Fleet Management News & Business Info | Commercial Carrier Journal
Issue link: http://read.dmtmag.com/i/510235
58 COMMERCIAL CARRIER JOURNAL | MAY 2015 COVER STORY: DRIVER TRAINING signed using Adobe Flash, which sometimes was not compatible with mobile devices. ITI now is working with providers of mobile fleet management platforms to connect data – such as the conditions surrounding a hard-braking or speeding event – to an action in the form of a training course. If winter weather was determined to be a factor in the event, a driver might be required to complete a course in winter driving as well as a course on space management. Thom Schoenborn, vice president of marketing for ITI, says that this next phase in the evolution of Pro-Tread – called "di- rected training" – will be ready within 18 months. Coaching behavior Studies show that drivers at the highest risk for accidents are those in the first three to six months of a new job. Soon after J&R Schugel hires drivers, fleet managers can identify those who may need additional training regardless of their past work experiences. "We see their behaviors and work on those," Merches says. When managers coach drivers on questionable behaviors, they show a current clip of the event as well as a previously recorded accident that resulted from the type of behavior being discussed, such as speeding. The message is clear: "Unless you change that behavior, this will happen," Merches says. "These are your peers you are looking at. They've been in the same boat." As one measure of success, the company has seen a de- crease in speeding events by 35 percent and wants to reduce them by another 50 percent. Video-based safety systems give fleets "new, immediate and ongoing" training material, says Steve Mitgang, CEO of SmartDrive Systems. SmartDrive combines the video captured from vehicles with a scoring method to deliver an objective, consistent and ongoing measurement of drivers' skills. G&P Trucking has been using SmartDrive for less than a year, but the Columbia, S.C.-based company plans to outfit its entire 400-com- pany-owned fleet by August while making it available at no charge to its 250 owner-opera- tors. The system has uncovered behaviors "that we didn't even understand or know about," says John Billingsley, director J.J. Keller is working to make training con- tent more closely integrated with its end-to- end compliance management platform. Instructional Technologies Inc. has rebuilt its Pro-Tread training courses to be mobile-friendly. To train drivers, New Ulm, Minn.-based truckload fleet J&R Schugel uses video that comes directly from the scene of events that involve its own driving force.