Driver Management Practices of Motor Carriers with High Compliance and Safety Performance‪.‬

Abstract This article reports findings from a survey conducted in order to characterize the driver management practices of trucking companies that are recognized as being among the safest companies in the motor carrier industry. Using primary dam collected from a geographically stratified judgment sample of the safest U.S. motor carriers, we present observations and analysis of aspects of the driver hiring, driver training, and driver reinforcement activities of the "best safety performers" in the trucking industry. The findings imply that the safest trucking firms apply screening criteria consistently in all driver-hiring situations; emphasize pre-service and in-service training for company drivers and owner-operators alike; cover a broad scope of topics in several venues during their training programs and use several methods to evaluate drivers in those programs; and use an array of different types of rewards to support drivers who demonstrate safe driving performance. The information developed in this study could be useful to managers of new entrant carriers who are still developing their safety management programs, to managers of established carriers who might wish to compare or benchmark their existing driver hiring, training, and reinforcement practices to those of the safest trucking companies, and finally, to public safety agencies that might use the results as input to the development of educational components of their motor carrier safety programs.