One of the things that we've worked at over the past four years and it's helped to build the culture within the organization, is we have an open door policy. And we want the drivers...we encourage the drivers to walk in because we should have nothing to hide. One of the big problems in the industry is - drivers always think the company is lying to them for the company's benefit. In order to allay those fears you have to welcome the driver in. You have to listen to him. And some of the things that I tell the drivers, they won't like. Some of the things a driver tells me, I won't like. But if you don't have that conversation, you can't come to a common understanding. So again, its how do we continually promote that culture of not, whose to blame? But how do you fix the problem?

A very small percentage. People that can't adapt to supplying customer service to the drivers and if they're obnoxious or short, or that type of scenario, this isn't the environment for them. We have zero tolerance when it comes to that type of a scenario. Keep in mind, we're not going to let a driver come in and actually react unprofessionally on a technician and let that go unnoticed. And conversely, we're not going to allow techs to snap on the drivers. And not just technicians. That's office staff, that's directors' positions, that's parts people. That's everybody, period.

What we did was a bit of a re-education process. So we taught the Operations Manager to experience what a driver experienced and then we took all of that information back and we started training the payroll people; we started training the claims people; we started training the safety people. It's - how do you approach an individual that wants them to come back to work for you? That wants to keep you here in the building. So if they get their pay on time, if they have a claim and they're handled properly by the claims people and they're handled properly by the driver manager, then all of a sudden they have a sense of belonging and that starts to permeate throughout the organization because everybody has to understand that it's the driver that makes our paycheque. It's about letting them know that they are important and they are. Every one of our drivers is important, equally as important. The only thing that separates us is our job description, that's it.

It has to permeate the entire company. In order for him to do his job, or her job, the mechanic has to make sure the truck is in proper working order. The sales rep out in the field has to sell freight so he can pick it up. Recruiting had to attract them. The dispatcher had to give him the information. Payroll had to get him paid on time. All of the things internally, the in-house functions, are supporting that activity. Therefore we are working for the driver. Now that doesn't mean that we report to him or that he calls and says do this or do that. What it means is that everybody's activity is designed to support him and that we're working in his best interest.

To explain the concept that We Work for Our Drivers, it's important that first you understand that it's our drivers that are doing the work we get paid for. If the driver isn't able to successfully do his job, none of us collect a pay check either, so it all starts with him. By saying that, internally everyone in the organization is supporting the activity of that driver. It all starts with the driver picking up the load. It finishes when the driver delivers that load and goes to pick up the next load. And once everybody in the organization started feeling that instead of using the driver as just a pawn to get to that profit line, they started understanding.