Beaver won’t be happy until he finds a company that loves him as much as he loves himself, which will be difficult 
joeyd:
Beaver won’t be happy until he finds a company that loves him as much as he loves himself, which will be difficult
More chance of a sensible post from Dozy
Hire and reward in general haulage terms is now almost at the lowest its ever been, except for in a few jobs which buck the downward trend, it’s been deskilled and made too easy (physically and vehicle handling/operating skills), this has been done so literally anyone can do it, but that makes the supply and demand balance of staff no good for the employee, but has also disillusioned those who want to take a pride in their job who have either found something else in transport (and treasured it) or got out of the industry altogether.
If you want to get out of the race to the bottom…which you’ll in most cases have to join for a while to get some road experience and history…then you either specialise into one of the many more intricate aspects of the industry where usually a combination of skills nous muck and bullets is to be found, where you’ll work harder than in general transport but the rewards will be there.
Or you go work for one of the few remaining own account operations where you carry or service the company’s own product, the top line may be no more appealing, but you often find the hours are sensible (though 24/7 operation) meaning the average hourly rate is high, and you get treated a whole lot better, supermarkets such as Asda are one suggestion but there are still some companies out there not so obvious where good staff are valued as they should be.
If you are lucky enough to land such a job, for God’s sake look after it, don’t do what so many do ie take the ■■■■ out of the sick pay, do your best to make sure the company becomes market leader or help get it there or stay there, cos if you don’t then sooner or later the directors will wash their hands of transport, as so many have done, and put the job out to tender to the usual logistics hyenas, and what was once a good job becomes another ruined in the race to the bottom.
I personally believe we are heading for another serious downturn, so my suggestion to anyone wants to listen is to find something as bomb proof as possible, something people can’t do without or a side of the industry that requires skills, and get yourself a good reputation there, give yourselves as good a chance as possible to weather the coming storm.
Juddian:
If you are lucky enough to land such a job, for God’s sake look after it, don’t do what so many do ie take the ■■■■ out of the sick pay, do your best to make sure the company becomes market leader or help get it there or stay there, cos if you don’t then sooner or later the directors will wash their hands of transport, as so many have done, and put the job out to tender to the usual logistics hyenas, and what was once a good job becomes another ruined in the race to the bottom.
You and I, as said before, agree on that point very much.
However, there seems to be a different feel in the air. My main customer - has been for 20 years - is changing it seems. I’ve had the self same conversation just now with the dispatch manager who is proper old skool. I was on site last week and I’ve never noticed so much of a divide between the youngsters coming into jobs like HR ( the frilly bits of work) and those that actually do the R&D ( it’s a high tech product) and the manufacturing which is still a skilled engineers job. Of course being haulage we are totally irrelevant to the new gods of business strategy 
. It makes me think long term that somewhere along the line we’ll be turfed out in favour of DHL etc.
Don’t know if you read much Juddian, if you do, think you’d enjoy this book
amazon.co.uk/White-Working- … in+america
It’s about the class divide in the states and the role it played in Trump’s appointment; it also has obvious parallels with the Brexit voted and I can relate it in micro fashion to my customer’s staff and the way they split themselves.
It’s not a long book and despite the title, an easy read.
Sorry OP, wandered off topic 
Thanks Albion, i’ll look that book up, yes read quite a bit because we don’t bother with the indoctrinating idiot box in the corner, or the radio come to that especially avoiding the state broadcaster, don’t read MSM printed or online propaganda, haven’t bought a newspaper for over 30 years and never will buy another, the only rag i subscribe to is Spectator, purely for the dark quiet humour from some of the columnists.
Bother, i hope your feelings prove ungrounded, but have the utmost faith in you altering course as required and finding other customers who puts service and quality above the alternatives if the worse should happen.
albion:
Juddian:
If you are lucky enough to land such a job, for God’s sake look after it, don’t do what so many do ie take the ■■■■ out of the sick pay, do your best to make sure the company becomes market leader or help get it there or stay there, cos if you don’t then sooner or later the directors will wash their hands of transport, as so many have done, and put the job out to tender to the usual logistics hyenas, and what was once a good job becomes another ruined in the race to the bottom.You and I, as said before, agree on that point very much.
However, there seems to be a different feel in the air. My main customer - has been for 20 years - is changing it seems. I’ve had the self same conversation just now with the dispatch manager who is proper old skool. I was on site last week and I’ve never noticed so much of a divide between the youngsters coming into jobs like HR ( the frilly bits of work) and those that actually do the R&D ( it’s a high tech product) and the manufacturing which is still a skilled engineers job. Of course being haulage we are totally irrelevant to the new gods of business strategy
Don’t know if you read much Juddian, if you do, think you’d enjoy this book
amazon.co.uk/White-Working- … in+america
It’s about the class divide in the states and the role it played in Trump’s appointment; it also has obvious parallels with the Brexit voted and I can relate it in micro fashion to my customer’s staff and the way they split themselves.
It’s not a long book and despite the title, an easy read.
Sorry OP, wandered off topic
You only wander off topic rarely Albion, unlike the majority of us here.
Do you and Juddian and others think that the attitude displayed in companies is related to their size?
Hasnt that always been the case? A company or department, with up to, about, 20/30 employees is going to function as a team, but much bigger and it will self divide and youll have infighting? Sometimes older vs younger, sometimes management vs workers? And back in the day didnt Murfitts drivers divide between artics and wagonndrags? Im suggesting that, but not sure I really believe it?
There does seem to be a trend within some big companies for various departments to become too large. As the head of HR wants to justify their request for a salary increase they ask for more staff, they try interfering in other departments, and generally take resources that should be going to “the sharp end”. Those people (says the common thought) that work in the bits where they wear white lab coats, are less concerned with office politics and allow this to continue, and so the company can be loaded with too much dead-wood.
There is a clear place for good administration workers everywhere, but don`t some places go too far.
joeyd:
Beaver won’t be happy until he finds a company that loves him as much as he loves himself, which will be difficult
Juddian:
Bother, i hope your feelings prove ungrounded, but have the utmost faith in you altering course as required and finding other customers who puts service and quality above the alternatives if the worse should happen.
In truth I could finish personally any time and retire; it bothers me for the lads, the long service ones are institutionalised now 
, they’ve no idea how proper haulage companies function. The youngsters would be traumatised. However, nothing stays the same and there was a hint a while back that they were looking at a big player - they put some of ‘my’ work out to another company. Lovely pic of some of thier expensive kit half on and half off a pallet on the back of a groupage trailer. I shouldn’t have laughed. But I did. A lot
Franglais:
You only wander off topic rarely Albion, unlike the majority of us here.
Do you and Juddian and others think that the attitude displayed in companies is related to their size?
**Hasnt that always been the case? A company or department, with up to, about, 20/30 employees is going to function as a team, but much bigger and it will self divide and youll have infighting? Sometimes older vs younger, sometimes management vs workers? And back in the day didnt Murfitts drivers divide between artics and wagonndrags?** Im suggesting that, but not sure I really believe it?
There does seem to be a trend within some big companies for various departments to become too large. As the head of HR wants to justify their request for a salary increase they ask for more staff, they try interfering in other departments, and generally take resources that should be going to “the sharp end”. Those people (says the common thought) that work in the bits where they wear white lab coats, are less concerned with office politics and allow this to continue, and so the company can be loaded with too much dead-wood.
There is a clear place for good administration workers everywhere, but don`t some places go too far.
I think yes to your question, especially with the larger firms. You see it when you have two depots - one has to grab all the work, or drop the other in it. As a manger youhave to try and make everything fair and work equally - an awkward manager on site can really mess things up.
Purely in reference to my customer, they are actually about half the size they were when I started working for them in terms of staff. But a lot of the upper management had come through the ranks. I know one of the guys there pretty well, now reasonably high up and he started at 16 doing grounds maintenance. You would never get that now. What you get is someone with an MBA coming in that thinks a. they know it all but no experience to back that up and b. that having a degree means that those who don’t are therefore not as good. Thee isn’t any unpleasantness, it’s more that without that degree, your experience and opinion is irrelevant.
High horse got off 
Yes size matters, but it’s not always the case that when companies get larger things go to rats.
I think it depends to some extent who’s paying the bills, if its still a wholly owned company where the top deck are putting their own money on the line then a tighter rein will be kept, and a manager will be responsible for the safe sailing of the department of their ship.
Mistakes will be made, but when its one person in charge ( we’re talking years here, not like logistics where here today gone tomorrow is the norm) the buck stops with them, and any mistakes are soon rectified and not repeated.
These companies tend to work by old fashioned values, including how they treat and expect their employees to behave, that doesn’t mean to say they don’t invest heavily or are averse to high tech, but they tend to be old companies who have stayed the course and grown massively because they never forgot who the most important person is, the customer.
If its a large logistics oufit, where the parent company is owned by shareholders and the client company money is footing all the bills, then it sort of becomes a bit like a politicians magic money tree where no one is held accountable, the heirarchy mushrooms out, and sight is lost of what we were doing in the first place as greasy pole climbers scrabble for position.
Any of us who have had the misfortune to work for some of these logistics outfits have seen the sheer waste day in day out, no one bats an eyelid, if you as a driver make a sensible suggestion mitigating an expensive folly you either get told to mind your own business or ridiculed or both, hence inevitably the staff knowing they are just a number and unappreciated give up caring.
I work for the other sort, happily
I did at one time work for Wincanton on the Kwik Save contract, that was run as well as i’ve seen anywhere.
Helped because the depot management was as good a crew as i’ve seen for a long time, had Kwikies not been take over by Somerfield and had stayed the same job (within reason) i would happily have seen my time out there.