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Welcome Back for our final installment of our Top Ten List...
3. Pros and Cons of Small or Large Trucking Company. Think back through your career and which companies you were the most satisfied with. Small trucking companies tend to be more personal which can be good and bad. Do you like to keep your personal life and interaction with your employer at arms length? Do you like to get to know your dispatcher, the mechanics, the staff and company owner more personally? These are personal choices of course, but important to your overall success with a company. If you like to remain more autonomous and be a small part of a larger company, this is important to keep in mind when deciding. With a larger company you can feel less appreciated, but at the same time your dispatcher won't be calling you late on a Sunday asking you to take another drivers load because he has "personal" issues.
2. Local or Out of State Trucking Company. What does it matter? If you work for a local company, it can be nice because it has more of a community feel. Local companies also mean more interaction with other drivers who work there. This can be good and bad, depending on how much gossip and complaining from other drivers you prefer to get involved in. An out of state company has the benefits of being removed from that and you won't have to go into to the terminal every week-end or so when you come home. Again it's all personal choice.
1. Sign On Bonus - Is it worth it? It depends and most likely NO. There are so many different types of sign on bonus's out there. The majority of them aren't sign on bonus's. So when you see an ad offering a large $5000 sign on bonus, don't get distracted and feel short changed because your sign on bonus was only $2000. Read the fine print. If it's too good to be true, it usually is. A $5000 sign on bonus paid over 6 months loses its appeal very quickly when you're only running 1800 miles a week. You did not get any type of bonus and probably lost money on the whole deal. These bonus's are designed to attract attention and they do! But in most cases, that is all it is, a ploy to attract your attention and get you in the door. Most Carriers have these bonus's now simply because they have to have them to keep up with the competition. Do your homework and do not make a decision based on a bonus!
The most important thing to remember is to not to sell yourself short! Stick to your guns and select the company who offers what you need and want as a driver. This is key to your long term success in this industry.
Do the legwork before you start at a company. If you are constantly switching employers it will only serve to cause frustration and burnout in your career. This is a great career and a very honorable profession.
I have been in the trucking business my whole life and my family has been in the trucking business for four generations. My Great Grandfather hauled moonshine from Kentucky to South St. Louis during prohibition. My Grandfather was a Teamster, My Dad owns a trucking company, my brothers are in trucking, My ten year old son, Joseph, sounds off the carrier names of every truck we see on the highway and helps his Grandfather in the summer by sweeping the shop and picking up trash on the lot at the terminal.
Trucking is a family tradition and I hope you encourage your family, friends and anyone you know to join our industry. The majority of trucking companies are in some way, shape or form, a family business. In these poor economic times, you never see trucking companies lay off drivers.
There are more jobs available now to drivers than ever before! This is job security.
Almost every trucking company has a training program to help people get a CDL and experience. All of the poor souls who are unemployed, whose homes are being foreclosed on, full of worry and the shame of it all... Do your good deed for the day and introduce them to our industry, A Family Tradition.
© 2012 Michael H. Komadina
18 Wheels of Justice™
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