AvatarFleet's Transportation Blog

How a Standardized Hiring Process Improves Candidate Selection

Go slow to go fast. NASCAR pit crews don’t rush to go fast. They go fast because everyone knows exactly what to do and when. Every second is standardi...

What’s the Best Place to Advertise for Bus Drivers?

Bus companies are typically sophisticated marketers. You have to be constantly booking new business, so you’ve nailed marketing strategy and tactics. ...

The Biggest Problems with Using Generic HR Software for Motor Carriers

We respect motor carriers who make the effort to muscle through making a generic HR system the system onboard drivers and manage Driver Qualification ...

5 Ways Recruiters Can Use AI and Automation to Hire More Drivers

It’s no secret that recruiters at transportation companies wear many hats.

How Safety Directors Should Use AI & Automation To Prioritize People

By now you’ve seen the sparkles.

3 Mistakes When Picking DOT Compliance Companies

Should you manage Driver Qualification Compliance or outsource it? The answer to that question is what will you do with that time and does it bring th...

Anchor Transportation Saves Time & Hassle with A-Suite Recruit

Anchor Transportation is a family-owned, 100-unit motorcoach company serving Tennessee and Northern Alabama. The 35-year-old firm has been using A-Sui...

What's The Best Fleet Maintenance Software?

Adding technology is one of the first things motor vehicle carriers can do to improve as they ascend from a good company to a great company. Technolog...

What is Continuous Driver Monitoring?

Other than maybe an office party on your last day before retirement, you don’t want any surprises as a motor carrier Safety Director.

The Core 4 Metrics Safety Directors Should Be Looking At Each Week

You know the old saying: “You can’t manage what you don’t measure?”

Top 5 Reasons AvatarFleet Won't Work for You (And What To Do About It)

Everyone knows time is money, and nobody in the transportation industry likes to waste either one.

The Top Problems New AvatarFleet Customers Face (And How to Avoid Them)

Congratulations! You’ve taken the first two steps toward becoming much more effective in your job as a Safety Director.

3 Things Safety Directors Should Know About AvatarFleet

As a Safety Director, you spend a lot of your day as the Chief Firefighter. You have to grow the fleet, reduce accidents and remain DOT compliant, amo...

LJ Rogers Increases Hires 112% With AvatarFleet's Driver Marketing Agency

Challenge Faced LJ Rogers was grappling with inefficient spending on job sourcing with minimal return on investment, specifically from Tenstreet's Job...

George Hildebrandt Decreases Cost Per Hire by 83% with AvatarFleet's Driver Marketing Agency

Challenge Faced Before partnering with AvatarFleet, George Hildebrandt Inc. faced significant challenges in their driver recruitment efforts. The comp...

ATCO Doubles Hires While Reducing Accidents/Million Miles to Zero

Challenge Faced ATCO Hauling, a woman-owned, tractor-trailer, and dump truck company, found itself submerged under the weight of paperwork and manual ...

Puryear Grows Fleet 122% While Reducing Accidents/Million Miles by 32%

Challenge Faced Puryear Tank Lines, a third-generation, family-operated logistics firm, faced significant organizational and operational challenges wi...

How Brisk Clients Use LLLC to Reduce Risk and Prevent Incidents

Brisk Management Services was formed in 2013 to provide risk financing and risk management solutions to mid-cap trucking companies. Their flagship cap...

ATC Driveaway Doubles Hires, Improves Speed-to-Hire With A-Suite

ATC Driveaway Transportation Services offers commercial truck manufacturers, work truck builders, and fleet management companies reliable, on-time, pr...

Simplifying Compliance with New York's Article 19-A Forms

For the passenger motor carriers who run in the state of New York, Article 19-A is a pain to manage. There is a lot of redundancy to the FMCSA Driver ...

What Are FMCSRs?

The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Regulations (FMCSRs) are a set of rules and guidelines established by the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration...

How JMS Transport Redefined Its Recruiting & Compliance Department with AvatarFleet's Software and Services

JMS Transportation's partnership with AvatarFleet has boosted recruiting, compliance, and operational efficiency. JMS overcame the small business hurd...

GO Riteway Passes DOT Audit With Ease Using A-Suite Comply

AvatarFleet's A-Suite Comply proved to be a game-changer for GO Riteway during a recent Department of Transportation (DOT) audit. Despite receiving sh...

Unlocking Efficiency: How to Find the Perfect Candidates Every Time

Do you find yourself saying “I don’t need more candidates, I need more of the right candidates”? We encounter many driver recruiters feeling frustrate...

How Much Does Driver Recruiting Software Cost?

Summary: The cost of driver recruiting software can range between $129-$6,000 per month, or $1,548-$72,000 annually, based on your fleet size. This do...

Spend Less Money on Job Boards with AvatarFleet's Driver Influencer Program

Would you rather give your recruiting money to Job Boards or your drivers?

How Much Does Driver Compliance Software Cost?

Summary: The cost of driver compliance software can range between $150-$1,200 per month, or $1,800-$14,000 annually. This does not include the cost of...

The 11-Step Guide for Switching to A-Suite Comply

Transitioning your DQ Files from paper or a local drive to software may seem like a daunting leap. It’s a common feeling if you're not tech-savvy or h...

Introducing AvatarFleet's New Candidate Landing Page

You want the best drivers lining up to work for you. And, you want to spend less time sorting through leads so you can build your fleet of all-stars.

Make Every Week Driver Appreciation Week

When was the last time you showed your drivers how valuable they are to your company? Are you waiting for driver appreciation week?

Truck Driver Appreciation Week: Be Thoughtful and Practical

Truck Driver Appreciation Week is almost upon us, so if you aren’t yet prepared, it is time to figure out how to show your thanks to your drivers and ...

Honoring The Heroes Who Serve Behind The Wheel & On The Battlefield with Ron Patterson of Puryear Tank Lines

Whether it's on the highways or in the military, heroes are among us, selflessly dedicating their lives to serving our country. Among these heroes is ...

Ideas to Improve Truck Driver Onboarding

The first week after you hire a new truck driver is make or break. It can be the difference between drivers sticking with you for years to come or lea...

How To Create Compelling Driver Recruiting Ads

Editors Note: We're giving away our driver recruiting secrets! Check out our free video series to double your hires without spending more on ads: [Vid...

7 Great Ideas for Truck Driver Appreciation Week

Next week is National Truck Driver Appreciation Week, so hopefully, you’ve been thinking of ways to show your gratitude to the hardworking people who ...

Creating a Career Path for CDL Truck Drivers

Do you have enough quality drivers in your fleet? That’s a rhetorical question because we know the answer is no. What if you could reduce accidents, l...

3 Takeaways from the SambaSafety + AvatarFleet Webinar You Should Know About

Trucking companies face massive risk from aggressive plaintiff attorneys and nuclear verdicts. The FMCSA isn’t the main boogie-man anymore. It’s lawye...

AvatarFleet Welcomes Three New Team Members

Cleveland, OH - AvatarFleet, the software provider that helps transportation companies fill empty seats, pass every audit, and bring 'em home safely, ...

Speed Up Your Application Process With EZApp

Did you know 60% of job seekers quit in the middle of filling out online job applications because of their length or complexity?

What Google's Change in Privacy Policy Means for Driver Recruiters

Digital advertising is an integral part of your driver recruitment strategy. Any changes in online privacy laws can affect your ability to reach and t...

2021 First Quarter Features Recap

Opting In/Out of Mass Emails and Texts Your leads, candidates, and team members have the option to opt out of mass communications emails and text mess...

Preventing a Nuclear Verdict: Interviews With Our Expert Panelists

Watch AvatarFleet President Scott Rea interview some of our panelists about the upcoming webinars.

2020 Fourth Quarter Features Recap

A-Suite Term Changes We have adjusted some of the terms used within A-Suite.

Introducing LLLC Remote

Online defensive driving training used to be watching a video to check the box. The goal was to prove in court that you tried. We always thought it wa...

Why Time to Respond Is so Critical in Driver Lead Generation

Managing Your Online Reputation with Author Joel Mandelbaum

The most recent episode of our podcast “Solving the Driver Problem” features Joel Mandelbaum, author of the best-selling book Winning Online: Increase...

Advice for Managing DOT Compliance with Irwin Shires

The most recent episode of our podcast “Solving the Driver Problem” features Irwin Shires, a longtime driver and safety expert, who works as Vice-Pres...

Advice From Ohio's Top Drivers at the 2019 OTA Driver of the Year Awards

A-Suite Ad Has Arrived

Is your cost-per-hire skyrocketing while the quality of your driver candidates plummets? If so, we have a solution for you: A-Suite Ad, the newest mod...

Virtual Driver Orientation with the A-Suite's Newest Integrations

Welcome to the new age of driver training, onboarding, and orientation.

Navigating FMCSA Regulations featuring Clay Merches

In episode 5 of Solving the Driver Problem, Scott talks safety and compliance with safety guru Clay Merches. Clay is the president of Leading Edge Con...

FMCSA Remote Audits Increase

FMCSA is going digital. That’s right, your government is joining the 21st century. As a means of continuing their usual responsibilities of maintainin...

How to Manage Recruiting, Compliance, and Training in the COVID-19 World

Motorcoach Rolling Rally Gets Congress' Attention

A logistical marvel during a time of crisis, motorcoach operators across America gathered in Washington D.C. on May 13th to stage a “rolling rally” ou...

The Origins of the Driver Problem featuring Mark Gardner of AvatarFleet

Scott sits down for a chat with AvatarFleet CEO Mark Gardner to talk about his experiences and knowledge that he's gained over a 30 year career in the...

Driver Retention Re-Invention

Why Does Driver Retention Matter? Before COVID-19, unemployment rates were at record lows - drivers had the leverage in the supply and demand equation...

How COVID 19 is Affecting Truck Drivers And What You Can Do

During COVID-19, we’re all counting on drivers to keep the stores stocked with the essentials. Consumers rely on them, the economy relies on them, and...

How to Take Advantage of COVID-19 in Transportation

How are you running your business when the world is full of uncertainty? The Marines would call this a

Fighting Human Trafficking in Trucking with Laura Cyrus

Professional drivers are a cornerstone of our daily lives. Some make sure that there’s food and medicine at the store. Some make sure there’s fuel at ...

Leadership in Transportation During Times of Crisis featuring Kim Richardson of KRTS

In our first edition of the Solving The Driver Problem podcast, host Scott Rea talks with KRTS's Kim Richardson on the subject Leadership In Transport...

1st Quarter 2020 A-Suite Features Wrap-Up

Our team is always working hard to make A-Suite the best it can be for our customers with fixes, updates, and new features. In this article, we recap ...

FMCSA Grants Limited Exemptions for Expired CDLs, Medical Card

6 Resources To Follow to Better Yourself as a Driver Recruiter

Keeping pace with the ever-changing landscape of recruiting can be a daunting task for any transportation specialist. As new technology emerges and dr...

Can I Keep My DQ Files at Different Terminal Locations?

If you have more than one terminal, can you keep your Driver Qualification Files at multiple physical locations? It may seem like a simple question, b...

How to Project a Forecast for your Driver Recruiting Funnel

Driver recruiting is a non-stop process that requires time and resources to find the right people. It makes the most sense, then, to try and do it eff...

Recruiting and Retention Tips From The Best

Chad Hendricks hosted "the Dr. Phil of Trucking" on his “Recruit and Retain” podcast, who had five great points worth sharing with our readers. Charle...

A-Suite Can Help Solve Drug & Alcohol Clearinghouse Headaches

A Summary of The Drug and Alcohol Clearinghouse The Drug and Alcohol Clearinghouse is waiting for you on January 6, 2020 so we’ve created a summary to...

Better Dispatchers Lead to Better Retention

Your dispatchers could be causing you turnover. Of course, they don’t mean to, but we hear it from drivers time and time again. Drivers often quit bas...

Top 5 Driver Recruiting Trends You Should Follow in 2020

2020 is right around the corner. The driver recruiting game is getting more sophisticated and you need tools to keep up. To start January with a bang ...

5 Things to Know about The Drug & Alcohol Clearinghouse

There have been rumblings about the Department of Transportation’s (DOT) new Drug and Alcohol Clearinghouse for years, and it appears that it is final...

CDL Finishing School Achieves Prestigious PTDI Certification

MACEDONIA, OH - AvatarFleet, LLC is excited to announce its strategic partnership with the Professional Truck Driver Institute (PTDI). AvatarFleet is ...

Driver Shortage Tops ATRI, It Should Not Be an Issue for You

Why Your Downloadable PDF Application Isn't Cutting It

We hope you don’t take offense to the article title. We aren’t here to rag on you. In fact, just the opposite, we’d like to congratulate you on a soli...

Building A Safety Culture Builds Safe Drivers | AvatarFleet

This blog post was updated on March 31, 2021.

Why Downloading PDFs Is No Good

Last year, 90 percent of CDL holders applied for a job using a mobile device. The future is here! Unfortunately, this means that these applicants are ...

Rethinking Your Recruiting Budget

Now more than ever, you need an efficient way to recruit more drivers. If your turnover rate is near the national average, still well over 70% for car...

Retention Re-Invention: Solve Your Drivers' Problems

The OTA Annual Conference took place in Cleveland, OH September 16th and 17th. Held by the Ohio Trucking Association and the Ohio Association of Mover...

AvatarFleet Hosts LLLC Certification with OTA on October 15

Retention Re-Invention 2: Building a Driver-Centric Culture

On September 16th and 17th, leaders in the transportation industry will gather in Cleveland, OH for The OTA Annual Conference. Held by the Ohio Trucki...

Why Rehires Are Your Best Lead Source

This blog post was updated on March 26, 2021.

Telematics - Where To Look For ROI

How to Improve Driver Retention with Mentorship Systems

Think back to the first job you ever had. Picture yourself walking through the door on your very first day. You may have been excited, but you were al...

How to Plan and Execute Your Driver Recruiting Process

Recruiting professional drivers is no easy job. A recruiter often has to do the job of four or five people, spending their day contacting drivers by p...

Time to Switch to Electronic Verification

In order to hire new drivers, all transportation companies have to run Previous Employment Verifications (PEV) under DOT regulations. The PEV has hist...

Why You Should Use Social Media to Recruit Drivers

The driver problem requires some new thinking. If you’ve been following along with us for some time, we’ve shared numerous strategies that can help yo...

How to Train Your Drivers to Avoid Distractions

Distracted driving is, simply put, risky. By definition, risk is the possibility of suffering harm or loss. You risk a lot when you drive distracted. ...

Retain More Drivers: Treat Them Like People

Do you know the top 5 reasons drivers quit a company? Some are obvious, like inadequate pay or not enough hometime. Others however, you might not expe...

Why You Should Move On From Paper DQF Files

Driver Qualification Files are a necessary part of life for transportation companies. The consequences of expired or missing paperwork can result in a...

3 Reasons Why You Need an ATS to Recruit Professional Drivers

Introducing The New A-Suite Recruit Applications List

We're excited to announce the latest version of A-Suite Recruit's Application List for users today! The new Application List offers more clarity, orga...

How to Optimize New Driver Orientation

How frustrating is it when you have orientation no-shows? You’ve spent time, money, and resources working with someone and then, last minute, they dit...

Scott Woodrome Brings Home a TDC Threepeat

Scott Woodrome of FedEx freight continued his dominant run at the Ohio Trucking Association Truck Driving Championships, winning the Grand Champion ea...

Build Your Recruiting Funnel By Understanding These Key Terms

Recruiting is an everyday job. It can be a lot to track, email, and call drivers day to day. So it might be helpful to be able to step back and look a...

How Efficient is Your Lead-to-Hire Process?

Hire More Drivers with a Faster Onboarding Process One of your biggest challenges in hiring quality drivers is that your competitors are vying for the...

Grand Champion, Ralph Hamilton, Headed Back to Nationals

Ralph Hamilton won the South Carolina Truck Driving Championships on May 5 in Columbia, South Carolina. The Grand Champion will be headed to Pittsburg...

Recap of TransRep National Recruiting & Retention Symposium

On April 27, 2019, TransRep hosted the first annual National Recruiting and Retention Symposium in Mississauga, Ontario, featuring various industry an...

Creative Solutions to Driver Compensation Problems

If your driver retention numbers are as bad as the industry average, you can change that! It should be no surprise that pay is one of the most common ...

Use Texting to Hire More Drivers and Achieve DOT Compliance

In 2006, we lived in a world without smartphones. In 2017, it was found that American’s check their phones an average of 80 times a day. The average A...

CDL Finishing School Is a Necessity

The average age of an over the road truck driver is 55 years old. Swapping 55-year-olds from company to company in an endless shell game will get you ...

How to Hire Your Next All-Star Driver: Lessons From OTA

The Ohio Trucking Association (OTA) recently celebrated the 2019 Driver of the Year Award. Twelve professional truck drivers were recognized for their...

AvatarFleet Releases Background Screening Integration

AvatarFleet's driver recruiting and compliance management software, The A-Suite, has integrated with Accurate Background, a leading provider of automa...

3 Ways To Improve the Driver Candidate Experience

Improving the candidate experience for potential drivers is an important on-boarding aspect that often gets overlooked. Use these tips to enhance the ...

3 Easy Ways to Improve Driver Retention

Between advertising, recruiting, on-boarding, and training, it costs you thousands of dollars to hire just one driver. So it hurts all the more to see...

Could Technology Bring In More Truck Drivers?

How To Target the Right Drivers

If you’re like most transportation companies in North America, you have more customer demand than you have a supply of drivers. Simply put: you turn d...

Creating a Driver Career Path & Improving On-Boarding Process

Our conversation continues with Kim Richardson of KRTS to talk about the importance of creating career paths for your drivers and the role orientation...

How A Compliance Tracking System Works

The digital age has forced trucking into the 21st century. It’s no longer just an advantage, but an absolute necessity to use technology in profession...

How To Create Millenial Truck Drivers

Millennials became the largest generation in the workforce in 2016. Even so, most trucking companies fail to effectively recruit and retain millennial...

For The Love of Drivers: Establishing the Voice of the Driver

We recently sat down with our friend Kim Richardson of KRTS to talk about some of trucking's hottest topics. We came away with a few recruiting and re...

One Solution to the Driver Problem: CDL Finishing School

The New York Times published an article this past summer on the changing demographics of American truck drivers. Fleets no longer consist only of midd...

How To Be A Successful Driver Recruiter

Being a driver recruiter is no walk in the park. You hustle and dedicate yourself every day to hiring the best of the best. Even so, the big boss remi...

How to Choose Driver Recruiting Software

How To Prevent Technological Distractions

If you’ve been in the transportation industry for a long time, you know as well as anyone that things have changed a lot. The days of paper logs, road...

The Wage War Is On In Professional Driving

How to Combat the Wage War in Professional Driving Trucking companies are desperate for more drivers and are pulling out all the stops to find them. A...

Now's The Time To Invest in A Compliance Tracking System

This blog post has been updated on January 27, 2021.

6 Ways to Measure Driver Recruiting Success

How to Quickly Grow Your Semi Truck Driver Pool | AvatarFleet

On November 8th, I sat in on a driver recruitment panel at the second annual Ohio Trucking Association Technology Conference. The focus of the panel w...

ATRI Survey Explores How to Solve the Driver Problem

Positive Employer Branding Grows Your Fleet

We’re continuing our recap of the important takeaways on recruiting drivers from the second annual Technology Conference presented by the Ohio Truckin...

What's the Best Way to Recruit Truck Drivers?

How Do I Retain My Best Truck Drivers?

Trucking is a relationship business. Drivers are people and their issues are your issues. Driver retention is all about establishing clear expectation...

Recruitment & Branding in Trucking | OTA's Tech Conference

On November 8th, the Ohio Trucking Association held its second annual Technology Conference. The conference covered topics focused on how to use techn...

How to Find Good Truck Drivers

Everyone asks us for the silver bullet when it comes to hiring good truck drivers. Where's the best place to advertise? Should I go with Craigslist or...

5 Ways to Attract (and Keep) Good Millennial Drivers

Recruiting Ideas to Hire More Drivers

Are you feeling the pain of driver shortage? Trick question - there is no driver shortage. You’re feeling the pain of the driver problem, which is a m...

3 Lessons on Solving the Driver Problem | OTA Conference

Vehicle Inspections Are Part of Safe Driving

5 Ways to Show Your Drivers You Care

Participating in The Driver Shortage: It’s Your Choice

The American Trucking Association and many other trucking organizations continue to pump out reports that we’re currently short 63,000 drivers, and fo...

Creating Viable Career Paths for Truck Drivers

Driving a truck can be a stable lifelong career but the lifestyle has contributed to the driver problem in America today. More than any other element,...

Why DOT Compliance Software Pays For Itself

This blog post was updated on March 16, 2021.

9 Keys To Safe Professional Driving

Professional driving is a tough gig. It’s also one of the most dangerous jobs in the world. That’s because driving any kind of vehicle is a dangerous ...

Help Make Trucking A Good Job To Have

Driver First, Customers Second

Why You Need Driver Finishing School

The Driver Problem Requires New Thinking

The Truck Driving Championships: A Great Driver Retention Tool

Invest In A Driver-Centric Brand

3 Steps to Enhance Your Safety Culture

Where Does Truck Driver Safety Start? | AvatarFleet

Three Lessons from the Titans in the Trucking Industry

Why Do People Do Dumb Things When They Drive?

For as long as cars have existed, people have driven without complete attention. Back in the 1930s, radios were first put in luxury vehicles and peopl...

Recruit More Drivers With a Better Screening Process

This blog post was updated on March 31, 2021.

How Build a Culture of Safety Leadership

Why Structured Interviews Reduce Driver Turnover

Improving Driver Retention starts with hiring the right drivers for the jobs you have to offer. You make a heavy investment in drivers before they wor...

Three Driver Recruiting Metrics You Should Be Tracking

Invest in Your Drivers to Reduce Turnover

Money can’t buy happiness or your driver’s loyalty. But you need to provide enough of a consistent salary, so they don’t have to worry about making th...

Four Best Practices To Improve Driver On-Boarding

When it comes to professional driving, the first 90 days are your critical period for retention. These first three months are pivotal for a driver dec...

Steps To Develop Your Driver Brand Statement

The Driver Shortage Is For Your Competition Take the term Driver Shortage out of your vocabulary. It’s an excuse not to grow your fleet. There is a Dr...

You Don’t Have to Have a Driver Shortage

American Trucking Associations has, once again, updated its numbers and they confirm what we read and hear about nearly every day; the driver shortage...

Millennial Drivers: A How-To Guide

You’ve read everywhere about how the trucking industry needs younger drivers. Luring them into professional driving still proves to be a challenge. Th...

Managing Organizational Change

Organizational change is usually conceived as logical, rational, orderly, and completed on a predictable time-frame. In reality, it is usually messy, ...

Product Updates January 25th, 2018

ApplicantCare

Recruit More Drivers with Your Purple Cow

The days of simply posting a job online and landing qualified applicants are long gone. Today, you have to “pay-to-play.” But tomorrow, you’ll have to...

The Only Acceptable Goal is ZERO Accidents | AvatarFleet

Professional driving is a dangerous business. By the simple fact that professional drivers spend eight to twelve hours on the road each day, they find...

An Efficient Hiring Process Removes Driver Problem

You’re Still Not Wearing a Seat Belt? C’mon Man!

6 Tips To Keep in Mind When Backing Up Your Semi | AvatarFleet

We have a saying here at AvatarFleet: Parked cars don’t have accidents, people do. If you back into something, it’s your fault and yours alone (not to...

Product Updates December 14th 2017

We're proud to announce a handful of software updates as we close out 2017. Highlighting the release are the following updates: New features to report...

Use A Culture Contract to Improve Driver Retention

Driver retention depends heavily on company culture. In an article from Heavy Duty Trucking’s online magazine, Deborah Lockridge, Editor-in-Chief wrot...

How to Conduct a Successful Safety Meeting

Safety meetings can be a powerful asset in your toolbox for a strong safety campaign. In trucking however, it’s difficult to get everyone in the same ...

Driving in Adverse Weather Conditions

In Northeast Ohio, we make small talk over weather because it changes like a playlist on shuffle. We know what we’re going to get, but we don’t know w...

What Truckers Think Will Help You Find More Drivers

You can’t understand a driver’s experience working for your company if you don’t ask them. You have drivers that come to work everyday and enjoy worki...

Driver Market: Tight Getting Tighter

With the holidays fast approaching, many companies have found themselves once again scrambling for extra help as shipping increases with the season. A...

Live From OTA Part 4: Implementing Driver Finishing School

Great Driver Marketing - Examples from the Real World | OTA

Live From OTA Part 2: The Millennial Problem

Is Permanent Trailer Registration Worth It?

In the past couple of years, Ohio has made the move to allowing commercial carriers to register trailers permanently in the state for a one-time fee. ...

3 Safest Truck Drivers on the Biggest Subjects in Trucking

Safe Driving Begins With Behavior, Not Technology

What To Think of Self-Driving Trucks

One of the hottest topics in trucking the past couple of years has been the self-driving truck. We’ve all heard or read about beer trucks driving them...

5 Reasons To Road Test New Drivers

It’s one of the most common things that happens when you hire a new driver. A driver used to drive for the company down the road. He or she decided th...

Increase Driver Retention by Reducing Stress

There are many ideas to try to cut turnover for truck drivers and keep retention at a high level. But one area driver retention efforts often overlook...

Ten Things Truck Drivers Get Pulled Over For

Join The Push For Better Driver Safety

Refocus on Safety During High Accident Periods

How To Do A Successful Driver Rehire Campaign

Get Ready For Truck Driver Appreciation Week

CCJ Survey Proves That Driver Shortage Doesn't Exist

The good people at Commercial Carrier Journal (CCJ) released their latest “market pulse” survey at the beginning of the month to take the temperature ...

Verified First & AvatarFleet Join Forces To Better Trucking

Verified First and AvatarFleet have partnered to streamline the hiring process through integration of background screening tools with AvatarFleet’s A-...

4 Keys to a Safer Trucking Company

Our friend Brian Fielkow published this great article on tips to build a strong safety culture for Inbound Logistics. The article makes several points...

Recruit Truck Drivers for Retention

A trucking company always wants to keep the truck drivers they recruit. That’s pretty obvious; you always want to retain everyone you hire. Unfortunat...

Recruit Drivers By Asking The Right Questions

Recruiting is a daily challenge in trucking. It takes a lot of effort and vigilance to fill your driver needs, especially when you have to deal with d...

Improve Driver Retention

You may have heard that driver retention numbers have improved slightly in the trucking industry in the past few years. ATA reported that turnover upt...

Retain More Drivers With Great Dispatchers

A major reason for driver turnover that comes up time and time again is that drivers leave based on the way they are dispatched or a lack of assistanc...

Confident Drivers Are Safe Drivers 

You have a group of drivers beginning their orientation this week. They have all passed their written tests and have been cleared to get started. Some...

Solve Driver Turnover By Teaching Your Team Problem Solving 

By now, this blog has taught you that to solve driver turnover takes practice, effort and time. One answer isn’t going to cut it for every trucking co...

Tracking New Driver Progress

Few things are more critical to driver retention than communication. It is so important that you establish effective communication with your new drive...

Recruit Young Drivers By Meeting Them At Their Level

You will try almost anything to find truck drivers. If you had a guaranteed strategy on how to find truck drivers that always worked, you wouldn’t nee...

Train Your Drivers To Help Other Drivers

Trucking companies have taken great pains to help new drivers get used to their jobs. They have upped bonuses, splurged on extra training, maybe even ...

Compliance Is Not Safety: Learn the Difference

You can’t run your business in trucking if you aren’t in compliance with federal regulations. This fact can often cost your company a bunch of time an...

Your Applications Could Be Costing You Hires

This blog post has been updated on January 27, 2021.

Driver Voices Matter

When it comes to reducing driver turnover, there is no magic formula. No matter how effective management is at your company, there’s no way to ensure ...

How To Stay Cool Truck Driving In The Summer | AvatarFleet

Summer means your drivers will be out on the long, hot road. While some people prefer the heat to the bitter cold of winter, summer can be just as dan...

Celebrating Those Who Sacrifice

At AvatarFleet, we love safe drivers. The Ohio Trucking Association’s (OTA) Truck Driving Championships and Technician Competition in Sandusky are tou...

Help Your Managers Solve Driver Conflict 

An inevitable part of trucking is conflict. Conflict can come from almost anywhere and is never pleasant. Sometimes conflict can even lead to driver t...

What Your Drivers Need To Know From Other Drivers 

We told you in last week’s post that it’s critical to have your experienced drivers explain to your new ones the way things are at your company. We’re...

Recruit and Retain Drivers Better by Going to WFBCON!

By now you’ve probably come to realize that the best way to find recruiting strategies that work for you is to try different things. One of the best p...

Retain More Drivers with Clear Expectations

The New York Times published a recent piece on the life of a long-haul trucker. The article not only calls attention to some of the issues that driver...

Retain Truck Drivers By Keeping Them Active

We've mentioned that hiring truck drivers requires some imagination. The same is true in truck driver employment retention. Once you have your drivers...

What Should Be on Your DOT Compliance Checklist

One of the easiest ways to make sure you are playing by the DOT’s rules in trucking is to develop your own DOT compliance checklist. DOT regulations s...

Why You Should Get DOT Compliance Software

You run a trucking company the best that you can. You’ve hired and trained qualified safety personnel to deal with DOT regulations and nonsense. You t...

The Top Three Qualities of Ohio’s Best Truck Drivers 

The Ohio Trucking Association celebrated the top 12 professional truck drivers in the state and announced Mark Spencer, YRC Freight, as the 2016 Drive...

Why Your Driver Recruiting Needs To Be Mobile and Social  

There are truck drivers looking for jobs and no one is reaching them. But you can. The world has gone mobile and lives on social media. Hey trucking: ...

Truck Driver Compliance In Real English

You know what truck driver compliance is. You and your safety team have a painfully instilled working knowledge of the DOT and their guidelines and re...

You Need Millennial Truck Drivers 

In your search to find truck drivers for your fleet, there are a ton of strategies you can employ for recruiting and retaining drivers. But in spite o...

Get The Most Out of DOT Compliance Software 

This blog post was updated on January 15, 2021.

How the Trucking Industry’s Turnover Rate Impacts Safety 

This blog post was updated on March 3, 2021.

Four Items For Your DOT Audit Checklist 

No one in trucking looks forward to a DOT audit. An auditor can cause a great deal of stress with the power to slap your company with costly fines. Mo...

Five Benefits of DOT Compliance Software 

This blog post was updated on February 23, 2021.

How To Improve Truck Driver Compliance  | AvatarFleet

Truck driver compliance and turnover are related. Compliance can be irritating, confusing and ever-changing, but it’s an essential piece of the turnov...

How To Build a Driver-Centric Culture

If you truly love your safe drivers, you’ve invested in building a driver-centric culture. A driver-centric culture put your drivers first in every de...

Highway Deaths Spiked! This Should Impact Your Fleet Training 

Despite efforts by the government and safety agencies, highway deaths continue to rise, reversing positive trends from past decades. No extra rules or...

Find Truckers Looking for Work, By Serving Current Drivers 

The Over-The-Road trucking industry is waking up and not accepting 100% driver turnover as a cost of doing business. Everyone searches for available t...

Recruit and Retain Younger Drivers Without Spending More Money

The average age of your driver population is going through the roof and you desperately need a game plan to bring the next generation into your trucki...

Benefits for Truck Drivers: The Secret Weapon for Retention

Driving trucks is more than a job. It's a lifestyle. And it's a lifestyle that's not for everyone. Drivers frequently work in the middle of the night....

How To Create a Driver Brand: Build a Driver Centric Culture 

If you constantly recruit, hire and then lose drivers, you need to work on your driver brand. Earlier this week, we answered the unanswered questions ...

How To Create a Driver Brand: Recruiting & Social Media 

If you experience constant driver turnover, you need to work on your driver brand. Earlier this week, we outlined How to Create a Driver Brand to summ...

How to Create a Driver Brand

When trucking companies hear about our success recruiting drivers, they always ask us for our secret sources. Advertising where your prospective drive...

Technology Can’t Prevent 94% of Accidents 

Our loyal readers know that safety is freedom from risk, which means you’re never completely safe. Putting trucks on the road means your company is al...

You’re Upside Down – Put Drivers On Top of Your Org Chart

How to Train for Winter Driving Safety

A belly full of turkey, stuffing, and mashed potatoes means that winter is right around the corner. Already, we’ve started to see winter-like weather ...

Learn How To Develop A Long Term Driver Brand | AvatarFleet

Focus on Behaviorally-Based Driver Training

There is no substitute for effective truck driver safety training. You can add all the technology in the world to your trucks, but in the end, you’ll ...

Simple Tips for a Great Start: Make Paperwork Suck Less

The Majority of Driver Turnover Happens in the First 90 Days Trucking companies know that the majority of their turnover occurs in the first 90 days o...

Quantify Your Driver Pay & Benefits

Pay is always a top concern for drivers yet trucking companies can’t precisely tell a driver how much he or she will make in a year. Drivers tend to t...

How To Reduce New Hire Driver Turnover

According to a Commercial Carriers Journal survey involving 423 fleet management subscribers, fleets are primarily focused on managing job expectation...

How Low Unemployment Affects Recruiting & Retaining Drivers 

Record Low Unemployment

Use Treatment, Transparency and Trust to Cut Driver Turnover

An Unengaged Workforce A Gallup study from 2015 stated that 70 percent of American workers hate their job or are completely disengaged. You can’t run ...

Top 10 Reasons Truck Drivers Leave Companies | AvatarFleet

In January 2008, Deborah Lockridge, published an article in Heavy Duty Trucking listing the top ten reasons drivers quit one company only to go to ano...

How to Build a Safety Culture Through Safety Leadership

This blog post was updated on February 10, 2021.

6 Communication Tips to Help Driver Retention

This blog post was updated on February 4, 2021.

Truck Driver Recruiting: Never Stop Learning About Your Competitors

Competition for truck drivers is a much bigger marketplace than your competition for hauling freight. Your competitors include any other transportatio...

7 Principles of Truck Driving Safety | AvatarFleet

Brian Fielkow presented his seven principles of safety that he has implemented at JetCo Delivery over the last 10 years to achieve a world-class safet...

New Med Cards: What You Need to Know

The DOT makes changes to required paperwork as often as the sun shines. The changes may seem arbitrary to drivers or managers busy with a plateful of ...

3 Traits that All Driver of the Year Candidates Share

AvatarFleet proudly sponsored the Ohio Trucking Association 2015 Driver of the Year, hoping to shine a bigger spot light on Ohio's best professional d...

Driver/Technician Shortages: Count Only on Yourself

The latest news is that not only is the driver shortage not getting any better (hint: it’s getting worse) but the technician shortage won’t get better...

Ideas to Improve Truck Driver Onboarding: Part 4

Embed Safety Everyone agrees that focusing on safety has to be part of a good onboarding or orientation program. But the best ways to incorporate safe...

Ideas to Improve Truck Driver Onboarding: Part 3

Humanize Paperwork This is the third installment in a series on improving orientation for new drivers. (See Part 1 and Part 2) Getting new drivers sta...

Ideas to Improve Truck Driver Onboarding: Part 2

Think People, Not Process Last week we provided ideas how good driver orientation and on-boarding integrates the new driver into your company. It sets...

THERE OUGHTA BE A LAW: DISTRACTED DRIVING

Like most kids growing up in the sixties, I read the newspaper funnies every night with my dad after he was done with the sports section. In those day...

Benesch Named Top Law Firm in Transportation

U.S. News & World Report and Best Lawyers, has named AvatarFleet partner Benesch Law the top law firm in transportation law.

Treating Drivers Well Pays—Turnover Punishes

When you treat drivers well, they will appreciate it and be more likely to stay and do a good job. When you don’t, it’s a source of turnover.

Retaining Drivers Via Health Programs

In these days of driver shortage, retaining drivers is extremely important.

How to Recruit More Women Drivers

As cited by the American Trucking Associations’ report, woman are an underutilized segment of potential drivers.

Best Ways to Vet Drivers: What You Don’t Know Will Hurt You

Bad drivers are bad news. Most trucking firms know that the consequences of hiring bad drivers is even worse than the pain of having a truck sit idle ...

How To Find Drivers In A Tight Labor Pool

HireRight® is hosting a free webinar on this important topic on November 12th and we’re excited to be part of it. By all indications, we’re going to s...

Protect Your Company From Negligent Hiring

Two Steps to Protect Your Company From Negligent Hiring and Retention Claims

OTA Announces The Next Truck Driver of the Year | AvatarFleet

The Ohio Trucking Association recently honored the best drivers in Ohio. Lew Eaton, from Ross Transportation, was named Driver of the Year. He has two...

March Madness Comes To Trucking

By now, you've trashed your NCAA tournament bracket. And, your dreams of winning one billion Dollars of Warren Buffet’s money are toast. Millions of p...

Teach Your Truck Driver Risk Avoidance | AvatarFleet

Truck driver risk was in full view of the nation as thousands of cars were stuck in Atlanta during a two-inch snowfall. There were over 1200 accidents...

4 Common Mistakes When Training Employees + 4 Best Practices

Part of being a hiring manager or supervisor is training employees. Too often, though, training employees fall short of expectations. Trainers are dis...