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Originally Posted by GMAN
When a driver is paid by the hour he isn't necessarily paid what he is worth. Some could be underpaid for their effort while others are over paid. I think everyone should be paid on performance, regardless of what they do for a living. When you are paid to produce there is an incentive for you to find better ways to do your job. There is also an incentive to get the work done in a timely manner. One of my biggest complaints with unions is the lack of incentive for the worker. In fact, there seems to be an incentive to be unproductive. I have heard a lot of workers over the years complain about the company making all the money and not giving a fair share to the workers. That is why I like percentage pay. The worker can share in the profits based upon their efforts. I think we would be much better off, as a nation, if we got rid of the hourly pay. It doesn't necessarily compensate people for their efforts. When a company pays on percentage or piece work they can better forecast costs. When a worker is paid percentage or piece work then he has an incentive to work harder. If he wants to earn more money then all he has to do is produce more. The guy who wants to sit on his hands won't make as much because he is not as motivated to work. Of course, he will complain. The guy who produces will be too busy to complain. He is the guy who will likely wind up running the company one day. That is the way with mileage pay. The more miles a driver turns the bigger his paycheck. What could be more fair?
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I recall you took a nasty spill and banged up your leg pretty bad . . any chance you might have bumped your head, too?
Piece work is against the law in this Country in every single industry except one. Care to take a guess?
Piece work was outlawed and replaced with the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1936. Truck Drivers were exempted from the overtime provision of the Act. Piece work was eliminated because workers were forced to pay the consequences of ruthless and/or inefficient management. Truck Drivers were exempted due to the inability of management to exercise control over their far flung employees. The fear was that the unsupervisable Drivers would drive to the ends of the earth and never rest if it meant making more money. You know this business, you know the technology, you read the posts here and you know as well as anyone that is simply no longer the case.
Managers set up their systems and managers impliment the controls. When the systems and controls fail, who should pay?
I agree that rotten Drivers should be canned. I also think good Drivers should have incentives. But when a good Driver can't drive because some inept manager can't get his head out of his rearend, I don't think I should be forced to take the rap.
You run your own show and I applaud you for that, especially since it sounds like you run a pretty good show. At the end of the day, you get to say how the check gets distributed and you get to call your cut whatever you want . . CPM/PPM . . hourly rate . . daily rate . . whatever you call it, you likely feel sufficiently compensated and you probably feel as though you ran your day in the most efficient manner you can.
If you order repairs, they have to be paid for. You buy fuel, it has to be paid for. You say screw it, I'm going on vacation, it has to be paid for. If you have employees, they have to be paid NO MATTER HOW EFFICIENTLY OR INEFFICIENTLY they perform on your behalf. Unless they happen to be the folks that make everything move.
At the end of my day, I have to confront the fact that no matter how efficiently I ran my day, as often as not, my compensation is predicated on the efficiencies of others over whom I excersize no authority or control.
Today, I ran 660 beautiful and uneventful miles. Man! Talk about efficiency! I'm on the tail end of a great 2200+ mile load. I got a message yesterday that there's a conflict with the delivery appointment as in, it's scheduled for tomorrow morning and I can't legally be there until late tomorrow afternoon . . I'm on plan and on schedule but somebody else isn't and I haven't heard a word since. It's a beautiful summer weekend! My support network is . . indisposed.
The shipper has already been paid, the CSR, my managers and the dispatcher will all be paid . . the bill states the freight is prepaid so the company is covered. But something tells me that I'm going to be sitting while this gets sorted out and that may take some time . . my time. I'll be off the board; unpaid and unavailable for pay. Somebody else screwed this up and I'm going to pay. I don't own the company, G-man . . tell me why it's me who has to pay . .
I was kidding about the head bump. You're an asset to the board and I, for one, have never made fun of your avatar.
