helpful? How can I be supportive and and all of that? And I think that that is that really is kind of what drew me to it. And I think that's what's really, you know, kept, you know, kept me excited about it for for the last last couple of years.

07:08 - 07:21
Ginger Craddock: Service includes protecting people when it matters most. Next, my friend Melanie Moore at Ozark Motor Lines shares a concrete example of responding to safety concerns with urgency and care.

07:21 - 08:10
Melanie Moore: So whenever I get a DM that's about safety, I take it seriously because we as a company take safety seriously. And I know that our safety team would want to know that this is going on. So as soon as I get something that safety related, I will screenshot the messages and I will send them to our safety team in an email and getting an email from me is kind of like a, red flag, Melanie sending an email on a Saturday. So maybe I should look at it. So especially, you know, if they said our driver came over into their lane or something like that, the safety team can get the truck number, the location, and the time, and they can use the Lytex camera footage to look at what happened.

08:11 - 08:37
Melanie Moore: And from there, they're able to coach the driver, they're able to give me more information about what happened so I know how to respond to the customer. And that way I can say, hey, even if I don't have an answer yet from safety, I sent this over to our safety department and they're going to look into it. Because I want them to know that it's important to us and that whatever happened to them did not go unnoticed and that helps deescalate the situation.

08:37 - 09:02
Aaron Craddock: Now let's take a minute to thank today's sponsor. Do you hire truck drivers in hard to fill areas, or do you need help creating efficiency in your recruiting department? You're not alone. With fifty plus years experience, TruckingClick specializes in data driven strategies, industry leading customer experience, and custom solutions that'll get you to your goal. TruckingClicks is your go to place for high quality direct leads at scale.

09:03 - 09:09
Aaron Craddock: Visit truckingclicks.com or call (512) 982-0816 today.

09:09 - 09:30
Ginger Craddock: Service backed actions build credibility. Melanie's the gold star example of turning problems into trust with responsiveness. Trust multiplies when people help each other. That brings us to our next highlight from Jason Douglas, an experienced recruiting, retention, and operations leader in trucking.

09:30 - 09:40
Jason Douglass: If I can help somebody out, I always offer it. Give me a call. Give me a text. And it's genuine. Sometimes people just think it's just something that you say, but I mean it really genuine.

09:40 - 10:01
Jason Douglass: Anyone that's reached out to me or talked to me in in the past, it We can't have enough friends, and I'm nobody's competition in this industry. I don't care if they work down the road. We can work as friends. If my driver works out better for your company, I'll power to him. You might offer him something that I can't, and I wish them nothing but the best.

10:02 - 10:13
Jason Douglass: People have so long hoarded their drivers, and I think it's you know what? They could be well suited somewhere else. And if they are, all I want is what's best for that driver.

10:13 - 10:35
Ginger Craddock: Jason understands that helping others is how communities grow and people thrive. When leaders put people first, the relationship becomes the antidote to high turnover. Keith Stetzer at Paper Transport, he takes us a layer deeper on the importance of relationships and culture in our next highlight.

10:35 - 10:48
Keith Stelzer: No matter what you do, right, there is a better paying job out there. Right? There's always a a job that has a little bit better schedule. But people, I'm not gonna say don't leave companies, but more often they do leave managers. They do leave the people that they work for.

10:48 - 11:02
Keith Stelzer: And, you know, I think that's something that we can never lose sight of, you know, and and when you're when you're thinking about your culture and and what you're going to do to prevent turnover, you you have to be focused there. I also think as you're as you're hiring people into, you need to be putting at the forefront.

11:02 - 11:24
Ginger Craddock: Relationships and culture reward persistence. Sometimes persistence takes education and grit to pay off. Wayne Skinner's story shows that Wayne did his part to be prepared and he left the timing to God. I wonder, are you doing your part and you're waiting on the timing? Here's what Wayne had to say.

11:24 - 12:22
Wayne Skinner: So going from a heavy truck industry into a ground support equipment industry, still a lot of similarities, but an opportunity to grow. And in between that time at Schneider and while I was a senior tech at FedEx, I did go and become a nontraditional student. I did complete a business degree and then took advantage of the army college fund, the GI bill, and on also some of the the college funds available for national guardsmen and completed my engineering degree at University of Memphis. And I I really had a desire to move into an engineering role. And I can remember, after graduating, I was still a senior technician at FedEx, and I had applied for my very first associate engineer position, and this was more on the operations side.

12:22 - 13:01
Wayne Skinner: And I I can remember all that time and effort putting into working and then going to school and, you know, trying to keep my grades up and trying to excel and win scholarships and and those types of things. And I can remember I applied for this role, and I hadn't heard anything. I didn't you know, no communication from the hiring manager. And I remember just being discouraged, and I I remember telling my wife, I'm like, you know, I've done all this and, you know, what if it was for nothing? And she, in her wise ways, she said, you know, God did not bring you through all of that to just leave you standing still.

13:02 - 13:37
Wayne Skinner: And, she was trying to encourage me. She was being very blunt with me as she's, tends to do. And, Ginger, I'm not exaggerating, she as soon as she finished making that comment to me, my phone rang. And it was the hiring manager that, had asked me to, show up for an interview that next week. So you talk about just a, you know, just a memorable experience, that going through that, and it was such a a tough time, but I was then able I did get hired as that associate engineer position and moved into ops engineering.

13:37 - 13:51
Ginger Craddock: Preparation builds confidence, but maturity shapes how we use that confidence. Elisha Grayson reflects on what maturity really means as she seeks her next great opportunity to serve the trucking industry.

13:52 - 14:12
Elisha Grayson: Yeah. So maturity used to mean to me that everything had to be perfect. It was all about perfection and everything. Now that I look at maturity, I don't think that's that's what it is. It's more about knowing yourself, your strengths, your patterns, your blind spots, your weaknesses, you know, what you need to do.

14:13 - 14:27
Elisha Grayson: It's not about like acting a certain way. It's more about not running like on autopilot. It's knowing how to respond. But, you know, back in the day, used to think, well, I'm mature if I'm perfect in everything I do. That's not the case.

14:28 - 14:30
Elisha Grayson: It's more about knowing yourself.

14:30 - 14:42
Ginger Craddock: And finally, the leadership move that ties it all together, emotional intelligence. Ricky Becker at FedEx Freight closes us out with the practice of reading the room.

14:42 - 15:19
Ricky Becker: You know, I think one of the biggest lessons I've learned as I've grown as a leader, and I've I haven't done this well, and I've done it really well, and all the in betweens is just read the room. You know, ebb and flow your your delivery based on, you know, how everybody else is feeling, but do a little vibe check. You know, maybe you have to have a tough conversation with somebody, and you can tell today is just not the day instead of being negative and, you know, making it not a productive conversation. Change it to tomorrow. There's always tomorrow.

15:19 - 15:42
Ricky Becker: You know? And every time you wake up in the morning, it's a new start. It's a new day. Brush off yesterday and just, you know, try to like I keep saying, ebbing and flowing. And, you know, I think that's probably my best advice because I've had the negative emails that have been sent out to everybody, and there's never a good reaction to that.

15:42 - 16:11
Ginger Craddock: As we wrap up today's episode, I just wanna take a moment to let all of this sink in. Every person that we heard from, Dawn, Ellen, Caleb, Alexandra, Melanie, Jason, Keith, Wayne, Alicia, and Ricky, each one opened a window into what real leadership looks like in our industry. It's not the polished kind. It's not the perfect kind. It's the honest kind of leadership.

16:11 - 16:31
Ginger Craddock: The human kind of leadership. What stood out to me is how consistent the thread is. Integrity, candor, honesty, service and community, resilience, emotional intelligence. You see in the real world, these aren't buzzwords. These are the choices that we make every day.

16:31 - 17:02
Ginger Craddock: Each person we heard from today is out there living it. Sometimes in quiet ways and sometimes in big bold steps, but always with purpose. I love this industry and it's because of people like them and people like you who show up with intention and heart every single day. That's how we build trust and this is how we build culture. This is how we take care of each other on and off the road.

17:03 - 17:23
Ginger Craddock: So thank you for listening. Thank you for learning with me. Thank you for doing the work that makes trucking better every single day. I'm Ginger Kradoch and this has been the Hire Truckers podcast. Until next time, lead well, serve well, and keep choosing the kind of integrity that moves people forward.

17:23 - 17:35
Aaron Craddock: Thank you for joining us today. Our goal with the Hire Truckers podcast is to provide industry insights, marketing trends, and motivation to level up your recruiting game. If we added value, take a few seconds to share this with your network. Have a great week.