Both the number and severity of Nuclear Verdicts have increased by an astonishing amount in the trucking industry. From 2012 to 2019, the number of cases with verdicts over $1 million increased by 335% compared to the six years prior. Since 2010, the average size of a crash-related verdict has increased by 967%.
To combat these trends, consider these 3 tips when approaching your pre and post-hire processes.
#1: Hire Drivers Who Fit Your Culture
Drivers who fit your fleet’s culture are more likely to enjoy their day-to-day workflows and have a favorable relationship with their supervisor, which makes them more likely to stick around for the long-haul.
According to Dirk Kupar, Co-Founder and CEO of TruckRight, the best way to find drivers with a strong cultural-fit is to interview them before running a records check. This interview should:
- Be longer than a 15-minute phone call about their driving history
- Involve asking questions that gauge how well a driver fits in with your fleet
By adding this interview earlier in your hiring process, you can more often hire drivers that are predisposed to like their job and follow your safety rules, reducing your turnover and liability.
#2: Analyze Critical Hiring and Onboarding Metrics
To assess the effectiveness of your pre-hire and onboarding processes, three metrics you should track include:
Velocity
Velocity is the amount of time it takes for a potential hire to go from submitting an application to getting behind the wheel. Reducing this time means you can spend more time engaging with new hires, keeping them invested in your fleet’s culture.
New-Hire Crashes
If you have a high crash rate among new-hires within their first year at your fleet, then you aren’t onboarding your drivers properly. This should be a separate metric from your overall crashes and should be used to evaluate your onboarding process.
Retention
Retention is the key metric for any hiring and onboarding program. The more drivers you retain, the more time you can spend on hiring the best possible drivers.
#3: Include Periodic Reviews to Evaluate Your Current Processes
In terms of immediate action, fleets should schedule:
- A periodic review of their pre-hire and onboarding processes to assess driver performance on the metrics above and make recommendations to improve their performance.
- A periodic review of their documented pre-hire and onboarding processes. The system for hiring and onboarding that your fleet’s documentation prescribes is the standard you’ll be held to in court. Making sure you are meeting that documented standard—and changing it if not—is essential to reducing your fleet’s liability.
The Right Tool for the Job
The Idelic Safety Suite® is the most comprehensive driver management platform in the industry and integrates with dozens of third-party systems, including pre-hire software like DriverReach, Driver Facts, TruckRight, and more. Safety Suite displays all pre-hire data alongside your other driver data and enables you to assign automated training and onboarding plans from your preferred training platform, helping you integrate your pre and post-hire processes into a single system.
Safety Suite also uses AI-powered models to identify which of your drivers are at-risk, pinpoint why they’re at-risk, and then recommend training to address their specific needs.
Watch a 2-minute demo to see how you can consolidate your systems and improve your hiring and onboarding here.
To learn more about how to improve your pre-hire and onboarding process in more detail, watch the webinar, Reducing Risk of a Nuclear Verdict by Employing Effective Pre & Post-Hire Processes, with Idelic’s Hayden Cardiff and Dirk Kupar, Co-Founder and CEO of TruckRight, here.