Episode 36: Enhance Value by Investing in the Recruitment Process, with Rob Hatchett

Recruit & Retain: Trucking Edition

Rob Hatchett has served as Vice President of Marketing and Communications at Covenant Transport since September 2012. Covenant Transport Services operates under three lines: Covenant Transport, Southern Refrigerated Transport, and Star Transportation. This program focuses on some of the recruitment efforts he has been involved with at Covenant, as well as the value Rob places on those who recruit prospective truckers as employees that will drive for the company. On February 1 of this year, Covenant began offering a $40,000 "teaming bonus" as a new incentive to attract top talent.

“Across all three of our companies, we've made about five pay moves in the past four or five months. But a lot of it's just keeping up with the market right now because it's so hot now.”

- Rob Hatchett

What you’ll learn about in this episode:

• How Rob is involved with driver recruitment and retention efforts across the companies in the Covenant family that has a fleet of more than 2,500 trucks and approximately 3,500 professional drivers
• Ways that current recruitment practices have started to respond to a market where turnover has crept upward and a shortage of drivers has become more noticeable in many fleets
• Why recent market trends offer challenges in the current marketplace for companies needing reliable drivers
• Why Covenant Transport began offering a "teaming bonus" for teams or single drivers who are interested in forming a team as a way to meet increased demand while offering truckers a chance to pair with others who have similar scheduling interests
• How traditional scheduling has changed because drivers have different opinions regarding shorter routes versus long-distance hauls
• The importance of the company offering incentives such as the "teaming bonus" in such a way that both encourages prospective drivers to apply while also allowing current drivers to enjoy these incentives
• How recruiting the best drivers available successfully takes place while avoiding the high cost of turnover that would happen if longtime employees felt overlooked, frustrated, or upset that their loyalty to the company was no longer valued
• Ways that Rob and recruiters at Covenant try to match drivers wanting to be home every weekend for family reasons and drivers who want to be out for 12 weeks in a row with opportunities that satisfy the drivers while maintaining diverse shipment schedules that keep things moving
• The effectiveness of spending funds on high-quality recruiters rather than advertising alone to attract prospective employees to the company while also creating an environment where turnover of recruiters has remained incredibly low for 5 years
• How the focus on recruiting and retaining workers has expanded the use of social media as a hiring and training tool for the commercial trucking industry
• How marketing and branding are becoming important aspects of recruitment and instilling company loyalty for prospective truckers similar to the way companies value these skills as the way they sell goods and services

Ways to contact Rob:

• LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/rob-hatchett-a697a59
• Website: www.covenanttransport.com
• Employment: jobs.covenanttransport.com