Recruiting Roadblocks and Solutions with Alex Frum
Join us in this episode of Industry Insights as we delve into the complexities of recruiting within the logistics and transportation sector with Alex Frum, owner of Alpha Kilo Logistics. Alex shares his insights on the importance of effective recruiting strategies in the linehaul space, the decision between outsourcing and internal recruitment, and the nuances of managing teams in diverse markets.
He also discusses the role of First Advantage in the background check process and offers valuable advice for both new and experienced contractors. Tune in to gain valuable knowledge on building a resilient recruitment process and maintaining a strong workforce in the fast-paced logistics industry.
About Alex Frum
Alex is the owner of Alpha Kilo Logistics, a Transportation Service Provider (TSP) for FedEx Ground with operations in Memphis, TN, Olive Branch, MS and Independence, KY. In addition to his Linehaul activities, he is a co-founder of the Linehaul Summit & Expo and provides consulting services to potential and existing Linehaul Contractors. Prior to becoming a FedEx contractor, Alex spent 15 years on Wall Street managing a fixed income trading desk and serving as a regional branch manager. Alex is a former Army officer and a graduate of the United States Military Academy. He is happily married to his wife of 18 years and has 4 beautiful kids.
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[00:00:00] Welcome to Industry Insights with Route Consultant, your front row seat to the fast moving world of logistics and beyond. Each week, we bring you game changing insights, real world strategies and fresh perspectives to fuel smarter investments and build stronger businesses. Join us as we sit down with expert guests to explore emerging trends and pressing topics across a wide range of industries.
This is industry insights. Alex, welcome back. It's good to have you. I feel like I've been here a long time. Yeah. I think we just keep you trapped in a box. Pull you out when we need you. Exactly. You know? Um. This is the, uh, this is the line haul box. This is the p and d box. Yeah. You know, you know, I'm, I'm just a puppet, you know?
Yep. With like, you know, wind it up like a jack in the box, pop out. Exactly. But, but it is a pleasure to have you, uh, and, and I think what we've talked about previously, I think the last time we talked about, uh, one, like, you know, some two of your biggest assets, people in trucks, we talked a little bit about, [00:01:00] um, maintaining those vehicles.
Yep. Uh, I think this time let's talk about the other asset, the, the people. Yeah. And so. When it comes to drivers, I think sometimes, uh, you know, I, I've heard linehaul space described as recruiting with the side of logistics. Uh, so I know that it is a huge component of this business. I don't know if there's any logistics in Linehaul.
Yeah. So I, I disagree with that statement. I think the job of a line haul TSP is to recruit and maintain vehicles. Yeah. Recruit drivers and maintain. Yeah. And it goes back to, like we talked about a while back ago, about the four pillars mm-hmm. Or the four columns. So you have safety service, availability, and finance.
Recruiting falls into all three of those buckets. Yeah. Okay. So you want to have safe drivers, you want to be able to provide drivers, and you want drivers who are actually gonna do the job. Yeah. You know? So those all go back into those three metrics. And then financials is, the less recruiting that you're actually having to do, the more profitable you're gonna be.
Um, because it costs money [00:02:00] to recruit drivers. One in paying deed or Craigslist or whoever you're recruiting from. Mm-hmm. Um, but two, just in like, if you don't have a driver sitting in that seat, then that's revenue that you're actually not earning. Yeah. We p and d we talk about, you know, you get a service charge, you get a flat weekly fee every week, and.
Linehaul, that's not the case. No. You get paid if you run, and if you're not running, you're not getting paid. Yeah. Yeah. So, so when it comes to recruiting mm-hmm. What's kind of your, your main method of doing it? Like how do you typically recruit new drivers? Um, so there's really two ways you can do it, right?
Yeah. You can either outsource it. Or you can internalize it. Yep. Um, I've, fortunately for me, or unfortunately for me, I've grown to the point, um, where I have a full-time recruiter who works on my staff. Okay. Um, she's also, uh, and my HR manager, so she handles a lot of other different functionality. Mm-hmm.
I'm not that big where I need a full-time, full-time recruiter, but. I have a, I've internalized it and I no longer need to use a third party vendor. Um, and the reason why, you [00:03:00] know, the, the positive for that is one, I hate recruiting. It's the one part of this business that I, I've recognized that I'm not very good at.
Yeah. And I don't like to do. Why, why do you hate it? I'm just not organ. I mean, I'm really organized, but I'm not organizing that functionality. Yeah. Like when you pop up an ad on Indeed, or Craigslist or ZipRecruiter or whatever, you know, thing you're gonna do, all of a sudden you get pinged with like 25, 50, a hundred emails and text messages or whatever kind of metric you've, you've decided that they're gonna contact or respond to you.
Um, and then your job is to respond back to them. Yeah, you know, and drop what you're doing and respond back to them in a timely matter. Um, more often than not, um, at least deed says this, that if you're able to respond to somebody within five minutes, then that is somebody that's gonna be interested in your job.
And that it's gonna follow up with you. Um, so there are, so it's, I'm just not [00:04:00] that kind of person. Like Yeah. As a line haul manager, I'm too busy general or line haul manager. As a line haul owner, I'm generally too busy or I have other things that I'm focusing on. Mm-hmm. Um, that takes me away. And so what I would find when I was a small contractor with only four or six trucks, like I, I would do all my recruiting.
In the evenings, and I was missing a lot of drivers who would contact, like I, I draft and post my advertisement on whatever source I was using in the morning, but I wouldn't be able to respond into the evening and I was losing all those candidates. Yeah. And I would get frustrated because I would call and text and email and no one would respond back to me.
I mean, in particular if there were guys who are applying for nighttime driving Yeah. If, if they're already. In a nighttime position, they may not be able to take those calls. Yeah. Or, or texts if you're trying to reach out to 'em at night. Yeah. Yeah. So, um, when I was smaller, I used a third party, um, vendor.
Mm-hmm. I used, uh, for a while I used Bright Flag. Mm-hmm. Had a lot of success with Bright Flag. Really enjoyed working with them. Um, [00:05:00] at different times I've used, uh, M three or Higher Impact, you know, they're all. You have to figure out what kind of service you want, if you're gonna use, they all provide different levels of service and require different metrics.
So it up, it's up to you to determine. What kind of support you need from that vendor in your recruiting process. Yeah. Um, now I'm able to do it all internally. I have a, um, a, a very kind woman who's my HR manager. She does a great job. She walks, she posts my advertisements, um, she follows up on Indeed, we, we religiously use Indeed.
Um, and then she processes the drivers all the way through FADV and then begins the onboarding process and continues to work with them. Um, throughout the entire stage. Um, we like Indeed over ZipRecruiter or Craigslist or Facebook or, uh, I don't know if there's any other thing, but Yeah. Um, just because it works for us, it works really well in our markets.
Um, I have a great relationship with Greg over at [00:06:00] Indeed. Mm-hmm. Um, he will give me information and say, Hey, um, there's a lot of. We're seeing a lot of job, a lot of drivers looking for work in Memphis. You know, if you need work, if you need, you know, do it here or hey, um, I know you're struggling to find team drivers in Memphis if you expand.
Your radius. Mm-hmm. And maybe include 150 miles. So guys who are willing to drive three hours to work, you might be able to find more team drivers. And that one thing nice about is understanding who you're trying to hire. Team drivers are willing to drive, okay. Multiple hours to get to work because they're gonna be at work for.
5, 6, 7 days a week. Okay. Yeah. 'cause yeah, you were like, find people three hours away. I was like, there's no chance I'm driving three hours into work. But it makes sense for a team driver that's basically driving in for the week. Yeah. And, and then they'll come back and drive home. Is it something where, do you pay fuel or like what Do you have to do any, do you have to do anything different if somebody's that far away?
No, I mean. I mean, I just have, I mean, a lot of times they live there for choice or, I mean, actually, I used to have a driver who drove five [00:07:00] hours. Wow. You know, he was living in Champaign, Illinois. Yeah. And he worked for me in Memphis, Illinois. He just. You know, whatever reason he's, I don't even know how he found my name or my, my advertisement.
Yeah. Because I, I wasn't, I definitely wasn't advertising 200 miles Yeah. Up there miles away. He found my, you know, he came to work for me for about 18 months and now he keeps pinging me all the time. Like, when are you gonna open up a champagne office? I'm like, I don't know, buddy. You get me some runs.
Yeah, exactly. Is, uh, do, do solo drivers ever drive from that far away? Like you found any No. I mean, the, the, the bigger issue with theirs, I wouldn't want somebody. Well, I take it back, I do have a solo driver who drives that far away. Um, just because, um, he spends the week in the truck. Oh, so, uh, I have, he actually reached out to me, said, Hey, I would love to do this run for you.
Um, can you, do you have any sleepers? And I will live in the sleeper. I was gonna say, it's better not be a day camp that he spends the weekend. No. So he, he lives in a sleeper for the week. Okay. And he drives, uh, he actually, it's a six day run. He does [00:08:00] it from, uh, Sunday. Um, actually I take it back. He does it from Monday morning through Sunday morning, and then he goes home on Sunday, spends the day at wherever he lives.
And actually he lives. Uh, about an hour and a half away and then he comes back on Monday morning and does the run. And it was just something that he reached out to me and asked me if he could do that. Yeah. I said, sure. I mean, your run is one of the runs. I actually have a sleeper run, uh, a sleeper run just because we happen to have, um, times where the other side won't provide freight or won't have a freight and they want us to go through anyways.
Okay. Well, yeah, sometimes it's just, you know, you, you play with the puzzle pieces you've gotten, see who reaches out. Yeah. So I do have that, but in general, um, I don't want my solo drivers driving that long because if you think about it, um, you are required from the FM CSAs, uh, or sorry, FMCs R so federal motor, uh, carrier safety regulations that a driver get 10 hours of rest.
Mm-hmm. After, um, after their duty day is complete. [00:09:00] And so if you think about it, you have a driver that's done a 14 hour duty day of which consists of 11 hours of driving, and then they have to drive for two hours or an hour to drive into work. I mean, they're really only getting at most maybe seven, maybe six hours of sleep.
Yeah. And that's just putting, it's a safety violation. Yeah. In my mind. And it's a risk. Yeah. And like we talk about you don't wanna summer, so I think the longest I have somebody driving in is 45 minutes. Okay. And I don't put it on any of my stretch runs. Got it. And stretch runs are runs that are gonna run right up, right up to that 11 hour driving time.
Yeah. So. You know, we've talked a lot about how you have it now. When you, how do you find most contractors when they start are, are they, are most people using a vendor or are most people trying to do it all on their own? I would recommend, unless you come from the truck driving or the recruiting industry.
Mm-hmm. I would recommend that you start off with a vendor is my piece of advice. Yeah. It's a little bit more expensive, but I think. They will walk you through and they can be a valuable resource and explain to you, okay, what is the [00:10:00] driver market like in St. Louis? Like if you're a brand new contractor going into St.
Louis, or, I mean, even me, like I've been in the business for six plus years. I really know my markets in Cincinnati. Memphis and Olive Branch, but if I was going into champagne mm-hmm. Or going into Savannah, I, there's a very good chance I would use a vendor just because I don't know those markets Well, yeah.
And they do, or they have the resources to do the research to get me the information and so I'll pay for their, I. Uh, you know, even if I don't use the vendor to recruit for me, I'll pay for their analysis of that market. Mm-hmm. To understand. Okay. Do we pay by the mile? Yeah. Do we pay by the hour? Yeah.
What's the going rate? You know, is there a propensity of team drivers? Is there a propensity of solo drivers? If it's team drivers, is it mom and pop drivers or is it husband and wife drivers? Is it daddy, son? Drivers? Um. Uh, or dad's son, drivers. Is it two brothers? Yeah. Um, or is it just two random strangers putting, being put into a team together?
I mean, each market is different, and so [00:11:00] understanding the makeup and the, the, the employee, the potential employee context is really important when you're recruiting. Talk a little bit about recruiting for teams. You, you touched on it. Yeah. You know, you've gotta put two people in a vehicle and they have to get along to some capacity and they have to depend on the other to some capacity.
Yeah. So depending on the market. Yeah. Some teams, um, some locations, it's really challenging to recruit individual drivers and then pair 'em up together. Mm-hmm. And in other areas it's really easy. So like Memphis is a really easy market where I can put two different people together. We just match up their personalities and they get along.
And then. Why is that the case? Why would, why would one market be easier than others? It's just like what they kind of recruit for. Um, I think Memphis happens to have a lot of truck driving schools. Okay. And so you have a lot of the big national carriers will have like a senior driver and a junior driver, or a lead driver and a driver trainee.
So it's just a lot they've gotten used to driving with somebody else too. Um. But like, I mean, I have, so in my teams, [00:12:00] I have two husband and wife teams. Mm-hmm. I have two, I have a a two cousin team. I have a one cousin team. Um. And then I have, my other three teams are just people I've put together. Mm-hmm.
I actually tried to do two best friends and they, they stopped being friends. Yeah. So I actually found it better for me putting, um, I split them up. They still both worked for me and then I matched them up with two people that I thought would better fit for their personality. Yeah. And I actually worked out really well.
Yeah. 'cause it's, you'd think you could just assume, oh, a husband and wife or a brother and sister would work great. But well, think about it like you went to college, right? Yeah. Are you best friends with your roommate? I'm best friends with one of my roommates, but best friends with one of your roommates.
Now, were you best friend. Were there other people in college that you were best friends with that weren't your roommate? Yes. Did you ever want those people that you were best friends with to be your roommates or you're like, you know what, I'm really happy being your best friend, but I don't really wanna be your roommate.
Yeah, exactly. Yeah, and, and even. I had four roommates and so that's why I [00:13:00] said one of my roommates. Yeah. 'cause one of my roommates. Yes. And the other two are, you know. Yeah. So, so what you'll find is that, you know, there's people that you wanna live with mm-hmm. Or wanna share a bunk with or a cab with, and then there's people that you're best friends with.
Yeah. And they're not always the same. Sometimes they are. Yeah. Um, I do like husband and wife teams. Until they get divorced. Yep. And then that's, that's a horrible situation to have to resolve. It's, yeah. Yeah. But you'll find crazy stuff that happens with a team. I mean, I remember. Uh, we always knew where we had this one guy who would always come in off.
So the, the run went from, it was like a 20 hour run. Yeah. So it was, it wasn't enough time for him to go home. Okay. So he would always go hang out in a strip club. And I, I, it God's honest truth, every Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday morning, you know, the run, the run would get back around. Well, not Tuesday.
'cause that was the start of the run. So on Thursday and Saturday mornings, the run would get back around four in the morning. Yeah. And wouldn't dispatch out until about eight. Okay. [00:14:00] So every at 8:00 AM in the morning, we'd always have to call the strip club and kick him out. Now this is before smartphones.
Yeah. And so he had like, just like a, he had like an old flip phone. Yeah. Um, and it, it was the craziest thing. We'd call the strip club up and be like, Hey, is Ray there? Like, yeah, he's in the back. I'm like, Hey, send him out when you're done. Yeah. It's been, oh my gosh. Just every morning for three hours and then get him out on the road again.
I, I mean, it's crazy. Yeah. Yeah. But hey, they're off hours. Yeah. You know, it's just you. You'll see if you are running teams uhhuh, you'll come across some of the craziest stuff you can ever imagine. Like, I ha I, I, it never happened to me, but I heard this great story about this, this couple that got divorced, you know, they were driving on a run and they ended up in Phoenix and they decided that they were, they, they decided that they couldn't work together anymore.
But not only that, but they couldn't live together and they actually went to. A court in Arizona and got divorced on the road and they both went the separate ways and the contractor stranded the truck. The contractor's, like [00:15:00] the truck is stranded outside of courthouse and outside of Phoenix. Now. Not even at the terminal.
Yeah, but at the courthouse. A courthouse, big FedEx logo right up there. Yeah. And like the contractor's trying to figure out Okay, like I think he was a contractor in. Like, you know, Ohio or Pennsylvania, and he's trying to figure out, okay, how do I fly a team out there? Oh my gosh. To go pick up the truck.
You know, not only let, let alone just like recover the load. Yeah. You know, you're already failing on those lows. Yeah. But just bring the truck back to, to Pennsylvania. Yeah. Cash. What a joy. So, um, I mean, there's all sorts of crazy stuff. Yeah. It's always, it's with anytime you're working with people, there's, there's the good and the bad.
So, and another part of the equation that I often hear is the bad is First Advantage. Can you just touch a little bit on what to expect, what that system is? Uh, so first advantage is, uh, the background, um, com, uh, third party vendor that FedEx requires us to utilize. Mm-hmm. There are also. Um, a source that FedEx uses to maintain driver files.
[00:16:00] Mm-hmm. Uh, so FedEx under a, as part of their DOT requirements, their, uh, reporting requirements needs to maintain certain files and track certain things. Um, so it's kind of like that gray area. So your drivers are really your employees. Mm-hmm. But because you operate under DOT, uh, FedEx's, DOT Authority, they have certain reporting requirements that they have to report up to the F-M-C-S-A and the DOT.
And so that's the party. Now, FE first advantage is. It's, it's a fine system for what it is. Mm-hmm. Just understanding the limitations that it has and what the contract terms of what FedEx has agreed. Uh, and what Fed first advantage is agreed to provide FedEx in return. Mm-hmm. Okay. So, um, first Advantage does a employment.
Uh, um, verification. They do a criminal background check. They are the repository for maintaining the, uh, the drug screens. Mm-hmm. Um, they also maintain, uh, they do MVR checks of all the drivers. So motor vehicle record check to ensure that the driver [00:17:00] has a valid driver's license and they have a medical certificate that's tied to that driver's license.
Got it. Um, so the way it works is that. First advantage is not, um, has the ability to accumulate or, or to import the data that you submit to them and then respond to that data. Either publish it or um, tell you that there's an error with it within 24 hours. So if you update something, if you give information to them at 7:00 AM in the morning, then you're not gonna get something at 7:00 AM the next day.
You're gonna get something at, you know, so it's. Once they start working, so they start working from eight to five. Mm-hmm. And they will publish something tomorrow, the next day between eight and 5:00 PM. Eight in the morning at 5:00 PM but it, they have 24 hours to respond to everything and then they have a certain amount of timeline to do, conduct a employment verification.
Um, and then under FedEx, um, requirements, your drivers need to have at least one year of verifiable driving history. Mm-hmm. Um, in the last three years or five [00:18:00] years worth of driving history in the last 10 years, or they can have graduated from a verified truck driving school and worked for a, a, a, um, um, a, uh, truck driving company for six consecutive months.
Okay? Uh, so that makes your, your driver eligible, but it's, it's very specific and you have to have a minimum of 180 days if you're going for this. The truck driving school and the six month verification. Actually, I think it's 182 or 83 days to be exact, or if it's three, if it's one year worth of verification in the three years.
Mm-hmm. Previously it's actually 365 days worth of verification in a, in exactly three years. So if you open the application on say, April. Ninth. Mm-hmm. Today, then that's April 9th, 2022 is where the verifiable history stops. Mm. [00:19:00] So if they only have 364 and the one day that they're missing was on April 8th, it doesn't count.
Mm-hmm. So it's, I mean, they're very, I mean, yeah, it's like working with a government contractor. They're very specific to the contract, but that's also prevent the, provide themselves some indemnification if they have an error. Yeah. But it's those little things that I know cause frustration. Oh my gosh, it gets so frustrating.
I know. The worst is, you know, they don't work on holidays. Yeah. So it's, it's 24 hours or three days worth of business. So like anybody, like, oh, I, I need this driver today. I submitted it, you know, on Friday. It's, it's, you know, today is Wednesday. You should have had your three days. Uh, no, the weekend doesn't count and Monday was a holiday.
Oh. And Monday was a holiday. So we have Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, and then we report to you on Friday whether or not we were able to verify the system. Yeah. Yeah. And then if you have to cure their file, if you have to fix something, they have 24 hours to observe, import, and look at it. And then they have 24 hours to respond.
Mm-hmm. [00:20:00] So it just gets frustrating. Yeah. Um, when you're trying to move quickly. Yeah. Yeah. Well, and so I know that that's. Another potential headache. Yeah. So, you know, there's two sides to this. So maybe you're trying to bring a driver in quickly and it's not going quickly enough. Or you've told somebody you're gonna bring 'em in and it's taking too long and you know, they decide to go somewhere else.
But I think there's also the challenge. What do you do? You know you're recruiting all the time. Mm. Are you recruiting even if you don't have a current opening for that driver? And how do you handle those situations? So, um, I don't always have driver, uh, ads out. Mm-hmm. I am always recruiting by word of mouth.
Mm-hmm. Though, um, I find that the best drivers and they best employees I get are if I can encourage. My employees to refer drivers to us. Yeah. So, um, I don't do driver bonuses. Okay. I found that, uh, hiring bonuses, all it does is encourage job switching. Mm. Um, what I do do is do [00:21:00] I, I do do referral bonuses, um, and I find that those are very effective.
Yeah. Um, so I, I do referral bonuses and um, a lot of times once I find, if I get a driver who works for me for a minimum of 90 days and they get into my benefits, then they're usually gonna stay with me for over a year. Um, so that's one thing. Um, the other thing I, I don't do is I don't recruit within the fence.
Hmm. I don't ever try to go over to, you know, to Josh's line haul business and try to recruit Josh's drivers. Yeah. I believe very strongly against that. Now, will drivers come to work for me from other contractors? Yes, but I require everybody who comes to work for me from to give two weeks notice. And on top of that, a lot of times I will call mm-hmm.
That driver 'cause I know or that contractor. 'cause I mow most of the contractors in the hubs I work in and say, Hey. I just wanna make sure you're aware Josh Gregory is looking to come work for Alpha Kilo. Yeah. You okay with this? You know, is anything going on? You know, anything I should be aware of? Yeah.
Um, or, [00:22:00] hey, just giving you a heads up, he reached out to me. He says he's giving you two weeks notice. Has he given you the two weeks notice? Yeah. Um, I don't mind drivers who leave with, leave me if they give me a two weeks notice. I have real issues if drivers leave and they don't give me a two weeks notice.
Yeah. I think that's unprofessional. Um, and it really hamstrings your business. Yep. Yeah. 'cause you have to immediately try to fill 'em. Yeah. And you can't. Yeah, you can't. It takes a minimum. I would say the fastest I've ever onboarded a driver was seven business days. Mm-hmm. So if you think about it, it's realistically it's two weeks.
Yeah. With first advantage. Right. So have you ever recruited somebody on before the, there was actually a, a run to put them on though. Um, yeah. I mean, during peak Yeah. Or as I'm prepping for peak, I will hire Dr. I mean, I will start to, uh, to bulk up. Mm-hmm. Um, a lot of times it's, I know that PE uh, FedEx is like, Hey, we're gonna have you start these temp runs on November 3rd.
It's October 25th. I've started hiring drivers and bringing 'em on or onboarding them [00:23:00] on my turn to FedEx and say, at this point, Hey, I know you. I'm not doing this temperament until November 3rd. I have extra spare capacity if you need it. A lot of times FedEx will be like, oh, that's great. We could do, you could do this, this, this, or that.
Okay. Um, sometimes I'm, I'm unhappy with a team or with a driver, and if I can hire somebody better and replace them, you know, I'll replace them. Yeah. Um, I mean, that happens. I mean, you'll be in a situation where, I mean like you're always trying to get. You, no matter what you do, no matter how success successful you are, you're always trying to replace the bottom 10%.
Yeah. You know, either from a safety standpoint, availability standpoint, or just, you know, whatever standpoint. Mm-hmm. Like I have a driver right now who still seems to think that he's employed. He's employed by me even though he's not showing up to work for two weeks. Yeah. You know, now I, you know, I.
Terminated him a [00:24:00] while back ago. He's didn't show up for, he gave me no notice and didn't show up to work for me for two weeks. He just sent me a text message saying, Hey, I'm, I'm, I'm going into surgery tomorrow. Like, that's great. Yeah. Thanks for the telling me. Yeah. You know, you, maybe you should tell your current boss.
Yeah. You, you know, showed for two straight weeks. We tried calling you and checking in on you for two straight weeks. You said nothing and then all of a sudden in week three on Monday, you're like, Hey, just letting you know I'm not gonna be in the rest of the week. And I'm sorry, like Yeah. Two weeks ago, you, yeah.
So I, I if I'm hearing you right though, your, your general strategy is you always keep the door open for good talent. Yeah. You always keep the, from, from word of mouth, from the right people to come in. Mm-hmm. And you find a place for them if that happens. But your job ads you tend to use strategically when you're hoping to fill or replace certain roles.
Yeah. I definitely will not keep a sign open for solo drivers. Yeah. Uh, for teams. You know, it's, it's kind of like taking the pulse of your teams and are you happy with your teams? Mm-hmm. Or you're not happy with your teams. So [00:25:00] sometimes I'll just keep an ad opening because I'm, I have teams coming through.
I'm not, you know, I'm not confident that they're gonna work out. Yeah. And I, I'm unhappy with how they're working, you know, and I, I just need to find somebody, something better. Yeah. Um. Your unassigned teams generally are don't last super long, they just get burnt out by being unassigned or, you know, it's, it's, it's, it's all a nuance.
Some teams love being unassigned, some teams don't. Mm-hmm. You know, I have a team that goes back from forth all the time, like, I'm really getting tired of this 5,000 mile run. Can we go be unassigned? Um, okay, sure. Yeah, I'll move that. You know what? I don't really like being unassigned. Can we go back to being dedicated again?
I mean, this team has been with me for four straight years. Yeah. They've gone, they've done every single one of my runs at least for six months. That's funny. But if they're, I mean, there's, they're good drivers and Yeah. They're two cousins that, yeah. You know, I don't have any accident issues with them. Um.
They don't always answer the phones when I want [00:26:00] them to answer the phones, but they're fine otherwise. Yeah, I mean, they show up to work, they run, they run hard, you know. Um, sometimes they'll be like asleep in the middle of the yard. I'll be like, call dispatch up and say, Hey, can you go knock on the door?
It's sitting right outside the dispatch window. What do you mean? Like, yes, I'll go, you know? Yeah. Can you just do me a favor? Walk out and knock on the door. Okay, fine. Walk on the door. And then they, they check in and get dispatched out, you know. Oh, wow. The, the, the quirks of every team, right? Yeah. But, well, so at this point in time, you know, you've got internal hires, uh, you know, recruiters.
What would you say is your biggest recruiting challenge today? Um, you know, I don't, it's, it's just the consistency. Mm-hmm. Um, I think that you, there's nuances like the, the one consist one issue a while back ago. It's not an issue anymore because I've transitioned my fleet, but trying to find drivers who could drive 10, 10 speeds mm-hmm.
When I had, when I hadn't upgraded [00:27:00] my fleet to all automatics yet. Mm-hmm. Um, it was challenging trying to find 10 speed drivers. Yeah. Um, and then you, you know, then I had too many 10 speed drivers and all they complained about being switched to automatics and now all my 10 speed drivers don't ever wanna drive in a 10 speed anymore.
Yeah. 'cause they enjoy driving automatics. Yeah. So it's like little nuances. Um, I think the biggest thing is just, you know, if you're honest with your drivers and take care of them, you're gonna have low turnover. Mm-hmm. But you're gonna get turnover and just be prepared for it. Yeah. Um, you know, don't complain about it.
It's just part of the business, I mean. No matter where you are, even here are route consultants. I'm sure that you guys have turnover. Yeah, I think it does. You know somebody wants something, you know, the grass always looks greener. Mm-hmm. You know, as long as you set the standard and you abide by your own standard.
Then you can have expectations of them meeting your standard. And then I think at the end of the day, that sets the, the type of culture that you want within your company. Yeah. So if you require your drivers to give you two weeks notice or like, I just had a situation where I had [00:28:00] to let go of a driver.
Um, they, they came on board with me for peak. I told 'em it was gonna be a temporary business. Um, they actually ran longer because I kept, uh, the temp run after peak. Mm-hmm. Up until last week. I said, Hey. I'm giving you, I just got notification from FedEx. Your run is going away this week, but I'm gonna keep you on for two weeks.
You know, I feel like. Yeah, I mean, I'm trying to give you a notification so you can go out and find yourself work. And he was really appreciated. He is like, I've never had that happen to me before. No one's ever told me that. You know? Yeah. You're letting me go, but you're gonna keep me around for two weeks until that happens.
Yeah. Now have I fired drivers for cause? Yes. Yeah, you will. No, don't be afraid of firing a driver for cause. It's so much more dangerous. If you keep a bad driver on Yep. You know, whether it's a safety violation, whether it's a contractual issue, whether it's negligence or whatever, you don't want to have somebody that's going to bring a negative spotlight on your company.
Yeah. Okay. And something we always say is [00:29:00] frequency, breed severity. So even if it's small mistakes that they're making. That shows that there is a, a pattern there, and ultimately one of those small mistakes are gonna be larger. Yeah. I mean, I, I had a driver who, um, we caught using racist language on our better camera.
Yeah. So we let him go. Immediately when he returned, we said, you know, you violated company policy. You no longer employee. And he, he was all upset about it, went to go work for another contractor. Lo and behold, he dropped, you know, some racist language in dispatch and that contractor almost lost his contract over it.
Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Yeah. So recruiting is obviously, it has its pros and cons. I think it's probably, I mean, there are some people who really enjoy it. Yeah. It's not my favorite part of the business, but it's, it's not your favorite, but it's, it's not like that's hindered your success. No. Yeah. No. I mean, it's not, I have 47 employees.
Um, I want to grow to 50. Yeah. I want to grow to a hundred. I mean, I would love to grow to. You know, [00:30:00] I wanna be the next, you know, I wanna be 500 employees someday. Yeah, yeah. You know, I, I want to grow, I want to get bigger. I want to build a company that lasts and has a culture that sets the standard.
Mm-hmm. Um, so yeah, recruiting is a necessary part of that. And it's learning what, I mean, I think in the, in the grand scheme of thing of being a TSP is learning, what are you good at? Mm-hmm. And then outsourcing or hiring to, to strengthen what you're bad at. Yep. So if you're not good at finance. You know, hire a financial professional to work for.
You either outsource it, there's plenty of vendors who can do accounting or bookkeeping, or have somebody come inside into your company and do accounting and bookkeeping. Yep. If you're not good at maintenance, hire a maintenance manager. If you're not good at recruiting, hire a recruiting manager. Um, whatever you're not good at.
I mean, if you're not good at everything, then we have a different story and we should, we should, you know. You know, maybe you should, you know, there's maybe something else we should talk about. Yeah, yeah. But you're, you're gonna be good at something. Yeah. Whether it's organization, people skills. [00:31:00] Financial planning structure, strategic, you know, orientation, there's gonna be something that you're good at.
Focus on that area, and then focus on your business and growing your business and outsource the things that you either don't enjoy. Mm-hmm. Or you're not good at. Like I remember I tried to convince my wife to be my recruiting mentor. My wife is deathly afraid of calling random people. Oh, that's the same as my wife.
Yeah. That's so funny. So I was like, okay, this is probably not a good idea. Yeah. You know, she is a great. Bookkeeper, you know, she does an amazing job as payroll. So she is my CFO. Mm-hmm. She is really savvy. She worked as a CPA for a number of years. Um, she understands, you know, accounting and bookkeeping and payroll.
She's really good at Excel, you know, so she quit work, you know, when she came into the company and she's rehashed everything and mm-hmm. She's a real asset. She's not a recruiter. And I'm not a recruiter. Even though I love to talk and I can go on forever, I'm just, you know, I just get, I'm just, I'm not organized or not Yeah.
You know, I'm [00:32:00] not focused on it. So I hired a great employee who's does a, a wonderful job for me. Yeah. And we talk about it all the time. Your time's too valuable. Yeah. To spend it on something that either you're not efficient at or it's, you know, a drain on all of your energy for the day to be able to handle it.
Yeah, I mean, I tell a lot of contractors to think about it this way. Look at your time. Mm-hmm. Okay. Your time is at a minimum worth $250 an hour. Yeah. Okay. At a minimum, you should value your time at $250 an hour. Okay. So if you can hire. Someone to do whatever you are doing and you can do it for cheaper than $250 an hour, which allows you to work on your business and not in your business, then you're coming out ahead.
Yeah. And I think that's a great way to think about it from a financial perspective. Yeah. So thank you Alex, for, for kinda running through everything. When it comes to recruiting, we know that, you know, this is a business where recruiting is always gonna be essential Yes. To be successful. I mean, and, and part of it is, I mean, I.
Yeah. One of the things that all [00:33:00] contractors have to do is get comfortable. I mean, you don't have to become an expert Yep. With FADV or First Advantage, but you need to become comfortable with the process and understand where are the, the choke points. Mm-hmm. And then manage around the choke points. Yep.
So, you know, and develop a process. Um, I know that we. We didn't really get into this, but like I have a set process. We send out different emails and we communicate at different points with our driver, uh, driver candidates mm-hmm. As they progress through the process. So we're not losing track of them and they're not thinking that we care about them and so that they know that we're trying to get them Yeah.
To matriculate. From a driver candidate into an alpha kilo employee. Yeah. You just gotta make sure you are doing everything to keep them engaged. Exactly. You don't lose 'em in the process. Yeah. Perfect. Awesome. Alright, well Alex, thank you so much for walking us through recruiting. It was my pleasure
