Issue link: https://read.dmtmag.com/i/671344
President's Profile 68 May 2016 BestDriverJOBS www.bestdriverjobs.com ary, and that's to change the way driv- ers are paid. "The fact that I didn't grow up in the industry meant I didn't assume that mileage pay is just the way it works. Part of the problem is that companies look at drivers like a variable expense, and the burden's on the drivers if there's no freight or there's bad traffic or bad weather. We just turned that upside down and decided that that's the company's responsibility," explains Wilbur. "It's not that we pay our drivers more than most companies, it's that we pay our drivers differently than every company. We effectively have a salary based structure which guarantees pay and income stability." Wilbur formulated his salary-based pay structure in conjunction with the company's most senior drivers, who had experience with the issue of deal- ing with fluctuating week to week pay. Wilbur looked at his drivers' weekly pay going back a year and realized that there was absolutely no consistency. "What I've always said is that ev- erybody in my office is working next week, and they know how much money they're going to make. Drivers are working next week too, but for most companies they don't know how much money they're going to make. They're the employees who have the most value and the most difficult job, yet they don't know how much money they're going to make next week, even though they know they're working," he says. That's when Wilbur decided to insti- tute a salary based program that would guarantee drivers a greater degree of income stability than the unpredict- ability of mileage pay. Of course in the trucking industry, where tradition and regulation reign, change is always hard. Wilbur faced initial resistance to the idea from his office and his drivers, but he eventually convinced his staff to simply try the program for a few months and go from there. In short, the salary-pay model has been a complete success. The program was instituted in January 2012 and SLT is currently down to 26 percent turnover. Also, the new pay program creates a win-win situation that finan- cially benefits both the drivers and the company as a whole, because the extra investment in driver salaries is made up for by money saved in decreased turnover costs. "We had basically no fall out on the driver level, says Wilbur. "We've tweaked some things, and we've learned some lessons on how exactly it should be structured, and it's worked perfectly. How we pay our drivers has been a foundation of our success. We do pay them more than virtually any other company, but it's really more in how we pay them." Wilbur's approach to driver pay is in- dicative of his encompassing view that the ultimate priority of a transportation company should always be its drivers. "It's so simple, but we just treat our drivers like every other employee, not like second class citizens," Wilbur says. "I have a 24/7 open door policy with every driver. I meet every driver in orientation. I have drivers text me, call me, and email me with questions or is- sues. We're listening to our drivers, and if there's a change that's going to help