Opinion: Embracing Change
B>By Steve Williams
I>Chairman
merican Trucking Associations
The next few years will remain a pivotal time for this industry.
This will be a period in which we should have the opportunity to strengthen our balance sheets. With our economic future improving, this industry is going to have some options.
It will be a time to ask ourselves tough questions about what we want the future of trucking to look like. Trucking’s image shapes public opinion.
Public opinion shapes public policy. During this period we will have an opportunity to fundamentally change the public’s opinion of our industry if we choose to do it.
We will have the opportunity to invest in new technology and new equipment, and to support policies that will make our companies and our industry more productive. We will have the opportunity to create an even safer environment for our employees and for those with whom we share the road.
But what will we choose to do?
The world is changing quite dramatically before our very eyes. Many don’t see it and many are unwilling to accept how fundamentally our world will change in the years ahead. In 10 or 15 years, there will be those companies that ask, “When did things change?” and others that say, “This industry isn’t what it used to be.”
We are the leaders of this industry. We must be the ones to navigate this highway of change.
Much like the carriers that stared into the uncertain future of “deregulation” late in the 1970s, today we are staring at new challenges that will dramatically change our industry over the next 25 years.
The challenges we face — economic growth and negative demographic trends — will create new opportunities for our industry. An important fact to note is that our workforce is aging and it is shrinking. This nation and this industry will be forced to move more freight with fewer drivers.
We must embrace change. In 1980 we experienced regulatory change and it spawned the greatest expansion in the history of our industry. Change is evolutionary and neither this industry nor any other can stop it — or should try.
We have work to do to improve our image. The trucking industry has spent years trying to convince America that it depends on us, and yet today there are many in this nation who want the quality of life that trucks bring — but without having to lay eyes on a single truck.
Right or wrong, too many people in our nation continue to judge our industry by the fastest truck, the dirtiest driver or the worst piece of equipment. That is why we all have a vested interest in seeing that everyone in the industry has an opportunity to improve his or her operation. We in the carrier community should expect our peers to elevate their games. Only when we choose to take the high road will we have the right to expect the support of our nation.
We all have a responsibility to ensure that we have done everything that we can to take back our industry’s reputation — one driver, one truck and one carrier at a time. Good operators deserve the opportunity to prosper . . . they have earned it. For the bad operators . . . your time has run out.
This nation and its economy depend on trucking and will depend on us even more in the future. Our nation expects a great deal of us and holds us to a higher standard. Frankly, it should. Where we work and toil every day, America works and plays.
With the law of supply and demand trending in trucking’s favor, we will now have the proper economic environment and opportunity to make decisions that this industry has perhaps been unable or unwilling to make in the past.
But, what will we do?
Leaders have the responsibility of anticipating the challenges that we face, and dealing with reality. The basic challenges that we will face in the future will require different strategies and solutions than those that served us over the 25 years since deregulation.
This industry has fallen into the same trap that many do . . . we have been reactive instead of proactive. We have done a great job of being “against” everything and have not spent enough time discussing what we are “for.”
ATA is embarking on an aggressive strategy to provide leadership during these changing times. We will continue the progress that has been made on tort reform. We will continue to work with the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration to develop a workable hours-of-service rule that accomplishes the objectives of safety for our employees and the motoring public. We will continue to fight the prospect of tolls on our nation’s highways.
We will continue to strengthen the ATA federation by working to increase membership in ATA by encouraging the notion of mutual interdependence of the ATA, the councils, the conferences and state trucking associations and by strengthening individual carriers’ members by promoting their participation in the ATA councils.
The future of trucking is very bright. Challenges of historic proportions face us. Tremendous opportunities exist for those who are willing to embrace change. That is what trucking has always thrived on to the ultimate benefit of not only our industry, but also our nation.
The author is chairman and chief executive officer of Maverick Transportation Inc. and is the new chairman of ATA. ATA owns Transport Topics Publishing Group.
This story appeared in the Oct. 11 edition of Transport Topics. Subscribe today.
