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Recently the Director of Operations for Cord Moving and Storage headquartered in Saint Louis Mo with branches in Belleville, IL, Dixon MO and Memphis, TN sat down and outlined a very strategic plan on driver recruitment. Mike Scalera a veteran and well respected leader in the moving and storage business shared these key facts:

“There are as many as 200,000 job openings nationwide for long haul truckers, both in the household and freight industry”. “The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics also sees the demand for truckers increasing, up from the 1.5 million drivers on the road now. It expects trucking to add 330,100 jobs between 2013 and 2020 an increase of 20%. “That’s why more than ever, it is essential to have a driver recruiting plan in place. Before you can implement a plan you must establish what your budget is.”

Here are some key factors that Cord Moving would like to share with the industry and those that rely on the trucking industry to look at when determining your driver recruiting budget and formulating your game plan. For those companies that are looking for a transportation firm they should require to see the driver-fleet growth plans before committing to a Transportation Agreement which is directly tied to service levels or the lack thereof.

Driver Turnover– Companies must look internally and define what exactly driver turnover means in their organization.  Who is responsible for monitoring, tracking, and reporting turnover? Companies must define their goals for turnover and what their growth plans for their fleet are for the upcoming year.  The recruiting department usually the operations department must hire enough drivers to meet the company’s growth plan in addition to enough drivers to keep up with their turnover.

Truck Count– Companies must determine how many trucks are in their fleet and how many are available to be assigned to drivers. They must also take into account any trucks that are out of services and what their growth or downsizing plans are for the year.  This will tell you how many drivers the company must plan to hire in addition to the turnover replacement drivers.

Cost Per Hire- Companies must look at their previous years recruiting efforts and determine how much was spent to hire drivers. Determine what costs were directly related to driver hiring and what costs are charged to the recruiting department.

Advertising- For most companies, advertising will be the biggest portion of their recruitment budget. To attract the best drivers, drivers need to know who you are and how to reach you. Most importantly, they need to know why your company is better to work for than your competitors and then the referrals through the word of mouth will assist your efforts.