@::zac…
The negativity actually comes FROM both running my own trucks many years ago followed by my absolute disillusionment with this cluster ■■■■ of an industry ever since.
I have my eyes fully open the industry is a complete ■■■■ up…end of.
You as a trainer keep churning out so called 'professionally competent 'TMs but nothing changes in the aspects I have pointed out.
When we are treated with respect,.and not pushed to the limit (I say ‘‘we’’ although I do not personally allow myself to be treated this way) then and only then will I consider these pricks to be actually ‘professionally competent’.
You refer to the days when I employed drivers,.can I just say that I did treat them as grown ups at that time…
AND I got more out of them BECAUSE of that…Hey! maybe there’s a message in there for your potential TM candidates.
And yet you’re still in the industry, why is that if it’s so utterly beyond repair?
Not that I’m bothered by your use of the label “trainer”, but I have more than one string to my bow, as well as TM-CPC trainer, I’m an ADR trainer, freelance DGSA and External TM. Still have my Class 1 & 2 HGV entitlements too, if I wanted to use them, which I prefer not to except when a genuine need arises.
I think your massive negativity (which seems to me to be higher now than it was on the old forum) is coloured by whatever your current situation is.
You won’t find any of the drivers I am responsible for who have that attitude, I’m an ETM who still very much remembers what is is like to be a driver, I look out for them in the face of bad attitudes from the Operator.
Not only do I insist they take all their breaks properly (rollocks to that tipping on a break nonsense), I actively encourage them to take more than the bare legal minimum - standing by my opinions on that aspect of this industry that I have frequently voiced on here before, despite vociferous criticisms from the “Why should I be forced to take more break than the legal minimum” proponents
No need to be so defensive, I never suggested at anytime that you did, nor would I expect anything less of a driver-turned-operator
You’re preaching to the choir there
My TM candidates get all the messages they need from me in the classroom as one of their instructors, together with my experiences as both a driver and as a working TM, and with a far more positive disposition than I’m getting from you.
Why are you taking all this personally to the point of coming across as if I am verbally attacking you ffs?..I aint.
I’m commenting on what I see and hear in this industry all the time.
You ask why I am still in the industry…answer is I try not to play stupid games set to me, but rather keep my head down and try and use these stupid games to my advantage, beat them with their own stick, win but at the same time appear to lose where everybody is happy, they think they have won/I know they have not!
I dont succumb to pressure, and if I think I am being p.taken I fight back verbally but politely, it’s called self preservation and looking after numero uno.
I aint being big headed, or clever we could all do it if we had the balls.
And am I really as you suggest the only driver you have come across with a negative attitude towards the job and industry??..seriously??
I do not doubt that you are a professionally competent instructor and teacher, I can tell by your demeanour on here, so no need to list your qualifications that you have undoubtedly worked hard for…I get it.
My only criticism of you (in a friendly constructive and non offensive way) is that you come across as (in fact the direct opposite of me) seeing the industry in a pseudo good light, with a hint of rosy specs, and fully believe the hype of a nirvanic faultless industry on the management side…but hey, maybe I pick you up wrongly.
You also say you work as a TM who respects his drivers (as I did) which I would congratulate you for, but again if you took those specs off for a minute (sorry) you would see you are in an incredibly small minority.
Ahhh. GBS, Man and Superman.“Those who can, do; those who can’t, teach.”
How about Aristotle? “Those who know, do. Those that understand, teach.”
In my experience the best teachers are quite capable of doing the job themselves.
But maybe you have had poor teachers? It might explain much.
More than that: the best way to get know any subject is to teach it yourself. The answering of questions raised, the explaining of details, the need to approach from a different angle for those that don’t “get it” straight off, increases the depth of knowledge for the better teachers.
I’m not taking it personally, I’m just talking to you - the whole point of the forum is it not?
Good god No, There are countless entirely negative people online - this is why we need TN, despite all the whinging about the new format, because Fakebook is the only other forum-style option, and that is just one boring whinge after another.
Maybe because I know you are experienced in aspects of the industry that many others are not experienced in (owner-driver/SME owner/PYT) I’m surprised that you don’t have a different, perhaps more constructive, POV
(why is the edit not fixing the quote problem?)
Comments can be accepted, I’m far too long in the tooth to be a snowflake
I think you do take me wrongly: there’s plenty of excrement in the industry to deal with, I’m about to embark this afternoon in dealing with an astounding “piece of work” Operator, who will be receiving the written equivalent of a fully charged taser in the family jewels for his unacceptable conduct, and it won’t be the first time I’ve given both-barrels to an Operator who is putting his drivers at risk, not just of fines and penalty points, but at risk of a sizeable stretch of porridge.
Maybe, maybe not, but I actively choose not to be on a downer all the time, I’m in my early sixties, I don’t want to be any more of a curmudgeonly-git than I already (often) am - you’ll have to take my word for it, seeing as you think I’m too upbeat
I try to avoid the scummy Operators who treat their drivers in ways I wouldn’t stand for myself as a driver; when one does “fail to meet my reasonable expectations”, they get a fairly nasty shock, as the afore-unnamed Operator will be seeing for their self later today.
Your first post was perfectly clear to me. And I apologise if you feel slighted and offended by me trying to give the exact quote for those that might have interest in such things. Sorry. I never intended to hurt you.
Your post said to me that trainers are trainers because they are incapable of doing the job themselves.
I suggested by my use of another quote by Aristotle,…that what you suggest is (to quote Dr Susan Oliver) “a load of bollox”.
But your following post seems as clear as mud to me.
Are you suggesting that trainers need more qualifications? That you would prefer trainers who are further away from actual job?
I don’t get offended by such things and I don’t mean to offend anyone on here, (well, not all the time). Straight talking Yorkshire man I’m afraid.
Albert Einstein could have tutored a DC of PROFESSIONAL COMPETENCY but without an exam to make one achieve PROFESSIONAL COMPETENCY then it is just a joke, a tick box joke at that. A further load of non jobs created, leaching on the back of an already financially squeezed industry.
A proper DCPC only given after sitting and passing an exam. That has a lot to be said for it.
It need not be all in a formal classroom setting, indeed some practical work would be excellent.
For a long time I have believed that what we have is a missed chance to give a bit of needed professionalism to transport. But the industry tried and succeeded to make it as cheap and easy as possible. And now (I really am trying to avoid saying it , but can’t) Brexit means that the domestic DCPC will be even less useful.
Getting a better standard of driver means more expense for the industry as a whole, and that means slightly more cost will need to be passed on to those needing goods moved.
Well, nowt’s for free, is it?
It is about time we as drivers were less complicit in the race to the bottom.
Agreed, the transport industry is in need of more professionalism but the current DCPC ain’t going to do that in its current format. Can’t really comment on the Brexit issue, all I can say is that it is not the Brexit I voted for but there again why would it be when major players in UK Gov are all remainers, (nothing against remainers btw).
Getting a better standard and dragging the industry in an upwards direction would be well worth paying for and if done correctly would weed out the PROFESSIONALLY INCOMPETENT drivers from the PROFESSIONALLY COMPETENT ones, ie the wheat from the chaff, thus possibly saving the firms money in the long run. As it is now it’s just a cost that doesn’t professionalise bugger all and continues to leach.
So we can agree that (and we better acknowledge that we are discussing the Driver CPC here) that it isn’t any more than a box-ticking exercise for many.
There are good courses from some providers, I’m not slagging off all providers, but there are also some that are a waste of time. Without some sort of test that one can fail then it is pointless.
If we can all (apart from a very small number of older drivers) pass a test once, then can’t we demonstrate that we can pass it again?
I doubt there are many who would fail, but those that would fail are probably the ones doing us all a bad turn.
There should be a scheme, set up by the industry, to help retrain those who need such help.
I’m not holding my breath on any of this. The industry as a whole, there are exceptions, are only about worshipping the gods of cost cutting in their race to the bottom. Long term thinking is not anywhere in sight.
@Zac.
Why do you think that because of my vast experience and time in the job,.that you’d expect me to have more positive and constructives opinions on it?
As I said, my opinions are such SOLELY BECAUSE of my time and experience in the job!,I go around with my eyes fully open,.cut through the crap,.and see it for what it really is.
If your opinions differ,.which they clearly do,.you have obviously had more positive experiences and episodes than I have.
I would not reccomend anybody to be a driver today,.because as a green new starter it would be neither possible nor appropriate to deal with all the grief and unnecessary b/s in the way that I do, as an experienced hand.
I’ve seen it all and can smell unadulterated bull crap at 100 paces, and I react accordinglly, which imo is the only way to deal with it to get any element of enjoyment and/or fairness.
If you interpret this attitude as ‘old style driver moaning’ then so be it, but most older drivers I know do agree about how this job has turned out over the years, so we can not ALL be wrong.
Anybody who knows me will tell you I am quite a positive bloke about most things, but I can not pretend everything in the garden of road haulage is lovely,.when it clearly aint.
But I will just carry on dealing with it in my own sucessful ways to maintain my good quality of working life in the job anyhoo.
A job which may surprise you…I still enjoy.
Because I’m crediting you with a sense of perspective based on experience; is that unwelcome?
I wish. I’ve just spent the afternoon drafting a legal letter, threatening an Operator with having his O-licence removed for his dodgy shenanigans, such is my rose-tinted world
At last! Something we can fully agree on
I’m still classed as a driver and I’m older than you I’m fairly certain.
Glad to hear it, even though that isn’t coming through in what you’re writing these days, and, complaining never solved anything, unless there was some well considered action behind it.
Sorry mate but I’m still getting the frosty passive aggresive vibe with a slight hint of patronising, but hey ho not a real problem, but I still ask myself…why?
As for you being older than me?,.the jury is out.
I aint giving my age, abd I assume you’ve seen pics of me on here to come to that conclusion but suffice to say I am often told I look a lot younger than what I am, not boasting just telling what I am constantly told…and I was first involved in road transport in 1979.
But hey, I aint intersted in a game of ‘Top Trumps’.
As for complaining without taking action not solving anything…
I’ve already expalined, …in an industry full of non backing up invertrbrates , (oops there I go again with my negative views on the job) my ‘action’ is to look after myself and make the best of things,.which has been very successful so far tbh.
I’ve never really understood what passive-aggressive was supposed to mean, and I’m not really interested to find out. As far as I can see it’s just the way you’re choosing to take it, but whatever. Other than being on the same forum and having HGV entitlements I don’t think we have any common ground so I won’t bother trying to engage with any other of your posts.
One of the places i worked at one morning there was the tm an office bod and a couple of drivers in the smoke hut. the tm was moaning about a lorry driver that had nearly gone in the back of him because he had decided to cut in front of him because he wanted to come off at the junction and couldn’t understand why the lorry had blow its horn at him. The office manager then told a story about an accident he had had in a lorry in similar circumstances and explained about the blind spots. I said something about would he ever go back into driving and his answer was he wouldn’t for this company because they load the drivers with too much work in stupid locations with only half the address and then ring the driver up every hour asking why its taking so long. The fact that he was the one that doled out the work and was then on the phone to the drivers escaped him.
I wish. I’ve just spent the afternoon drafting a legal letter, threatening an Operator with having his O-licence removed for his dodgy shenanigans, such is my rose-tinted world