Women Truck Drivers Overlooked Despite Dependability
•Télécharger en tant que PPTX, PDF•
3 j'aime•1,805 vues
This document summarizes the experience of women working as truck drivers. It discusses how women truck drivers have historically been overlooked and stereotyped in the industry. It provides tips for women interested in becoming truck drivers, such as conducting an honest personal assessment of whether they are suited for the job, choosing a reputable commercial drivers license school, and researching potential training carriers. The document cautions against team driving and lease purchase models during training. Finally, it suggests organizational solutions like mentorship programs and evaluating company culture to attract and retain more women drivers.
Recommandé
Contenu connexe
En vedette
En vedette (12)
Similaire à Women Truck Drivers Overlooked Despite Dependability
Similaire à Women Truck Drivers Overlooked Despite Dependability (19)
Dernier
Dernier (20)
Women Truck Drivers Overlooked Despite Dependability
- 1. Women Who Work As Truck Drivers Presented by Desiree Ann Wood President/Founder REAL Women in Trucking, Inc. 501 (c) (6) Truck Driver Association For the Department of Labor Women’s Bureau Women Moving America Forward Webinar
- 3. Let’s Connect! LinkedIn: Desiree Wood “Trucker Desiree” Twitter: @TruckerDesiree @WomenTruckers Facebook: “REAL Women in Trucking, Inc.”
- 4. The REAL Deal on Women Truckers Dependable, Dedicated, Diligent …. … often overlooked, marginalized and stereotyped by the their industry Women Trucker Quote: You gotta work twice as hard to be considered bottom of the pile out here
- 5. Women Are Not New To Trucking ! Luella Bates Circa 1918 Rusty Dow Circa 1944 Adriesue “Bitzy” Gomez Circa 1977
- 6. Recognition for Sex Appeal not Aptitude Public Perception Trucking Industry Would it be acceptable to hold a beauty contest for Male CEO’s to recognize their work? GENDER STEREOTYPE
- 8. • Can I drive? • Do I understand my responsibility to highway safety? • Do I have the ability to learn something outside of my comfort zone? • Can I be alone for long periods of time? • Can I climb? • Can I lift and/or maneuver at least 75lbs? • Can I survive on very low pay for 6 months? • Can I go without a shower for a couple days? Conduct an Honest Personal Assessment
- 9. Choosing a CDL School Step One Step Two • Read the FAQ on our website • Watch our video on choosing a CDL School • Interview training carriers before selecting a CDL School • Seek out community colleges and technical schools for CDL training • Select a preferred entry-level truck driving carrier • Google the carrier name followed by the word “complaints” • Be prepared to be with your trainer at least 35 to 45 days over the road for most cases • Pack Light & Be Ready to Learn
- 10. Why Research Training Carriers First?
- 11. Washington State Department of Licensing Bates Technical College ~ South Campus Tacoma, Washington Program covers 2 quarters 720 hours program A total of 40 college credits $5857.58 is total tuition Title IV FAFSA-based funding is available to qualified persons, as well as other State grants (depending on whether they are a dislocated worker, low-income WA State resident 1 year, on public assistance, on Food Stamps, etc.) They average 1 female student per class of 12 • Grays Harbor College • Bates Technical School • Big Bend Community College
- 12. Truck Driver Pay • Gender Wage Gap • Local jobs = Additional Labor • Over the Road (OTR) = .CPM
- 13. Set Up To Fail JUST SAY NO! Team Driving Student Fleets and Lease Trucks Pushed on Student Truckers • Team Freight Moved by Student Labor is NOT SAFE training! • Trainers are not teaching when team freight is the business model of the carrier. • Single Women are at a higher risk for sexual assault & harassment at team driving training carriers. • Training carriers that have lease trucks manipulate new drivers to buy them.
- 14. • Seek a mentor who has knowledge of the type of driving you will be doing. • Don’t let others do your work! It’s fine to accept help but you must learn to do by yourself. • Your goal is to become a personally responsible , safe driver. • When the conversation begins to turn personal, bring it back to professional Personal Strategies
- 15. ORGANIZATIONAL SOLUTIONS • Be Honest • Evaluate your corporate culture using an outside 3rd party and make changes. • Mentorship Programs: Internal/External • Innovate new business models
- 16. If you would like more information on strategies to attract and retain women as truck drivers please email me Desiree Wood realwomenintrucking@gmail.com
Notes de l'éditeur
- Slide 1 This presentation was created and delivered for the Department of Labor Women’s Bureau – Women Moving America Forward webinar held on March 23, 2016 Hello, My name Desiree Wood, I am the President and Founder of the REAL Women in Trucking, Inc. truck driver organization. This group was formed in 2010 was to protest the way women truckers have been marginalized and stereotyped by our own industry leaders. Only 1 in 6 women entering truck driver training are making it to become qualified drivers according to trainers in our organization. Today, REAL Women in Trucking, Inc. is a 501 (c) (6) member organization. We are REAL women drivers delivering highway safety through leadership, mentorship, education and advocacy.
- Slide 2 I began my personal journey into commercial truck driver training in 2007. I was pre-hired to work with a large over the road truck driver training fleet right out of my CDL school. The experience was harrowing and it led me to use social media to share what I discovered. What happened to me was not an isolated incident. I found that there was an industry wide problem and it was not being addressed. My personal safety was jeopardized and it hindered my ability to remain employed as a truck driver, it also impacted highway safety and I wanted the public to become more educated on how truck drivers were trained. I am a west coast native and I am familiar with driving in the Pacific Northwest, often picking up and delivering around the west coast port regions. Heavy traffic, weak infrastructure, extreme winter weather in the mountains regions and the difficulties finding truck parking make Washington unfriendly territory for many truck drivers. I am currently based out of South Florida. These are a few pictures of my road pictures with my dog Karma, a street dog that came into my life during my first year trucking.
- Slide 3 As I mentioned, I took to social media to share my concerns. My Twitter activity has been recognized internationally. My student trucker story was the basis of a series of investigative reports by Dan Rather. This is powerful stuff when you consider that an individual who lives alone in the cab of a truck and lives an invisible life can be heard around the world. That is the life of a truck driver; isolated and alone… for a woman trucker it is even more isolated. You have to love being with yourself to enjoy this job.
- Slide 4 Truck Driving is one of the top 10 most dangerous jobs to hold. Women Truckers make up about 6.1 % of the truck driver population but I believe the number is much higher like, 20% visually, out on the road, Women Truckers are very present. The data discrepancy I believe lies in the way these women are calculated. Women Truckers describe themselves as Independent, emotionally able to work and travel alone, committed to highway safety, resourceful, with good trip planning skills. Truck drivers require a reasonable level of upper body strength to maneuver between 75 and 100 lbs. on an OCCASIONAL basis. It really depends on the type of work they will be doing. They must be able to climb in and around trailers, inspect engines, recognize and identify problems that need repairs. This requires a willingness to get hands, hair and clothes dirty every day. Sub-standard employers often do not schedule freight appropriately. Because of this, first year truck drivers may find it shocking that a daily shower is a luxury not a privilege. The load always takes precedence over personal needs. Women truckers must be creative in solutions to create a suitable lifestyle for themselves on the road. It is not for everyone regardless of gender.
- Slide 5 Women are not new to trucking; they have been driving big rigs since the World War I era but they are mostly invisible in transportation history timelines. “Service in Silence” has been an expectation of these women, even from women in different sectors of the industry. Marketing using the image of women truckers has always occurred but it has not helped women receive the dignified recognition they deserve. In 1918, Luella Bates was used to promote truck equipment. The message was: “It’s so easy to operate our truck, even a woman can do it” In an era when women didn’t travel far for work, if they worked at all Luella traveled in an open top truck from Wisconsin on a transcontinental tour. In 1944, Rusty Dow was the first woman truck operator to drive over the Alaska Highway. Truck driving was considered so “unnatural” an occupation that it substantiated grounds for the State of California to take the children of Adriesue “Bitzy” Gomez. Bitzy was a fiery activist with the “Coalition of Women Truckers” who exposed “The Sleeper Test”. This is an issue that is still prevalent today in some starter trucking companies where single women are expected to team drive with a person they know little about.
- Slide 6 Women who are seeking information about entering trucking today are getting the wrong message about what it takes to be a trucker. Naïve female students are easy to exploit and truck driver training is isolated. Women entering trucking must be prepared to work but the public perception of women truckers promotes a sexy, promiscuous outlaw and our own industry sponsors events for beauty contests over ability. The imagery new entrants are peddled gives a sense of cohesion that does not exist. There is little focus on the education and work ethic required for truck driving and therefore we are seeing less serious candidates in the training sector.
- Slide 7 Women truckers come in all shapes, sizes and ethnicities. They are Mothers, Grandmothers, Mother/Daughter Teams and Sisters. Many drive alone preferring the solitude of the road. Most of the women entering truck driving today are between the ages of 42 and 55. There are some women driving who are over 65 years of age. Some of these women have been on the road 30 or 40 years, it is all they know. Our Vice-President is pictured in the upper left corner of this slide; she will be 75 this June. It is important to note that many seasoned women truck drivers were introduced to the occupation by a Spouse, Father or Brother and learned over a long period of time. This is not today’s Entry-Level truck driver training environment. There are many obstacles to success during the first year.
- Slide 8 Women considering truck driving should do an honest personal assessment to determine if they have what it takes as to become a qualified driver. An aptitude for driving is number one. There is a great responsibility to highway safety. You must have the ability to learn something outside of your comfort zone and be able to live and work alone for long periods of time. Can you climb? Can you lift and/or maneuver at least 75lbs unassisted? Can you survive on very low pay for 6 months, maybe longer? Can you tolerate going without shower facilities for a couple days? Right now the industry is promoting more “Women Friendly” trucks with a message that speaks to say “women are smaller and weaker than men so they need this to be encouraged to enter truck driver training” This is the wrong message! There are many Women and Men who are barely 5 feet tall that began truck driving before there was power steering. Truck drivers must be able to drive 11 hours a day with limited access to a bathroom and taking a shower will be at a truck stop. You cannot always find healthy meal choices; there is little time to exercise. There will be night driving. You sleep in a bunkbed in the truck. Extreme weather driving is year round. Truck drivers must have the courage to keep driving in a storm in a safe manner but also to have the common sense to shut it down and park when it is no longer safe to move. You can either do it or you can’t. Not all of us are cut out to be Doctors and Lawyers and not everyone is cut out for truck driving regardless of your gender or your stature.
- Slide 9 There are 2 parts to becoming a licensed commercial driver. Step one is Choosing a CDL School rather than a CDL Mill. Step two, is being hirable at a preferable starter company and getting at least 1 year verifiable accident, free employment. By doing this correctly you can move on to better paying truck driver jobs. State and Federal Grants are available for training, there is tuition reimbursement, getting a conditional pre-hire letter is common and there is easy job placement. The problem is choosing wisely and this is why our organization was formed. I do want to point out that despite very low barriers to entry for women there are still many discriminatory hiring practices that occur by employers that hire only experienced truck drivers so this keeps women down in the low-wage carriers. On our website we have created a section dedicated to CDL training information for women entering truck driver training. The “Frequently Asked Questions” section provides no nonsense information for women about some of the problems associated with finding good training and a good starter company. The video called “How to Choose a CDL School” goes in depth to explain and educate women that they must interview starter companies before they choose a CDL School. Uniform standards in truck driver training are a few years from being a reality. There no protections for misleading recruiting tactics. Community college programs and technical schools are ALWAYS the best choice. They are also cheaper and more thorough than private enterprise CDL school programs.
- Slide 10 In the previous slide I talked about choosing a CDL School by researching starter companies first. This may sound like putting the cart before the horse but it is an important part of the two-step process. We want women to understand that if they invest time researching preferable starter companies they will learn that they ARE NOT hirable if they attended the wrong type of CDL School. To avoid this situation, find the place you want to start working FIRST, ask them how many hours they require on the graduation certificate or if they ONLY hire from certain CDL schools. Google all CDL Schools and Truck Driver starter companies using their name followed by the word “complaints”. A great place to read truck driver reviews is “The Truckers Report” in the forum section.
- Slide 11 Washington State Department of Licensing has a list of Approved CDL training schools. This is a good starting point but this list should not be considered a guarantee of quality CDL training. I have flagged 3 public CDL programs on this map. I would consider these schools preferable over the private schools listed on the state website. Local and regional employers are more likely to hire graduates from a community college program CDL program. REMEMBER! A preferable employer considers a qualified CDL student candidate to be one that has been trained well, not fast!
- Slide 12 The good news is that truck drivers are generally paid the same regardless of gender. Overdrive Magazine recently published an analysis that the “median wage in 1980 for truck drivers was $38,000, adjusted for 2015 that would be $111,000 a year”, in reality the median wage today remains around $38,000. You may have heard about a shortage of drivers but experienced truck drivers say it’s more of a pay shortage than a driver shortage. Turnover is consistently 100%. Most student truckers will not make it 6 months. The pay for first year truck drivers is low. After repayment of tuition debt it could be only $18,000 for the year. A 1st year driver without tuition debt can expect to make about $36,000. Long-haul drivers are normally paid “cents per mile” CPM. They are not subject to wage & hour laws. They are only paid when driving not for waiting and there is lots of waiting. Federal regulations limit how many hours a day and per week they can drive. This creates a stressful work environment that can impact health and safety. Long-haul drivers may live on the road for months at a time; this type of driving has been called “Sweatshops on Wheels”. Local jobs are different. Pay is hourly, there is fewer miles driven per day but metro traffic, weather shutdowns and often additional labor is required from the driver to unload freight. Some of the lifting may exceed OSHA guidelines. “Driver helpers” at some local companies are a practical solution but they are not widely used. Lifting agility tests have been reported as discriminatory for women in experienced level jobs. What I mean is the job really does not require that much lifting or the test is different for women to eliminate them. The regulations, the lifestyle, the unpaid labor hours, it’s hard to deal sometimes but some drivers stick with it because they love the work and it gets in your blood.
- Slide 13 Anyone who has decision making ability that allows starter trucking companies to have access to new students must be aware that there has been ongoing sex assaults, harassment and retaliation for reporting the conduct at a handful of starter training carriers that use a “team business” model to move freight. Some of these same carriers also push lease trucks on new truck drivers and saddle them in so much debt they cannot focus on the safe operation of the truck. The majority of the people who are looking to get into truck driving are from low socio-economic conditions and they are easy to exploit. The best way for students to avoid being set-up to fail is to ask the starter company if team driving is a component or phase of their training AND if they have lease trucks available. If they answer YES to either of those questions, that company should be scratched off a prospective starter company list. These are companies that are not focused on safe training during the first critical year for the student.
- Slide 14 Personal Strategies ASK for Help! Reach out to connect with a mentor and keep them informed as you progress through each stage of your first year, be forthright to tell them what is going on and take their advice. Your mentors want to see you succeed; they are trying to help you so you have to trust them. Too often Women do not want let anyone know they are having trouble until it is too late to fix the situation and that could be a career ender. The personality type that is attracted to truck driving is a loner and this makes it difficult to mentor and accept advice from other women. Women do not all have the same experiences when they enter truck driving training. Married women who will be driving as a team with their significant other will have a completely different experience as a single woman. This should not be taken as a message that you need to run out and get a man in order to be a successful. In fact, the opposite is true. You should strive to learn all that you can while you have access to your instructors. It is common for men to offer assistance to women but it is best to politely decline and do the work yourself. This is how you earn respect from your fellow drivers. Students SHOULD NOT take training advice from someone who has not experienced today’s entry-level corporate environment; things are nothing like they were 20, 30 or 40 years ago. Don’t compare apples to oranges. As a woman trucker you are an anomaly, you will encounter people that have little experience communicating in a professional manner and do not realize they are being offensive. Be personally responsible. Steer conversations back to a professional level; do not share personal issues because it can easily be misinterpreted when you are out on the road alone. Don’t confuse a male driver’s interest in your learning as a romantic attention. This can create professional and personal trouble for women and men. The lack of sexual misconduct training and accountability matched with a unique isolated training atmosphere is the reason the early months of truck driver training can go down the wrong path. More female trainers are needed in the industry but there is unprofessional conduct among female trainers also so this is not a solution. An overall mutually respectful work and training environment should be the goal of everyone. Women must be proactive to connect with outside resources to educate themselves on how to manage their new isolated life on the road. Our organization holds weekly conference call s and has created a Facebook community in order to keep in touch with women truckers who are out on the road. This helps us stay connected regularly and bring up specific topics as they arise. For Instance: Winter Driving Tips, How to deal with a difficult dispatcher, personal safety precautions, how to properly report internal incidents to the human resource department, equipment help, locating safe places to park in certain regions, etc.
- Slide 15 Organizational Solutions Be Honest! There are many women that value highway safety and can enjoy a low maintenance life but allow them to plan accordingly by providing a true illustration of what the job responsibilities are. Evaluate your corporate culture with an outside third party and make changes. Too many companies in trucking think they only need to comply with Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) regulations and NOT Occupational Health and Safety (OSHA), Equal Employment Opportunity (EEOC) or Department of Labor (DOL) laws. Outside 3rd party analysis of the corporate culture can help see what is invisible internally. Take action and implement change. Comprehensive sexual harassment and discrimination training is weak or non-existent in many truck driver carriers. Culture change must be reinforced with annual retraining. Consequences must me clear, not empty threats. When there is a complaint it must be taken seriously immediately. Investigate and listen to your employees, especially the new entrants since they are vulnerable and they have a right to safe training. The objective should be to create a healthy work atmosphere that diminishes prejudice, bias and sexual misconduct. Mentorship External and Internal mentorship is important. Women truckers have a unique lifestyle that keeps them isolated from one-another and from other positive role models. External mentors help women during different stages of their truck driving career. Internal mentors help women truckers understand particular company policies and procedures. Innovation: Business models in trucking need modification. The lifestyle impacts driver health. Women make great truck drivers but they also have family responsibilities. Relay teams are personally safer than sleeper teams and keep the freight moving, they can also help get drivers home more often. Driver helpers in local food and equipment delivery minimize workers compensation risks. Advanced training on forklift, pallet jack and lift gate operation for women open more local opportunities. Driver Pay and Work Conditions: These two areas need to be addressed in order to satisfy labor shortage projections. A truck driver should be making at least $1000.00 a week at a minimum for the work they do and many are not. OTR drivers are expected to be away from home often for a minimum of 3 weeks at a time with only 3 or 4 days of home time. This is simply not enough; it should be at least 7 - 10 days off. Retention would improve greatly is those 2 items were addressed. There are some large carriers training students who are doing a really bad job. We must all become more aware of who these mega-student fleets are. These carriers should not have access to state unemployment job hiring funds and websites.
- Slide 16 I want to thank you for your time and let you know I appreciate this opportunity to participate in this webinar. If you or your organization would like more information on any of the topics I have spoken about, please email me at realwomenintrucking@gmail.com