Posts Tagged ‘Sexual Predator’

Personal Responsibility is the ability to take care of oneself by means of, keeping healthy, managing ones emotions, keeping a sound mind, treating yourself with respect, and etc….

Being a trucker requires organizational skills. It requires common sense and it often requires two people to run one truck in an orderly fashion.

Many times a non-driving trucking spouse or partner maintains paperwork, audits settlement sheets, navigates and may be in charge of locating, planning & booking loads if they are owner-operators.
The non-driving spouse who rides along or manages to co-pilot from home contributes a great deal to the success of a professional driver.

A single person is expected to all of these things alone and the consequence of paperwork errors, miscalculations in a logbook or navigation can be costly. They can also affect your career.

When someone is considering entering trucking they should ask themselves and be honest.

Do I have good organizational skills?

Do I often rush to get things done and overlook details?

Can I read a map without a GPS system?

How do I react in severe weather?

Frequently, recruiters say nothing to student truckers about the intense logbook rules & regulations that are required to operate a commercial motor vehicle. The logbook can become a great source of stress unless you take your time to learn how to manage it accurately & legibly. If you cannot write well or do not have some math skills you will have problems in this industry. Even as many carriers are moving to paperless logs, you do yourself a great disservice by not understanding how to manage a logbook to use your time effectively.

Speaking as someone who used to audit hotels with many revenue venues on a daily basis I will tell you that the logbook truckers must complete on a daily basis took at least one year for me to fully grasp. This is because you are generally completing it when you are dead tired and your thoughts are scattered. Mistakes might be simple addition errors but they can be time consuming to correct. Truckers are constantly under time constraints. Falsifying your logs can mean your CDL. I personally suffered the most violations while I was taking advice from my trainer and a former trainer that I teamed with for one month.

Learning to do your logbook is a very important component to becoming a truck driver if you wish longevity. People, who grandstand about how they cut corners, run two books etc. are idiots. In the past this was expected but now it will eventually end your career. Even if your dispatcher is pushing you to “Do a favor” you will be the one to suffer, your dispatcher will never go to bat for you if you have falsified logs to do a favor for him or her, NEVER! , So don’t do it. Turn off your phone at night and make them put all favor requests on the Qualcomm.

The reality you should take into account is that hours to work are controlled because of the logbook and federal regulations. You are permitted to drive 11 hours per day not to exceed 70 hours in a week. A seventy hour work week? Do the math before you commit to a loan and understand this so you better estimate of how much you can make as a truck driver. That is 70 hours you log and there are indeed tricks to not burn up your hours while you are waiting but you are still probably not resting. These are long days.

You will be paid CPM “cents per mile”, therefore at the maximum per week running legal you should be able to estimate if you can survive on this low pay during your student phase. You will not be paid to sit in traffic, yet it is burning up your drive time. You are not paid to sit at shippers and receivers which can be many hours. You are not paid to fuel, wait on repairs, climb in trailers, sweep out debris or complete your logbook. Can you feel the tension building?

In some student fleets the pay is as low as 13 cents per mile. Most student fleet trucks are governed engines that only go on average 66 -67 mph, another control to your miles. All things being perfect this is barely enough to buy food and afford a cell phone. You should clearly understand this.

Right now there are many 4 year drivers who are making 18.5 cents driving team freight, this is because many companies who require experience are not hiring but a recent CNN Money reports the return of the mythical driver shortage reaching 400,000 by 2011. Here is my analysis of the Truck Driver Shortage

There are many drivers who are trapped with not enough money to buy their own trucks, no suitable options to move up the food chain & 100′s of new students arriving each week thinking there are tons of jobs awaiting them. If you are a new trucking student expect to feel unwelcome, but don’t take it personally.

What about your temper? I find most people who seek this job are independent by nature, loners and very strong willed. While working alone may seem like a great idea, truckers are often in stressful situations. You should aspire to become a professional driver. Not a unprofessional driver.

Are you a good traveler or do you get annoyed easily with delays?

Are you a good driver?

Do you suffer from road rage and act out on the highway?

Do you have trouble with your temper in stressful situations?

Do you permit others to upset you?

Most everyone will have to say yes to at least one of these points but a professional driver has disciplined control of their emotions to not tailgate, cut cars off because they cut them off, not weave in and out of traffic and to monitor weather knowing when it’s okay to roll and when to shut it down.

Venting on the CB is one thing but acting out on the highway is not impressive to anyone, it is dangerous and stupid. If you have these tendencies you should truly reflect and determine.

Can I change these things to be successful in the long run?

Committing to becoming a professional driver means your conduct on the highway AND with others when you are working should be PROFESSIONAL.

As a trucking student you will see a good deal of juvenile behavior in these huge carriers that train students. The turnover is so great that no one expects you to be around next week. You are little more than a one cow being herded into the pen. You may feel warm and fuzzy during orientation day but once you leave the terminal you are a number on a screen.

The training environments in these mega carriers have little guidance and they bring people from all walks of life looking for new carreer. There are people who would like to provoke you endlessly, get you involved in their personal dramas, and give you false information just for the heck of it. Some will pry into your life to create a drama and this includes some trainers, dispatchers & supervisory staff.

The reason my Student Trucker Horror Story is long is because every person I knew going through training was having one endless drama after another during their training and most of it was occurring because there was a complete failure by our company to provide any guidance or support.

It was as if a few inmates had taken over the prison yet in the hallways the management wandered about with a blank stare. It reminded me of the movie “The Stepford Wives” waving at each other as if nothing was wrong. The distress of the students from a lack of accurate information, communication & follow up was and is inexcusable. It was surreal to me that so much suffering could be occurring in one place that operated on denial auto pilot.

As a student you will be subjected to some people who engage in petty gossip, stay away from them. If you choose to “Hang Out” you will find that simple conversations often turn to sex, sometimes women see it as harmless flirting but as a student trucker you can get yourself into seriously bad situations.

You should realize accepting help as a student female often means there are “strings attached” even when the person says there are not.

Protect your privacy:
Don’t talk about your former job, education, marital status, income level , DO NOT talk about how many miles you are getting & DO NOT believe they are getting as many as they say they are. There is a lot of jealousy and because everyone is paid very little there is an element of desperation. Other drivers are always trying to see if the grass is greener on your side of the fence. Do not get into these conversations.

Its okay to listen and learn but do not engage because the conversations generally deteriorate into contempt and that is when the gossip starts. Listen & Learn of what to do & WHAT NOT TO DO with regards to accidents and incidents Realize that everyone will tell you, “Oh my way is the best & only way” That is 100% Baloney!

There’s more than one way to skin a cat and you will meet a lot of loudmouths who have plenty of advice but are failures in the execution of the job.

If you are adaptable, have the ability to listen, learn and you can hold a vehicle steady that’s the first step.

DO NOT try to form any Romantic Relationships in the first year or so, most end in heartbreak or disaapointment but the real loss is your chance to be taken seriously and get your much needed experience. You may meet several people in your first few months trucking that you like on a personal level and impulsively you decide to team up, after all the most effective teams are married couples. More often than not the following occurs:

• They turn out to be already married
• They have several people they “see” while they are on the road
• They are unsafe drivers and you cannot sleep while they are on duty.
• They expect you to drive, be their secretary, mommy and cook.

Once you decide to get on a truck and develop a relationship as a student you are generally taken less seriously from this point on. You are viewed as a “Truck Hopper” because there are women who go to truck driving school simply to meet men. As a single woman entering this industry, you will have to work harder to prove you are not a “truck hopper” because unfortunately there are those who cannot believe a woman can actually find peace working alone and not be a man-hater.

Mixing the two learning to drive a big rig and developing a new relationship is generally not a confidence booster. Often the man begins to feel threatened as you are becoming more confident and a power struggle ensues. If you truly want to drive you can derail your career very early by not understanding this concept. Get your experience FIRST! Then you can have more freedom than if you get dependent during your learning period and forgo some of the teaching you should have had.

If a veteran owner-operator, or other veteran driver encourages you to quit your training company to team with them you should realize that an O/O cannot get insurance to let you drive so this is actually a trick to get a sex partner trapped on the truck. Quitting to run team with someone you do not know or have never lived with is a really dumb idea also. If it does not work out, chances are you cannot go back to the training company you left. Also, starting out as a couple and never learning how to operate the truck on your own can mean you have shot yourself in the foot. This will place you at a disadvantage should you decide to go on your own later.

Sexual harassment is going to happen in trucking and in other jobs. We need to get educated. If you have a thin skin, find another line of work. But you have a right to be trained in a safe manner.

Men in trucking often have not worked around women before so you should expect to hear things you have not heard in your former work environments. Everyone in the trucking industry should have increased training BUT it is often women in support positions who are the greatest harm to entering female students. These are often the culprits who cover up abuse by a few guys who harm many. This is frequently because these women get a good deal of flattery, flirting and sometimes more and feel compelled to protect the offender at the expense of the targets of abuse. This is one way a hostile workplace is created and can be manipulated by a predator in bully organizations. It is a huge problem in trucking and especially for female students.

Mind your mouth, and your manner of dress as a student. You are being watched by predators who know most will not make it. They are looking for someone vulnerable, someone eager to learn who needs a mentor. They are looking for signs in the way you talk and dress to see how to win your confidence. Whether you engage in consensual sex or succumb to badgering after getting yourself in a dangerous situation you should realize you were a mark the moment this person set eyes on you. Stay away from “Mr. I know everyone and I can hook you up” unless you want to be used like trash.

Understand that the Human Resource department is a last resort. Do not make threats to sue and mouth off, you are only setting yourself up to be retaliated against and this may happen anyways. Instead, document with email correspondence in a professional manner and create a dated paper trail.

If you have an incident that requires the police call them, get a report and do not let your company off the hook if they say they are “investigating it”, chances are they ARE NOT and delaying, follow up is crucial. They drag things out on purpose and delays to file formal charges only make you look bad.

If they tell you there is no statute of limitations to file a harassment claim they are lying and be aware all information you provide them of the incident they will twist and try to make it seem you are guilty or mistaken. Phrases like “we are investigating but we don’t have to tell you the outcome” may sometimes mean they have simply let the predator go on to circulate elsewhere hoping you won’t find out or run into each other again. This is frequent in trucking. Beware of the friendly “Let’s all work together” & “we are stronger when we are united” cheerleaders. Place a time limit and follow up. In this industry these are specific blow off phrases I have heard time and again by people who participate in covering up abuse.

Sexual Harassment is really not taken seriously and cases are rarely won. The truth is that truck driver training fleets that have non-existent harassment & conduct training, trauma preparation, or follow up are willfully negligent. What the trucking industry is doing with the provocative way they treat victim’s amounts to Psychological Warfare and many drivers show signs of “Post Traumatic Stress Disorder’ (PTSD) after they have reported an incident to their HR Department. Victims are generally treated as the guilty party rather than the offender.

Certainly give them the benefit of the doubt to resolve the issue internally unless it is serious violence or a rape. Make sure you call the police to make a report. The trucking companies are always looking for a way to make you look guilty for dropping the ball. DO NOT let them tell you that you “brought it on yourself”. If this happens GET A LAWYER! NO ONE deserves to be raped or beaten for any reason whatsoever!

If you begin to experience nightmares, or other symptoms from the incident itself that are unresolved or retaliation after you reported it go to your HR Department for a form of first injury to file a claim for PTSD under workman’s’ comp. If they try to tell you that you cannot file or it will not be allowed demand the paper firmly but politely. Get their name and every single person’s name involved that you speak to regarding your issue.

Carriers seem to react with a better attention span to workman’s comp claims rather than lawsuits. It is truly the bully organizational structure that has permitted this conduct to permeate the trucking industry. Some experts who study bully organizations feel trucking carriers who begin to experience an increase of PTSD claims due to their poor handling of harassment for both men and women they might begin to correct their training atmosphere, eliminate the predators and create a safer environment. Locate an employment lawyer just in case; the internet is beginning to have plenty of trucking harassment cases which show this is a pervasive problem that is willfully ignored.

Women are trained from childhood to not only judge each other but remain silent when they witness something they know to be wrong. In the trucking industry this will be the toughest obstacle to recognize and overcome.

If you do get a female trainer expect her to be tough and appreciate it. But you should not have to be her monkey, her audience for her lovelorn confessions or have to be subjected to unsafe driving such as tailgating, exceeding the speed limit or breaking the law in any way shape or form.
Is it true that some Women feel they are a service to others when they remain silent when they are in the position to protect?

A female trainer should not only teach you how to operate the truck but hopefully give you personal safety tips like how to secure your doors at night with the seat belts and so on. You both should take personal responsibility upon yourselves to know, YOU STINK!

Having to live in a truck with another person and not being able to shower each day makes for very smelly living. You might be able to tolerate your stench but it is new to others and it might be so offensive they may refuse to continue to drive with you and give no reason. Make sure you use personal wipes on EVERYTHING daily to stay “Fresh” and dispose of them. Sadly, there are many people who need this spelled out. Wipe all your cracks liberally! Large people have to understand that they sweat more from places others do not. Even skinny people can smell like ass after a day or so of hard work and no shower. Don’t be arrogant! Use a pillow for the driver’s seat if your butt sweats and remove it out of sight & in an airtight bag when not in use. Keep your bedding clean and clarify the potty stops.

Couples might feel comfortable using a porta-potti on a truck but with a trainer you just met, especially of the opposite sex, I doubt it. Sometimes asking to stop for the bathroom is not tolerated at all. You should clarify this before you leave the terminal with a trainer or co-driver. This is also a characteristic to watch out for as some may become abusive when you ask to stop to use the bathroom. Try to plan to go around fuel stops whether you feel like it or not. If you are using a bottle, dispose of it properly. I prefer to see urine poured in the grass and bottles put into trash receptacles. Crapping your pants is unfortunately something that does occur in trucking. Obviously do not make a habit out of crapping in a bag, although some slobs do and the stories are … ICK!, but emergencies do occur and many times there is nowhere to stop. You should think about this.

Becoming a trucker does not mean you have to act like an ape or look like one either. On the other hand, many things that people take for granted like fresh water and clean toilets are a treat for the professional driver.

While there are some trainers or co-drivers who are slobs, other drivers are meticulously tidy, respect this and clean up after yourself. Use a bit of baby powder in your hair if it stinks from not washing.  Use deodorant and if it is not strong enough find one that is. It is incredibly hard to sleep or drive with someone who stinks and it is very hard to tell someone that you want to vomit whenever they come around.

Your Trainer should not delay to teach you how to back the truck up and dock it, teach tail swing, how to complete your logbooks and what the consequences are for not doing them. They should teach you about chain laws and how to adjust your tandems and how to complete all of these things as if you are alone. You have abour 35 to 40 days with your trainer there is not a moment to spare. Learn everything you can during this time and ask for help if you don’t understand. Some people need things explained more clearly, there is nothing wrong with this.

Your trainer should not by prying into your personal life and YOU should NOT behave as if you are at a singles bar every time the truck stops. Before you leave the terminal with your trainer you should know how to send a distress message from your Qualcomm and understand how to delete it so that the other person does not see it. This can help prevent an altercation on the truck in dangerous heated situations.

Know your fleet manager’s name, phone number and email. Also know his boss’s name, and the boss’s above him. If your company has an “Incident Response Center” or Emergency 24 hour call center, make sure you have the number programmed in your phone. In my situation, I did not know such a department existed in the beginning but once I did they handled getting me safely to a motel and through the weekend but the ball was dropped after that.  This is what I commonly hear from male and female drivers who have experienced “Incidents” where they had to get off the truck during training.

They are not being told these departments exist and when they do find them to be assisted, their dispatcher and/or fleet department drops the ball. There is no follow up or lack of sensitivity because whatever trauma that occurred is not handled properly.

If you are scared, GOOD! The students who are scared make better drivers who pay attention and take this job seriously; the ones who aren’t have accidents and often hurt others. They won’t be truck drivers very long but hopefully you can steer clear of them so they don’t take you down with them.

Written by Desiree Wood “Trucker Desiree”

Additional Reading:

Bring it On – Ethics in Sexual Harassment Training

Truck Driver Employee Rights under OSHA and FMCSA

The Hostile Workplace

Workplace Fairness – Trucking Whistleblowers

Employment Law Terms

Technorati Tags: CDL Training, Female, FMCSA, Harassment, OSHA, Rape, Recruiting, Respect, Retaliation, Sexual Predator, Truck Driver Shortage, Truckers, Trucking

Related posts

• Practical Truck Driver Training Solutions Part 2 (9)
• Recruiting & Retaining Women as Truck Drivers (4)
• WIT President Seeks to Benefit from Harassment Judgment in Trucking (2)
• Practical Truck Driver Training Solutions: Part 1 (6)
• Wild West Women (8)

This series of posts on Solutions for Ethical Truck Driver Training comes as a result of many long ignored suggestions made by actual truck drivers to their companies who train students and receive a good deal of government funding. The turnover rate in trucking is 125% which is outrageous and most of this turnover is due to predatory lending & poor recruitment. Poor Training & Support, Personal Safety & Harassment Issues, Retaliation by carriers & Industry to push truck drivers out of the industry who protest being mistreated and provoked.

Let’s cut to the chase:  As predicted when the economy crashed in 2008 the phony truck driver shortage that the ATA and the carriers it represents rely upon to keep the government money coming in, also dissapated.  Now it’s back right when the jobs bill is coming up and all the usual suspects are in high gear for recruiting, but have they corrected their ugly ways?

Sexual Predators and Control Freaks are drawn to environments where they can get what they want and operate without notice. Religious Organizations, Religion based dating sites, Pediatricians, Boy Scout Leaders, Girls Schools; even organizations like Trucker Buddy will attract a risk taking predator. Religion plays a part because denial provides a safe haven for such predators to utilize this fertile ground as a place to feed their illness. This is why these organizations should recognize they have greater responsibility in screening the people they give positions of power to dominate over another person.

“Shunning” is how a person is treated after they have complained about mistreatment or abuse. A sanction to isolate a person further is often associated with religious groups but the behavior is common in the trucking industry, which we refer to as retaliation for reporting abuse. There are many more extreme cases of retaliation that occur in the form of threats or intimidation. Most commonly a ruined DAC and/or telling prospective new employers that the driver is no longer hireable. This has effectively ended many truck driving careers.  For Women, the misuse of lifting requirments or agility tests in a manner that is not equal to test given to men and in some cases making the weight inappropriate for the job has eliminated some veteran women truckers from the trucking industry.  This is why few people hear much about Women Truckers,  most want anonymity.

The ATA advocacy page I have linked says nothing about the recent outpouring of social media, investigative reports and lawsuits about abuse to student truckers by predators and control freaks.  Still the media hype machine is hard at work to create the basis for the next wave of student truckers.  Articles in Fleet Owner & Reuters ; describe a false image, those of us who have had pay cuts know these articles are complete rubbish.  Moving on to more ethical companies is not a viable option because most are not hiring. Only the training companies are claiming to be suffering for truck drivers. Curious isn’t it?

In one manner or another, the government is funding the handful of student training fleets who will most benefit from this next wave of recruiting.  The ATA has not acted responsibly when they have continued to ignore that many of the carriers it represents think nothing about hiding behind religion or skewed statistical data which makes it appear everything is fine in the world of training student truckers. This makes the ATA and the Organization “Women in Trucking ” nothing more than an accomplice to abuse.  The flip-flop advocacy of what is a priority depends where they can get media attention, it is repugnent and obvious.

“Working behind the scenes” is no good. “Serving in Silence” makes a sinister undertone of a cover up to that which is unacceptable to protect something that is well-known.  Partnerships with companies who have lost, settled or are in current litigation for rampant problems of sexual misconduct and discrimination look to be nothing more than a public relations recovery rather than a pro-active approach to correcting a fixable problem.

Many former female trainers from the handful of government funded mega-fleets have written suggestions to help but they have been ignored. There is no reason a $100,000 grant should be awarded in order to create a solutions code, or any other amount in my opinion when real truckers have written endless letters and suggestions to make a better training environment for all student truckers and they have been ignored.

Trucking Companies who train government funded students or receive favorable tax incentives to train workers should be held to a higher level of corporate accountability.  Hiding behind religion should not be a factor to avert attention but rather make these companies held under a microscope more closely when it is well known this particular environment makes it easy for a pleasant liar to thrive.

Predators thrive in an environment where there is denial; just ask someone who was raped as a child by a Priest, Pastor, Minister or Deacon of the Church.

I recently had lunch with a Woman Trucker who I had met some months back, she dresses in a rather eccentric manner but she is older than I am. She is very animated and sweet but I could see most people would judge her by her appearance automatically. During lunch she said whenever someone brought up the “P” word meaning “Pedophile” she would go crazy. She never knew why, she had no recollections of her childhood. She had been abandoned by her Mother and raised but her very religious Aunt & Uncle. As a young lady, she got herself involved in troubles that lasted until she was in her 30′s and she came close to dying.  A social worker suggested she talk to a therapist and she began to realize she had been raped her entire childhood by her uncle who was very respected in the community and a church leader.  Most of the people in her small town already knew about the abuse but they said nothing. They only whispered behind her back. She did not know because she had blocked it all out. Even her childhood friend confessed that there were rumors in the town that her children were fathered by her uncle. She told me when she came to grips with these truths she became liberated and began living her life. She said she dresses in a manner she feels good and she does not care what others say because she feels like she is a teenager for the first time at 50 years of age.

She began driving a truck about 5 years ago and was thankful for the government voucher to have a chance for a new life. The trainer she was assigned told her she had to have sex with him in order to learn to drive the truck, when she refused he threw her off the truck. Her second trainer used her only as a second log book and did not teach her anything. This is a very common training experience for single women entering trucking. Veteran Women truckers may not be fully aware of this because many have become Owner-Operators and have never had to work for one of the Government funded fleets. This woman I met loves the freedom trucking gives her to live far away from that small town where she can be herself. She is not a highly educated but she is very astute in her perceptions. She is  thankful she has found trucking but frankly, when CSA2010 comes into effect I feel many of us poorly trained students will be replaced.

It is very difficult to have a student insured obviously because they come from CDL Schools with barely enough experience to hold the steering wheel, PTDI certification OR NOT!  NOTHING can prepare a Student Trucker for being in charge of a big rig on the open highway until they get out there and do it. I would also like to add a word of advice to single women who have been offered to learn to drive from a “Owner-Operator”. While this might sound wonderful that someone has taken a personal shine to you, the truth is they probably want a relationship or a 2 week sex partner. For insurance reasons like I said above it would not be possible for a veteran to take you on their rig and for you to receive the hours needed to be considered experienced.  I have met many student females who bought this line only to be put off a truck after they refused sex.  They often say that they never learned to drive but were only badgered for sex the entire time.

Student Truckers are funneled into a handful of Truck Driving Training Fleets where they are to be trained to drive and most will not make it.  There is no shortage of truck drivers but there is a shortage of good trainers who are not Control Freaks and Predators.  There is also a problem in poor recruiting which makes good trainers quit.  This is especially true for Women trainers.  Retaliation for reporting predators remains a problem and as one former CR England Trainer alleged in a June 2009 blog talk radio program for “Truth about Trucking “, sometimes groups of trainers will work in conjunction passing a female student around until she has sex with one of them.

Being a trainer for a student means you are risking your life at the hands of someone you do not know anything about. This is a huge risk when the quality of students is very poor and trainers often quit because of it.  The quality of students has been poor because of the government money to foot the bill for anyone with a pulse thus creating predatory lending.  The good trainer suffers the consequenses of this chaos which leaves predators who see student truckers as a ripe opportunity for additional company money and sex.

Contrary to the assertions by Ellen Voie in the Q & A about the CRST Sexual Harassment Case here on this site, the Women did not all want to be part of a lawsuit.  Tracy Hamm for instance had filed with the EEOC prior and had never been contacted.  She saw others being hurt by the same people and wanted change so no one else would be hurt.  This is in her deposition and Ellen Voie had no business making such remarks at any juncture when she had never talked to any of these women at length.  Another former Woman Trainer who sucessfully sued U.S. Xpress shared this ridiculous question she was asked when she was deposed for her case. “What color panties were you wearing?”  her story will be in a future post about some of the unsafe training situations these companies put female recruits into.  It becomes overwhelming when the companies are linked to “Women in Trucking” AFTER the lawsuits & allegations. Personal Safety is equal to Highway safety for this line of work. You cannot concentrate on the highway if you are afraid of your trainer or co-driver, or want to kill them as in a recent case from “Falcon Transport ” where one driver murdered his co-driver, while the truck was rolling!

The particular woman trucker in the U.S. Xpress case was able to go on to work in the industry because her settlement included not being blackballed which is most commonly done to women truckers who ever dare speak out about the treatment they receive.  She later married a trainer and became one herself.  They are no longer married but she told me her former Husband has had multiple complaints against him for sexual misconduct but he has not beenn taken off the training board except for short periods. He was eventually assigned to train only married couples but was caught multiple times masturbating while he was training, even kicking the students out to stand on the street while he finished!  Why is he still a trainer at all?

She is no longer a trainer and like other women trainers I have met, they are given the problem students who should not be on the road at all but for some reason the company retains them.  The clue to this may be that in order to receive the funding on each student they must be employed for a certain period of time, even if they are a menace to highway safety.  That is the student trucker industry!  These are the students who after a good deal of time are not learning and/or have many “issues” that prevent them from becoming good, safe truck drivers.  It is because of this, Women trainers are scarce.

Tracy Hamm the Woman Trucker from the CRST Case who first made contact on the Trucker Desiree blog had offered solutions from her perspective after having been a student who had troubles and as a former trainer. We have all seen many competent truck driving students fail to succeed because of the system which protects predators. We have also seen many incompetent truck driving students succeed who should not be on the highway or go on to become predatory trainers themselves.  This is why we are demanding solutions!  If you read the entire Q & A of Ellen Voie you would have seen Tracy Hamm’s name brought up time and again.  Ellen Voie contacted Tracy following a phone conference we had when I advised Ellen that her information was incorrect. Tracy also spoke at length with WIT Director Marge Bailey who took away a very different view once she spoke to Tracy. I am not at liberty to share the remarks that Marge wrote to me following her chat with Tracy, but I can say it was lengthy and Marge Bailey expressed a concern that indeed these issues are much more complex and need to be fully addressed. Tracy like many other Women Truckers provided Ellen Voie & myself solutions that have been suggested to carriers for a good deal of time.  The problem is that the carriers ignore these suggestions.  Recruiting seems to be a priority but not conduct to insure success.

Here are some of the Solutions from Tracy Hamm and other Women Truckers:

1. The trainer & trainee should spend at least 24 hours together prior to training.  During that time, they should ask one another questions and talk about their expectations.  The carriers should help by preparing a “Common Concerns” Checklist to help facilitate this interview process.

2. A general compatibility questionnaire would help determine the appropriateness of the match. This will also benefit the “Team Business Model” where some carriers require a team driving component to training: For Instance, Music Preference, Cleanliness, Personal Hygiene, Bathroom Stops, Sleep Patterns, Gambling Stops, Storage… answering these questions verbally will reveal personality traits such as inability to work together OR over accommodating behavior which can turn into “I gave you everything…” tantrum later.

3. The Student Company should be required to have a liaison that will be responsible for the trainee’s success. That person will have the trainee’s phone number and will call him/her once each day to inquire how the training is going. The trainee should meet the liaison in person during on site training. The trainee should be told how to make an S.O.S. via Qualcomm prior to leaving with their trainer and be given phone number that WILL be answered should they need assistance for an emergency to get off the truck. This should be discussed prior to fully understand what would be considered Urgent and what is NOT.

4. To avert retaliation or confrontation by trainer/co-driver for requesting to be removed from a “situation” the liaison and student should devise code words or phrases to indicate that there is something wrong that needs the attention. For example, “I need more vitamins in my water” could mean, “get me out of the truck immediately!” (something to that effect.)

5. The trucking carrier should supply the trainer and trainee with a code of ethics that they must agree to by reading, signing and keeping a copy with emergency numbers before departing the terminal. This should also be done for truck driving teams in student fleets. Any violations of sexual misconduct are grounds for termination.

6. A series of conduct films are very much needed in truck driver training because of the highly unusual training conditions. Two complete strangers from very different backgrounds, religions, political affiliations are expected to conduct themselves as professionals who live and work together without guidance?

I’d like to see my CEO teamed in a truck with the very outspoken 50 year old woman with a gold grill on her teeth. I’d like to see them work together to put a set of chains on at donner pass at 3 a.m. How about Clayton Boyce as my trainee when I’m PMS? We all have our daily issues but in this super intense environment in which we expect to teach and learn we should also provide more guidance before we hand out keys to 18 wheelers.

Other former Women Truckers have offered suggestions such as putting cameras in the cab which for training trucks might be fine if they were activated by a panic button rather than rolling constantly. This is rather impractical given the sleeper size, the reality of changing clothes, having to pee in a cup or bottle at times when facilities are not available. Cameras open up the door for too much weird behavior which is already a problem in trucking where abuse of power is an epidemic.

The first step in making solutions is freeing ourselves from denial and understanding that being a trainer for a trucking student who cannot drive can very well end someone’s life, including the trainers.

The trainer should not be put on team miles from day one which has been common practice. The reason why is that students who come from ANY CDL School ARE NOT prepared to drive an 11 hour shift.  This is something you build up to and throwing students out on the road to move cheap freight puts every single person on the highway at risk!  The trainer is there to train a person who has little more than a few trips around the city where they went to school.  They have barely driven enough to understand lane changes , changing weather and how to manage traffic flow.  The trainer is placed in a catch 22 if they must be in the sleeper for 10 hours by law. How can they ever supervise the student legally?  That is a question I would like to ask Ray LaHood U.S. Secretary of Transportation. I know this man cares about safety because I follow his news closely on Twitter and I highly doubt he is being told the correct information about what goes on in the REAL World of training truckers and what female recruits have to put up with in order to learn.

The trainer should not be expected to break HOS laws to train students.

Putting trainers in unsafe training situations makes good trainers quit and leaves only the ‘Hot Dog” trainers and Predators who have another reason they take the risk. There is a shortage of good trainers because predatory lending brings unsuitable candidates into trucking.  There is a shortage of good qualified, screened students. There is a shortage of proper & effective support from the carriers to teach conduct skills to recruits who are expected to live, work & learn in a truck the size of an elevator.

This is the first part in a series of solutions that have been contributed by various REAL Truck Drivers who care about Highway Safety & Personal Safety.  These things should not be for sale , they are free and we hope ethical professionals in the trucking industry will recognize that it’s time to do things differently.

Correct the manner in which you train trucking students and your driver shortage will cease.

Not there ever was one…..

Additional Reading:

A Pedophile named Trucker

Tennnesse Sex Offender owns Trucking Company

ATA – Why is Everbody picking on me (The Clayton Boyce Story)

Center for Sex Offender Management

Rate your Boss – Hostile Workplace

Trucking Company sued by EEOC for Retaliation

Retrain the Dispatchers

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