Navigating the Roads with Mentor Wisdom

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 2 (00:09):
Hey everybody, welcome to a very special
episode of the Outer Vellpodcast.
As you all noticed, it's notthe podcast anymore is it?

Speaker 3 (00:15):
It's not the podcast anymore.
I will get that right one ofthese days.

Speaker 2 (00:18):
One of these days I'll get it right.
Well, as you can all see, it'sa very special episode of this
show.
This show.
We are here, surrounded by theentire Highfield family staff.
Yes, it's been a great timegetting them all in here.
Yes, has it been a great time.
It's been busy, it's been busy,crazy, busy.

(00:39):
I personally blame Kelly forthat.
It's all Kelly's fault.

Speaker 4 (00:43):
It's all.

Speaker 2 (00:44):
Kelly's fault.
It's always Kelly's fault.
As usual, it's all Kelly'sfault.
It's always Kelly's fault.
It's better if you say thatwith a microphone in your hands.

Speaker 1 (00:50):
It felt a little like herding cats a few moments ago,
but yeah, we all are in here.

Speaker 2 (00:55):
Yes, absolutely, we are actually all here.
We can't move.
No, we're kind of stuck.
We're kind of stuck.
There is no easy access thatcouch right there.
Fun fact, they all had to sitin unison.
Yeah, so there's four people ona two-person couch, not?

Speaker 3 (01:12):
before Don, and I didn't get all the way in the
corner it only took about 45minutes for us to get them all
to sit in unison.
Yes, because it was like okay,are we doing this on three or on
three and then we sit, or howare we doing it.

Speaker 2 (01:24):
I know it was like one, two sit, or one, two, three
sit, right exactly.
And then there's the Criscothat's going to be such a mess.
I am not looking forward tocleaning that up?

Speaker 3 (01:34):
Well, it's on you.
I don't live here, so I don'thave to clean it up Well.

Speaker 2 (01:46):
Dean, are you using no cinnamon rolls?
I think Cinnamon rolls forbreakfast tomorrow.
Well, we are so glad.
I know you all saw the introjust now, so you saw everybody
who they are.
That was a lot of fun puttingtogether, jerry.
Thank you so much.
That took hours.

Speaker 5 (01:56):
I know.

Speaker 2 (01:56):
But you had nothing else going on, so it was a
really nice treat to this.
So, Dina, I think it's onlyfitting that I come to you first
and go.
Why are we all here?

Speaker 6 (02:12):
We are here for the Highfield Family 2024 Mentor
Retreat.
That's right.
We are here to celebrate ourmentors, bring them together
with the staff and just showthem our appreciation.
Get them working together alittle bit, getting to know each
other and getting to know us.

Speaker 2 (02:34):
So in the timeline of things as far as the viewer or
listener is concerned, we arejust starting Saturday Last
night we had an epic uhcelebration of life.
Um, yes, that was a lot of fun.
It was a.
We did a dia de muertos uhevent, celebration of life,

(02:56):
right, like it's a remembrance,right, yes, and uh, which was
really fun, really cool, thatthing that Don did.
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (03:07):
I think, that surprised us all.

Speaker 2 (03:09):
I was so mad we didn't have a camera on him.

Speaker 3 (03:11):
Yeah, that surprised us all.

Speaker 2 (03:13):
It's one of those things you have to live in
infamy yeah.

Speaker 1 (03:16):
Infamy Agreed.

Speaker 2 (03:17):
Now when Jimmy tried to outdo him disrespectful, but
you know he's a lot older, butanyways.
So today we're starting themeat and potatoes of the retreat
right.
Yes, what are you excited about?

Speaker 6 (03:35):
I'm excited about the team building event.

Speaker 2 (03:38):
I am too.

Speaker 6 (03:39):
Yeah, I'm really looking forward to that and see
how our mentors fare.

Speaker 2 (03:45):
Yes, oh, man.
So the timing of this is kindof rough, because I want to talk
to you about it, because I'mexcited about it, but we can't.
No, because if you are a mentorand you're here listening to us
now, we can't give it away.
Oh, that's so frustrating.
No, we can't give it away.
Oh that's so frustrating.

(04:06):
Well, next week, me, buttermilkVince, eric, jerry, jerry, no,
not really.
We will wrap up and tell youhow it went, so y'all be on the
lookout for that.

Speaker 1 (04:21):
I'm excited Better than the last one.

Speaker 6 (04:24):
Oh, you know.
I don't know, it's different,it's completely different.
But it only remains to be seenif we can even slightly shadow
what what Mel did, what Mel didlast year with the Amazing Race.

Speaker 2 (04:41):
I believe that would be Stitches it would be Stitches
.
It would be Stitches.
It would be Stitches.

Speaker 6 (04:45):
Okay, I forgot all the names.

Speaker 2 (04:48):
We need name tags.
Hello my name is Exactly, so weall know who we are now.

Speaker 3 (04:54):
I'm a little nervous.
Yeah, a little nervous oh.

Speaker 2 (04:57):
Yeah, about which part?
Yeah, his role, my role.

Speaker 6 (04:59):
What are you doing, oh?

Speaker 2 (04:59):
are you my roll?
What are you doing?
Oh, are you oh.

Speaker 3 (05:05):
Did they not know that?
I didn't know that.
I don't know anything, I justspilled the beans.

Speaker 2 (05:08):
So this is one of those weird situations where I
know what we're doing, highlevel.
I know where it's going to takeplace Well, not really as of
well as of In your house.

Speaker 6 (05:21):
Yeah, as of Somewhere .

Speaker 2 (05:26):
As of 10 minutes ago.
I got the scoop on that and nowI know a little more
information on it.
I am oh this is exciting.

Speaker 6 (05:34):
It's been a team effort with Jerry.
Jerry has done some deepresearch into how to make this
come about this concept and Meland I have worked together in
getting things done.
I'm excited.

Speaker 2 (05:50):
I'm excited too.

Speaker 1 (05:51):
Is it Saturday yet?

Speaker 2 (05:53):
It is, it is Saturday , it is Saturday, it's actually.

Speaker 6 (05:55):
Saturday it's not Saturday night.

Speaker 2 (05:57):
Yes, it's actually really, really cool.
You talk about Jerry helpingout with all this.
It's funny because we broughtJerry in as IT and producer for
this podcast.
That's kind of his whole jobrole and it's morphed into what
he really is is the paidresearcher.
I feel like he spends 50% ofhis time researching, 40% of his

(06:23):
time researching, 40% of histime implementing and 10% of his
time wrangling the five of usfor the podcast.

Speaker 3 (06:32):
There's some time missing there.
We're missing a lot of time forcoffee.
Oh well, yes.

Speaker 2 (06:38):
Prime Day came and went, did you end up getting the
$7,000 coffee maker?

Speaker 11 (06:42):
No, he won't let me, I won't let him.
He literally told me no.
Thanks for the confirmation Donyou could get.

Speaker 2 (06:52):
Okay, all right, I get it.
You could take the same moneyand travel, you know, first
class to France for a week.
You could buy a new car, youcould.
What else could you do withthat money, I don't know.
Or you could buy a coffee makerwhich will make coffee for
years and years Well, the way hebuys coffee makers a couple

(07:14):
years, that's true, a coupleyears, and it's the gift that
keeps on giving.

Speaker 11 (07:20):
They would make really really good coffee oh.

Speaker 1 (07:22):
I would love to come over and have that really,
really good coffee.

Speaker 3 (07:24):
See there, that's a good reason not to get the
coffee maker, I'd rather comepay my $4 or $5 to you.

Speaker 11 (07:30):
He literally went to Starbucks just the other day
and I was like, look, if we hadthis at home, that would have
saved you $7.
And your time.
Yes, and your time?
Yeah, because we waited at thedrive-thru through forever
Forever.

Speaker 2 (07:41):
And that was on company time.

Speaker 11 (07:43):
No, it wasn't, oh, okay Still.

Speaker 2 (07:49):
I do like a cup of joe, but it's funny because you
just like a year ago, you toldus about the new excited.

Speaker 11 (07:55):
That was the a good drip coffee maker.
This is an actual espressomachine.
I want an espresso machine.

Speaker 2 (08:02):
Isn't there like a coffee shop going out of
business?
You could just buy their oldcoffee maker.
What is this like?

Speaker 3 (08:07):
Are we having a side conversation here?

Speaker 2 (08:10):
Gina needs the microphone.

Speaker 6 (08:14):
What's going on here?

Speaker 2 (08:16):
Sidebar there's no sidebars, you are live on
television.

Speaker 6 (08:20):
The American sidebar about an espresso machine that
he could potentially get one fornot quite as much money.
That does exactly what have youmet Jerry?

Speaker 2 (08:30):
Yeah, Is it a Breville?
Is it chrome plated?

Speaker 6 (08:32):
I don't remember.
It's not mine.
My daughter has one.

Speaker 3 (08:34):
Okay, if it's not a Breville, he doesn't want it,
it's not interested.

Speaker 11 (08:37):
It's not $7,000 like Patrick says, but it is
expensive.
But it would match all my otherappliances because I have
invested a lot into the Brevillebrand.

Speaker 6 (08:48):
Oh, okay, yeah, Well, I just think you need to send
this podcast to Breville andjust see, yes, If you're out
there listening, hook me up.

Speaker 1 (08:57):
The only catch is you can do research and some other
stuff for them too, the onlycatch is you have to bring it to
the show every day.

Speaker 4 (09:04):
It's actually got to sit right up here.

Speaker 2 (09:07):
It replaces this wonderful picture of me and Eric
.
And every day, part of the showis one moment for a coffee
break and we go and we travel.

Speaker 4 (09:17):
We are looking for new sponsors for the show.

Speaker 11 (09:19):
We are New sponsors.

Speaker 2 (09:23):
New sponsors?
Yes, well, the old sponsors,they're getting tired.
You know Like they're like andyou know I go to the board
meetings and I deal with thepushback from the current
sponsors and they're mean,they're just mean, they're just
mean.
So it's yeah, new sponsorswould be nice, but don't tell
the current sponsors, they wouldnot be happy about it.

Speaker 3 (09:45):
They would not be happy about that.
The last time we got paid bythe current sponsors, they paid
us in pennies.
That was a pain to go to thebank with all those pennies.

Speaker 11 (09:54):
And I think after the last one, Pallet is not
happy with me.

Speaker 4 (09:57):
Oh yeah.

Speaker 3 (09:59):
That kind of ruined that.

Speaker 1 (10:01):
No free coffee from them, for sure.

Speaker 2 (10:03):
RTA R-Petro.

Speaker 3 (10:07):
Pilot canceled my professional driver's card after
that oh no.

Speaker 2 (10:10):
But Love's is taking care of us.
Love's is doing a great job.

Speaker 3 (10:14):
I go to the area every day and get a shower.

Speaker 5 (10:18):
They need that bean to cup though.

Speaker 3 (10:20):
Does Love's have the?

Speaker 2 (10:20):
bean to cup.
Yeah, welcome to 2019.
I haven't been in a truck in acup.
Does Loves have the bean in acup?
Okay, is it Okay?
Yeah, welcome to 2019.

Speaker 5 (10:25):
I haven't been in a truck in a minute.

Speaker 1 (10:28):
How many minutes should we calculate?

Speaker 2 (10:29):
We should Kidding Someone If you can calculate she
got off the road in 2019.
How many minutes has it been?
No, we didn't what.

Speaker 5 (10:37):
February, the end of February, oh you got 2020.

Speaker 2 (10:42):
That's right.

Speaker 5 (10:43):
Yeah, we got off the truck and COVID shut the world
down 16 days later.

Speaker 2 (10:46):
In all fairness, she preempted her getting off the
truck.
She bought a car in 2019 andparked it at my house.
Facts Like okay, Because that'swhat you do.
Right, yeah, that's what you do.

Speaker 5 (11:00):
They had the one I wanted up here.
They didn't have.
We looked everywhere, did wenot there?

Speaker 3 (11:04):
you go.
Yes, yeah, we got it inDelaware.
Can I just say Jimmy's hair.

Speaker 1 (11:08):
I love it.

Speaker 3 (11:09):
Oh yeah, it looks like it's a cross between John
and Punch on chips.
Oh, I love it.

Speaker 1 (11:20):
I love it.
I heard Tom sell it earlierfrom Dina.
I did say he kind of looks likehe's from the 80s, Like I don't
know.
It's got the feathery thinggoing.
I like it.

Speaker 10 (11:31):
It looks good.
Well, in the 80s it actuallywas the butt cut.

Speaker 1 (11:34):
And.

Speaker 10 (11:34):
I love the side cut now.

Speaker 2 (11:36):
Oh yeah, you got to go side cut at least Down the
middle is no good.

Speaker 10 (11:41):
Every couple of years I just grow it out
something different.
I'm threatening now, when I docut it, I'm going to leave the
back the way it is for a while.

Speaker 1 (11:46):
Oh, rock the mullet, sport a mullet.
I've never had a mullet, I'vealways wanted to.

Speaker 10 (11:51):
I'm a full-grown man .
I can do what I want.

Speaker 2 (11:53):
I think that'd be fun .
Yeah, you're forgetting.
You're a married, full-grownman.

Speaker 1 (11:57):
That preempts You're wearing your hair, though,
that's correct.

Speaker 2 (12:02):
No, yes, I like it almost got chopped off today.
Dad walked in the house and hi,dad, and he walks up and he
looks at you and he goes.
I know that hair, jay.

Speaker 4 (12:17):
Leno.

Speaker 10 (12:19):
Thanks, Donnie.

Speaker 1 (12:20):
Thanks, Donnie.

Speaker 4 (12:21):
You're welcome.
It's 100% accurate.
No, it's not, it's completelyaccurate.

Speaker 10 (12:27):
For those of you who can't hear, Maybe the color
only in color.

Speaker 2 (12:30):
No, it's great, I think it's wonderful.
Go ahead and give us fiveminutes, give us your best, ross
Perot.
Oh wait, that's not.

Speaker 3 (12:44):
Leno.

Speaker 2 (12:45):
That would be.
Oh, that was Dana Carvey.
Was it Dana Carvey?
It was Dana Carvey right.
Yeah.

Speaker 10 (12:53):
Thanks, Vince.

Speaker 2 (12:54):
You're welcome.
It could use a haircut.

Speaker 10 (12:59):
No, Thank you, no, I like it.

Speaker 1 (13:04):
Makes him look distinguished.

Speaker 2 (13:07):
Makes him look like straight out of a 1960s sitcom
70s.

Speaker 3 (13:11):
I would give him 70s I wouldn't say 60s, it's
definitely not 80s.

Speaker 10 (13:14):
You're too young to know You're too young to know a
60s sitcom.

Speaker 2 (13:17):
I saw.
I Dream of Jeannie.

Speaker 1 (13:18):
Again, Tom Selleck's still rocking his hair like that
.

Speaker 2 (13:22):
Is Tom Selleck still alive?
Yes.
I would like to hear from Jimmy.
I think we should Because, asy'all know, the listening
audience and, of course,everybody here y'all are all
deep lovers of the show andwatch every single week.
Jimmy, we've been talking withEric for the past several weeks.

(13:47):
We had a week off, but he'sback on.
Y'all are regulars.
He's been telling us all aboutwhat it's like being in the yard
and then going up there andworking with y'all for a little
bit.
I'm curious now what do youthink?
How do you like having himaround?

Speaker 1 (14:01):
That's Eric Bender, correct.
I don't think Eric Highfield'sin the yard that is Eric Bender.

Speaker 10 (14:06):
Yes, the newest addition to the Highfield family
.
Yes, Eric.
Bender, yeah, he worked withVince on the yard for a couple
weeks.
He came to the HighfieldSoutheast Division in North
Georgia and worked for a weekgetting him trained on the
administrative side of themaintenance department and he's
picking it up good.
He's learning a lot and we'llget him on the phones as soon as

(14:28):
we absolutely can, so me andDon can have a few minutes off
every now and then.
But yeah, we're excited to haveEric and looking forward to the
future having him inmaintenance.

Speaker 2 (14:39):
Absolutely.
It's so cool because right nowhe just got a new monitor.
So for those that don't know,for the maintenance staff and
for operations and maybeaccounting I'm not sure about
that, but we buy theseridiculously large.

Speaker 3 (14:53):
Not for operations.
Fleet support Fleet support I'mso sorry, no, no, no, you got
an iPad.
It's easier to carry thisaround than a big monitor, than
a 40-inch monitor, yeah it trulyis.

Speaker 2 (15:07):
So they get these huge monitors and you can
actually get like two fulldocument pages side-by-side and
manipulate and do all this coolstuff with it, which is great
because you use differentprograms.
So sometimes you have oneprogram one window, one in the
other, and then go back andforth.
So his just, you just went, youactually it didn't even come in

(15:35):
.
You had to go fetch it, if Iremember correctly, out at the
Best Buy in where was it?
On Morse Road.

Speaker 3 (15:37):
On.

Speaker 2 (15:37):
Morse Road.
Okay, yeah, so we sent youliterally the opposite side of
Columbus from us.
Nothing like going 40 minutesto pick up a monitor.
So it's set up in my kitchenright now, our dining room,
vermont.
Nothing like going 40 minutesto pick up a monitor.
So it's set up in my kitchenright now, our dining room
rather, and it takes up theentire table it does.
I can hide behind it.
You literally could be asleepand we would not know.

Speaker 12 (15:56):
Yeah, I might have done it.

Speaker 2 (15:58):
Oh, really I don't think so Every time.

Speaker 1 (16:01):
I looked at you.
You looked like you were.

Speaker 12 (16:02):
Oh yeah, I was into what I was doing.
You were taking care ofbusiness.

Speaker 1 (16:06):
Or Jimmy was by you providing.

Speaker 12 (16:08):
Laser focus.
He didn't even say hi to me forthe first 20 minutes.
I didn't see you because youwere hidden behind it, I didn't
see you.

Speaker 3 (16:13):
Yeah, I'm surprised.

Speaker 12 (16:15):
It's nice, though, for sure.

Speaker 2 (16:17):
Well, it's great, we are going to check the camera
slider.

Speaker 4 (16:20):
You wouldn't get fired already.

Speaker 2 (16:24):
You wouldn't get fired, there would just be a
conversation.
Yes, no, but it was really cool.
You know, at one point today,since we are all up here, at one
point today, we had you behindyour cubicle that you formed
with your monitor and laptop.
Don Pacing and Jimmy had one ofmy speakers.

(16:48):
He has his laptop set up on topof one of my floor-standing
speakers for my stereo in theliving room, his earbuds in the
monitor doing that Like it wasjust chaos.
It was just everybody was goinganywhere they could go to find
a quiet space to do something, Ithink, if I'm not mistaken, so

(17:10):
when y'all come up here, jim andKelly come up here, they are,
they stay at our house and atone point, kayla, you were in
their bedroom doing work on acomputer.
Because you couldn't get awayfrom the insanity and it was she
wanted a big monitor.

Speaker 12 (17:25):
She has a big monitor.
Oh, is that what it was A bigmonitor.

Speaker 2 (17:28):
Oh, that makes sense.
Okay, oh, now I get it.
Okay, well, you know.

Speaker 1 (17:37):
It's hard if you get us all on the phones together
with someone, because I cameover around noon, 11 noon, and
was still answering calls inbetween helping prepare for
mentor retreat her office wasthe uh, the bar, the bar the
kitchen bar the kitchen bar yeahyep, just a little corner that
had a plug in so I could keepthings going.
But you know you, you get us allon the phone and you either

(17:58):
have to step outside or retreatto a closet, or you know, yes
thing there where you could bequiet, you know here hear and
not sound like you know you'rein a customer service kind of
office setting.

Speaker 2 (18:12):
There were quite a few calls that I'm pretty sure.
If you called in and talked toJimmy today, he was outside on
the back porch during that call.
I have a comment to say on that.
Yes, ma'am.

Speaker 7 (18:22):
My office was your patio bar and I'm right in the
middle of a conference call andhere comes Jimmy with a leaf
blower.

Speaker 1 (18:30):
He had to take a break from his computer.
I guess.

Speaker 10 (18:33):
And he comes down the stairs, a little fresh air,
and he's just in his own littleworld.
Yardwork is therapy for me.
Ten minutes of leaf blowinggets my mind right.

Speaker 7 (18:40):
Yes, and he went on, you know, and then, 10 minutes
later, more leaves.

Speaker 4 (18:48):
Oh my gosh, the leaves and the wind are insane.

Speaker 2 (18:51):
We just picked up for this event.
We have a big van so we can geteverybody around easily and
it's one of those tall vans it'sreally tall.
So I went to the Enterprise,got that van today and I was
driving it on the interstate.
It was just me in it headingback to out to the yard, uh, to
see events, and the whole timeon the interstate.

(19:13):
I'm like it better be windybecause I am getting blown all.
I'm like I can't keep it.
Yeah, I can't keep it in thecenter of the lane and I'm like
it better be the wind and uh,when we got off, uh, at the exit
, there were some flags thereand they were just like yeah,
straight up straight up, butyeah, and then they were
straight up, and then they wouldcollapse, and then straight up
again, like it was.

Speaker 3 (19:33):
Like oh my gosh, mel and I were working on a truck in
the yard today and we were both, I think I was on the driver's
side and she was on thepassenger side, and we had the
doors open and it was just theright angle where the wind just
moved straight through.
So we figured at that point wehad to at least one of us had to
have a door closed so wewouldn't get that wind, so we
could actually work in the truckwithout things blowing
everywhere oh, wind was blowingso hard, so the the doors were

(19:56):
latched open yes, both doorswere completely open all the way
and staying open, and there wasjust a wind tunnel coming
straight through the cab of thetruck yes, and it was blowing
out like our rags that we wereusing to clean with the paper
towels.

Speaker 5 (20:12):
It was just blowing them out of the truck, so we had
to close the door yeah I didn'tfeel anything in that tank of a
350 I was driving oh, I bet youdidn't it.

Speaker 4 (20:21):
It's nice and low and heavy, just so you know you
might have been blowing in thattwo-story tall van.

Speaker 2 (20:27):
But the.

Speaker 5 (20:28):
F-350 was rock solid.

Speaker 2 (20:30):
I have an old, if you can imagine, one of those old
square Ford F-350s Four-door.
A four-door Got a sleeper cab.
What do you call those cabs?
A crew cab?
No, but over the bed is thecanopy.
Oh the camper, camper, shell,camper, shell over the bed, but
it's four-wheel drive, it's onhuge tires and, yeah, you're
right, you can't feel anything,except for every pebble.

Speaker 5 (20:53):
That it did.
It definitely could feel thebumps, you could feel the bumps,
no wind.

Speaker 2 (20:58):
Now maybe that was part of what threw me off,
because I drove that to thedealership and didn't feel
anything.
And then I get in this van andI'm like what is?

Speaker 13 (21:04):
happening.
Try driving one of our trucksaround the corner to Carrier in
that wind.

Speaker 2 (21:12):
Yeah, yeah, well, yeah, I've done it.

Speaker 3 (21:15):
Try driving one of our trucks down I-80 in that
wind.

Speaker 2 (21:18):
Yes, in the winter let's sprinkle a little ice in
there.

Speaker 4 (21:23):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (21:24):
No, thank you.

Speaker 4 (21:25):
Thank you.

Speaker 1 (21:26):
I'm like how many of us have done it?
No, I'm just kidding.

Speaker 2 (21:28):
Yeah, yeah, that brings back some memories.
Thanks, vince.

Speaker 4 (21:35):
You're welcome.

Speaker 2 (21:36):
You're welcome Reminds me of being out in South
Dakota learning how to skate.

Speaker 3 (21:40):
Learning how to skate in South Dakota Ice skate.

Speaker 4 (21:42):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (21:43):
In a truck.

Speaker 4 (21:43):
Yes, Learning how to skate yes, is that the code?
Ice skate, yeah.
In a truck, yes.
Or on literal ice?

Speaker 3 (21:47):
skate On a truck.
Oh, yeah, okay, in a truck.
That was me.
Yeah, I get it.
Oh, that was good times.

Speaker 2 (21:52):
Great memories, good times, your truck's not supposed
to be at a 45-degree anglegoing down the road.
No, no, no when you're goingover ice and it's out of 45
degree angles, you didn't feelany pebbles did you?
You don't feel any pebbles.
The ice really does levelthings out quite nice.

Speaker 4 (22:07):
I just felt the seat in my butt.
Cheeks, that's awesome.

Speaker 1 (22:14):
I like that.
Carla's been here.
We all have a place to staythat when you come in.
She's been over at the LukeShire house.
She heard me on a call theother morning and she's like
I've never heard somebody elselike you know what your job does
.
And then we had our littlemeeting you know today that we
usually have, and she camedownstairs for that too and said

(22:35):
it on it, and so it's it's neatthat she gets to see what what
we're all of us are doing.

Speaker 3 (22:40):
So yeah, I really like that I can't wait to get
carla in the yard for a week,and there you go she sees what
we're doing in the yard.

Speaker 4 (22:45):
Yeah sad ones have to get done, so I can't that's
true, you're right.

Speaker 9 (22:49):
You're right.
The one thing I from my end, isI don't see what everybody else
does, so it's interesting to meto sit in here and hear what
you have to say to your people.
What you have to say to yourpeople yeah, it's all.
It's just stuff that I don'tget to hear because I'm behind
the scenes.
I'm the one that makes surethat you know that you have

(23:12):
money to buy another truck.
Yes, that's true, and to makethe truck drivers happy on
Tuesday morning when they lookat their bank account.
Yeah, so.

Speaker 13 (23:25):
Vince, there's actually three of us that have
not driven a truck, Not two likeyou say in your intros.

Speaker 3 (23:32):
Well, I do say three, there's actually four, there's
actually four.
I forget about that.
Yeah, over the road, and I dotell people.
I say, look the three thathaven't.
Or if I say two, the two thathaven't.
Mel has been doing this for along time.
She has a CDL, she drives thetrucks, she has been around us
long enough to understand thestories we talk about.

(23:53):
And Delina is your best friendand she's heard a zillion
stories and she's been with uslong enough where she knows what
we go through as well Maybe notpersonal experience, but has
dealt with it.
So, but that's, people don'tunderstand that.
All of us have this experienceand we understand it.
We're not people that have comeoff the street or come out of

(24:15):
MBA school and just startrunning a trucking company.
We have lived the life,especially our founders, who
started out right when you are,some people that are brand new
and started out right where youare.
Some people that are brand newand started out doing this and
built it from there.
So again, understanding whatthe lifestyle is like as a truck
driver.

Speaker 2 (24:33):
Absolutely.
I mean, it's Eric and I.
Our story is showing up at a TAthat we were told to go to.
Went to the service departmentthey said oh yeah, here's your
keys.
Yeah, and that was ourintroduction into trucking,
which you think about what we donow, and it's horrifying,
completely different Horrifying.
Like there's no way we would dothat.

Speaker 3 (24:52):
No.
But that's how it was back inthose days, and that's how it
still is for some fleets.

Speaker 2 (24:55):
For a lot of fleets.
A lot of fleets don't roll thatway, but you know, even Dad
like had a CDL, but it was forchurch, so I was kind of sharing
.
We were talking in the vantoday.
Do y'all remember or do y'allhave the same experience of like

(25:17):
, loading up into a 15-passengervan and driving hours away to
summer camp?
Sure, yeah.
So we were talking about thatkind of situation.
And Melissa, how many?
Why did we?
Melissa will testify to this,melissa Lee, my sister, as we
like to call her, stitches.
For some reason we never wentto summer camp close, except for

(25:39):
Mobile.
I would be the only one.
Yeah, that was the closest EverGlorietta, new Mexico.
From Louisiana it's a bit of adrive Ridgecrest, ridgecrest,
north Carolina, the place inKentucky between the lakes that
we did Animal.
City Beach.
Animal City Beach, kansas City,missouri, st Louis Missouri.

Speaker 13 (25:59):
Because who wants to go to summer camp in Louisiana?
It's a little warm.

Speaker 3 (26:03):
Can I venture a guess why your parents sent you to
summer camp so far away?
No, no.
No, because Dad was right alongwith us.

Speaker 2 (26:13):
Dad was a designated driver back then and so he did
drive those 15-passenger vansand we've been again all over
the country with him and you hadto get your cdl.
So, uh, the 15 passenger vans,the old school ones um, they had
this issue where if you loadedthem improperly or something, uh

(26:37):
, and you went around a corner,they would flip over and there
was charges left and right thatwere having kids go to summer
camp and they're tolling outtheir vans.
I don't know if you rememberthat or not.
So the insurance companiesbasically said we're not
insuring you anymore if you'regoing to have these vans,
because y'all don't know how tooperate them.
And so the church went to,whereas in that situation where
we owned a 15 passenger van, itcouldn't use it.
So they sold the van and dadwas on the bus committee and, if

(27:01):
I'm not mistaken, when it goesover 15 passengers, you had to
get a cdl with a passengerendorsement, right, correct,
yeah?
And so, um, y'all were tryingto get a 15 passenger bus, but
it never.
None were good.
Right, like every.
Every time y'all kept lookingat it like a 26 passenger or
something like that.
That we it was a 26 passengerwhile we wound up with yeah, and

(27:24):
uh, so you and a couple ofdeacons at the church and the
youth pastor, obviously, and acouple other people went and
y'all got cdls together, right,correct?
Yeah?
So I mean you've got the cdl.
You went through all the allthe rigmarole to get one, just
like we all did.
Passenger stuff is, it remindsme, a lot of hazmat.
So there was like when you wentto at crossings at crossings

(27:46):
you have to stop right.

Speaker 12 (27:48):
Stop open the door, listen.

Speaker 2 (27:50):
Yes, continue on.
Yeah, and so you got toexperience all that stuff from
that angle where we had cargoand hazmat.
Only two people don't have CDLs, like Carly you don't have CDL
right and Carla, you don't haveCDL right.
And, yeah, dillian doesn'teither.

Speaker 9 (28:04):
But I do have a motorcycle endorsement.

Speaker 2 (28:07):
You do that's true.

Speaker 1 (28:09):
That counts for something, doesn't it.

Speaker 2 (28:10):
It does count for something.
It does count for something,yeah.

Speaker 3 (28:14):
I want to see Carla make a U-turn on a Hayabusa.

Speaker 2 (28:18):
Can you make a U-turn in the box?

Speaker 9 (28:20):
I no longer have the Hayabusa.

Speaker 2 (28:23):
For those of you who don't know, Hayabusa is the
fastest production bike you canget.

Speaker 3 (28:30):
basically, it's a very large bike and Carla's all
of 5'1".

Speaker 9 (28:34):
Yes, yes, it was a very fast bike.
Plus, it had an OZ on it.

Speaker 3 (28:40):
I always forget that part.
I always forget that part.

Speaker 1 (28:43):
She doesn't.

Speaker 9 (28:44):
No, she doesn't, and that's an important part of it
Do you ever use it, not the NOS,because it was fast enough
without it.
Yeah, thank you.
I bet You'd be surprised howmany people will pull up on the
side of you whether it's a car,a bike, a truck want to race you
when you're on that bike Firstgear, you're out.

(29:05):
You're out of the park.

Speaker 3 (29:07):
First gear you've left them.
They're in the smoke.

Speaker 4 (29:13):
Did you ever do a wheelie?

Speaker 9 (29:15):
No, I had it too low.

Speaker 12 (29:18):
The wheelbase is a lot longer on a high booster
than it is a normal bike.
Popping a wheelie is possiblebecause it's got enough power,
but it's just not smart.
It's a lot harder to do.

Speaker 3 (29:27):
You wouldn't get up very high.

Speaker 12 (29:29):
It's a lot harder to do.

Speaker 9 (29:30):
It was stretched.

Speaker 3 (29:33):
It wasn't popping a wheelie, it was a drag racer.

Speaker 12 (29:36):
Yeah, it wasn't popping a wheelie.
It was just going to spin thetires.

Speaker 2 (29:43):
That's always fun to watch too.
Smoke the tire until it justexplodes.

Speaker 9 (29:46):
And kiss everybody bye oh.

Speaker 3 (29:54):
And that my friends is Mild-Mannered Carla.

Speaker 2 (30:01):
It's the silent ones.
Right, it's the silent ones.

Speaker 4 (30:04):
Be, careful.

Speaker 9 (30:04):
How long have we known her?
I just found this out this year.
It's the silent ones, right,it's the silent ones.
It truly is.
Wow, be careful, it truly is.

Speaker 1 (30:07):
How long have we known her?
And I just found this out thisyear.

Speaker 2 (30:09):
Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 9 (30:11):
Yeah, who knew, the less people knew about you.

Speaker 12 (30:16):
The better off you are.
Do we even know your legal name?
Oh?

Speaker 2 (30:24):
I do, and for the right price.
I might consider there you go,oh no.
I kid, I kid, I kid.
I would never.
I would never do that.
Well, kayla, let me ask you aquestion.

Speaker 8 (30:37):
Okay.

Speaker 2 (30:38):
You are what I would call the sensible one.

Speaker 8 (30:41):
Okay.

Speaker 2 (30:42):
In this group of Insane people I am I am very
offended and I disagree withthem.
The sensible one.

Speaker 3 (30:46):
Okay, in this group of insane people I am, I am very
offended and I disagree withthem.
I'm going to call Time out.
Pull up your sleeve.
You're calling her the sensibleone.

Speaker 5 (30:54):
She looks like she's been beaten nine rounds with
Mike Tyson by pigs right now.
Okay what?
No, that's not sensible.
She gets trampled.

Speaker 8 (31:04):
You got beat up by pigs.

Speaker 2 (31:05):
Explain.

Speaker 8 (31:07):
It's my job to put them on the truck, and they
decided they did not want to geton the truck, so they ran me
over and just went right backover the top of me.

Speaker 3 (31:18):
So wait, I'm confused .

Speaker 1 (31:19):
How many pigs?
When did we start a pigdivision?
Hang on, hang on hang on.

Speaker 3 (31:22):
I was just saying Jerry's doing moving, you're
moving people in trucks, right?
I mean, we went over that ayear ago or so and now we have a
pig moving company also.
Sure, I don't understand.
When did we start moving pigs?

Speaker 5 (31:40):
She's the crazy pig lady.

Speaker 8 (31:41):
I went back to my roots.
I started with pigs.
That's where my career started,and then we went to trucking
and stayed there.

Speaker 2 (31:49):
So, basically, you work for Highfield and you are
our.
For those of you that don'tknow, kayla, she's our Panther
fleet support.
And then not really in theevenings, I would say mornings
Right, and like super early inthe morning you go and work with
a local pig farmer.

Speaker 8 (32:06):
Yep.
Pig farmer right, yeah, yeah,okay, usually somewhere between
3 and 5 am is when it starts,and then it's about an hour a
load and you leave.
You have somewhere between twoand four loads at a time.

Speaker 4 (32:21):
Wow.

Speaker 8 (32:21):
How many?

Speaker 1 (32:21):
pigs go on a truck 170 usually.
And at a time, how many pigs goon a truck 170 usually and how
many came back over you RoughlyBefore you got out of the way.

Speaker 8 (32:30):
I didn't get out of the way.
I stayed on the ground andcovered my head.

Speaker 5 (32:35):
She'll show you later .

Speaker 8 (32:37):
Probably three.

Speaker 1 (32:40):
Three pigs.
How big are these pigs?

Speaker 8 (32:44):
They're like 280.

Speaker 3 (32:45):
Oh, that's tall, small ones, small ones.
Yeah, I get it.
I get it yeah.

Speaker 12 (32:49):
They're just the babies.

Speaker 3 (32:51):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (32:52):
Yeah, when you got up did you look at them and go bad
bacon it's hard not to get madsometimes.

Speaker 8 (33:05):
No, I just said, well , better just go back and get
these, Because if you get mad itjust makes it so much worse.

Speaker 12 (33:12):
The other end running forward like yeah, okay,
because I mean it's far.
Yeah, you just see her kind ofget up.
You know I'm like, okay, she'sokay, she's getting up.
Yeah, oh, you want to switch.
You know you want to come backhere.
And she's like, no, I'm good.

Speaker 5 (33:26):
My point is you called her the sensible one.

Speaker 2 (33:28):
Yes, well, okay, I don't know what the question was
now.
It was an hour ago.

Speaker 8 (33:37):
I'm okay being the sensible one, okay.

Speaker 2 (33:39):
We've had.
Some people have sent us someinformation not information
questions and they've inquiredabout the mentor program and
what all we're doing.
I thought you know what.
We're here to celebrate mentorsand to work with them and to
reinvest some time and resources, and I thought it would be fun.
Why don't we go through acouple of these mentor questions

(34:00):
?
I'm going to pitch them outthere and then I'm going to let
someone volunteer to take it andit will go from there and, of
course, I expect to hear fromall of you.
The mentor program that we have.
What do you think the primaryand maybe secondary goal of that
program is?

Speaker 1 (34:21):
You know, being contractor, sourcing or
recruiting, however you want tocall it, that program is, you
know, being contractor, sourcingor recruiting, however you want
to call it, when people ask me,you know what is the reason for
the mentor program?
It's to come out here and hitthe road running from day one
and to maximize your revenue,but not to just go into an
industry, even though it'strucking and you may be from
trucking but it's expeditingcompletely different animal of

(34:45):
trucking.
But it's to come out here andthe mentors are sharing
peer-to-peer knowledge.
These are teams that want topay it forward and from day one,
from as soon as Vince or Melgives you keys and they leave
the truck and walk away, callthose mentors.
They're going to knoweverything about everything.
Those mentors, they're going toknow everything about
everything and if they don't,they'll point you in the right

(35:06):
direction, either on theHighfield staff phone tree or
calling Panther and who youshould talk to, or FedEx and who
you should talk to.
But it's really to just lessenthe anxiety of something new and
if you lean into that, thetransition into this new job or
career that you're taking onwill just be minimalized, and
that's what I feel.

(35:26):
You know.
It just really.
These people want to sharetheir knowledge.
Why not take advantage of that?

Speaker 6 (35:32):
I actually, when my husband and I came on in 2019,
Kelly and Jimmy were not ourmentors, but they were here in
Columbus when we picked up ourtruck.
We had had our CDLs for onemonth.
We went to school in SouthernCalifornia.
We got our CDLs.

(35:52):
We had our hard copies.
Jerry was actually our mentor.
So we started driving for FedExCustom Critical.
Started driving for FedExCustom Critical but I didn't
know anything about trucking orother than you know what I had

(36:13):
to pass to get take my test.
What I had done behind the wheeland just things at that time
that you saw on YouTube, youknow.
But I had never done it before,did not know even.
I mean, we will joke sometimesabout how some people don't know
how to fuel a truck.
Well, hello, I, I didn't know.

(36:33):
There were two fuel tanks onthe truck.
I didn't know that if you turnoff the driver's side, one
before you passengers, one isdone.

Speaker 2 (36:41):
You got to start all over again, start all over again
.

Speaker 6 (36:44):
You know, I mean all of those things that like vince
was saying.
You know, most of us here havedriven a truck.
Don't let that intimidate you,because some of us here started
from ground zero and yeah sureand learned from our mentors,
from jerry, from don, from jimand Kelly I mean the people that

(37:05):
had been doing this before usand I don't know how we would
have made it, but we did withtheir help and it's invaluable.
And I think that's what makesHighfield so special is that
Patrick and Eric were there.
Highfield so special is thatPatrick and Eric were there.

(37:28):
No-transcript in the businessto be successful right out of
the gate, because there's not alearning curve if you use your
mentors.
Yes, it's flat there's no curve,because they are going to tell
you what you need to know to besuccessful.

(37:50):
And yes, there's ups and downs,but there's ups and downs in
any new career.
This is your business business,this is your new life.
You're not an employee.
This is you, on your own,making decisions, and if you
don't take their advice, you'rejust doing yourself a disservice
.
Sure To the success of yourbusiness.

Speaker 3 (38:17):
I think what a lot of experienced drivers forget is
where they came from and therewas a time in their career where
they didn't know how to feeleither.
You know and when mel and I aredoing our orientations in the
yard and showing you the truck,I try our my my hardest to
remember that that there arepeople that the people I'm
talking to sometimes have zeroexperience and don't know what

(38:38):
an apu is.
They have no idea how to feel atruck and don't know what an
APU is.
They have no idea how to fuel atruck.
They don't know anything aboutit except, like you said, what
they learned in truck drivingschool, which is a far cry from
what you need to know to operatea truck, let alone operate a
truck in your business.
You know, we had mentees thathad no idea how to fuel a truck

(39:00):
and they were embarrassed to askthe question.
But don't be embarrassedbecause, again, we were all
there at some point and if youstart with a carrier, your
trainer, hopefully, will showyou that, but coming on board
with us as a contractor, you maynot know that stuff.
So you ask your mentors thosequestions and your mentors help
you.
And a lot of times we hadexperiences where we had a

(39:23):
mentor team.
Call us one time and theydebated for half an hour 45
minutes on something and whetherthey should call us or not.
And they called and we hadexperienced the exact same
problem and were able to answertheir question in 15 seconds
because we had been there anddone that.
So it's a great way to learnthose things.
Both of those examples aresitting in this room right now.

Speaker 2 (39:46):
Well, I love what you said.
I'm going to try and get us alittle bit more back on track.

Speaker 4 (39:51):
But you did say.

Speaker 2 (39:52):
the question was the primary goal and secondary goals
.
And, dina, you said it, yousaid exactly it.
The purpose of the mentorprogram when we started it was
that you come out and you'resuccessful from day one.
Yeah.
That is, that was, that is, thatwas and still is the goal.
Because in this industry that'snot normal.
You typically come out and theytell you you've three months to

(40:13):
figure it out.
So for the first 90 days whereeverybody's expecting you to
make a little money, learn thefreight lanes, learn how to
negotiate, learn all that stuffon your own, and you're going to
have horrible pit settlementsfor those first several weeks,
the several months, andeventually you'll get it.
And we were like that's crap,there's got to be a better way.

(40:34):
And that's kind of how wedecided to go this route and why
it was successful from my pointof view, I only see the
settlement sides of it yes but,um, starting with this and
looking at it and having driversand seeing what they're doing
on there and then starting thesementor programs, it got to.

Speaker 9 (40:58):
I get a settlement and these teams have only been
here two or three weeks and Icalled Kelly and I said Kelly,
is there something wrong withthis settlement?
Because they make way more thanmost people who start, who
don't have the mentor program.
So there's definitely adifference in their settlements
that I see on my end whenthey're listening to their

(41:20):
mentor.

Speaker 2 (41:22):
And that's huge.
You're dead on right with that,like it is a huge income
difference.
But again, it's not forced.
We don't make people do it, no,but it is.
The proof is right there.

Speaker 5 (41:36):
Everybody said great stuff.
The only thing I wouldpiggyback on is that don't
discount how much the mentorswant to help.
So everything everybody justsaid but there's another layer
on it is that these peoplereally do care about helping, or
they wouldn't be doing whatthey're doing.
A lot of them in the beginning,it's a lot of calls or whatever
.
It is their main goal and quitefrankly, I think it almost.

(41:58):
They get emotionally involvedin it sometimes and I think when
they have mentors or menteeswho may be afraid to call them
like Vince was referring to they, you know they don't understand
.
They're like we're just here tohelp, so don't discount that.
They're invested as well, thepeople who are helping.
So that's just another layer ontop of everything that they're
there to do.
We talked about what what thedrivers will get from it, but

(42:19):
the mentors get reward from thattoo, and I think they really
enjoy it.

Speaker 2 (42:22):
How are mentors and mentees matched?

Speaker 6 (42:25):
Well, we send out.
When you get your welcomeletter from Highfield, once
you've been approved by thecarrier and it's time for you to
kind of start your onboardingprocess with Highfield as the
fleet owner, you get your letterfrom them, from one of the

(42:46):
girls Melissa or Delina sendsthat out introducing all of us
to you and what our roles are.
And then you have paperworkthat you have to do, online
things you have to fill out, andwe have a questionnaire and
that questionnaire we haverevised it many times.
We revise it as often as neededto try to get the information

(43:11):
from new teams about you, aboutyour experience, about what your
experience, about what yourneeds are, about what your
desires are.
Do you smoke, do you have a peton the truck?
All these different things thatwill help your mentors
ascertain what kind ofinformation they need to give

(43:32):
you and how they need to guideyou.
The pairing of that has severallayers.
One is we look at what maybeyour side interests are.
I look at what your sideinterests are If you ride
motorcycles, and I know that wehave a mentor team that loves to
ride motorcycles.
There's common ground there.

(43:52):
So you, you're kind of startingout with some common interests,
some things.
Maybe you're veterans, maybeyou're grandparents, maybe
you're 20s You're in your 20sand we've had some young mentors
who have been very successful,and so it just depends on how

(44:13):
much information we can get fromyou in that questionnaire.
It helps me to decide how topair you potentially with the
best possible mentor team.
All of our mentors are good atwhat they do and that's why they
are doing what they're doing,but it's another layer of a
personal connection building afamily, building a relationship

(44:36):
beyond just trying to give youinformation on how to make money
.

Speaker 8 (44:42):
We are high field family and so try to put that
together speaking of thequestionnaire, um, it's kind of
hand tailored from all of ourmentors.
We asked our mentors, like,what information do you guys
want to know about your teambefore you talk to them for the
very first time?
And so we gave all the mentorsan opportunity to put questions

(45:04):
in and we put them together andthat formed the questionnaire
and and help and help stina,pair them together.

Speaker 2 (45:11):
So if, if you ever wonder where the questionnaire
comes from, that would be it andit's really cool too, because
that's one thing we do revise,that we go through through, we
look at it, we talk to thementors and they say here's the
questionnaire we want, and it's148 questions.
And so we do, we pare that downand we break it down into what

(45:33):
it is now and then in a year ortwo we re-look at that
questionnaire and go does thisstill make sense?
And a lot of times over thecourse of that much time, what
we see and the things that werealize, hey, we could phrase
this different, we could askthis different.
And also the mentors go, youknow, we asked you to ask this

(45:54):
question but really doesn't helpus as much as maybe if we ask
this.
So we do revise that as well.
Right, like I've seen that overmany times absolutely, um, of
how, how we ask and things we do.
So you may come in and yourquestionnaire looks different
than someone who's been with usfor three, four years.
Um, but it's still to get thesame thing and it's it's to help
us pair you with the bestperson.

(46:15):
Uh, find common ground, regionalstuff, stuff has happened.
I know we have had some teamsthat live in Texas and they're
like hey, let's pair you with amentor team from Texas because
they're going to be able to tellyou how to get home easier,
things like that.
So sometimes that plays intoaccount.
And then also, we do protectour mentors.
So we do try our hardest tokeep a certain number of teams

(46:40):
with our mentors and not exceed.
That doesn't always happen, butwe do that as well.
So, um, you know, we're lookingafter both the the team and the
mentors and, uh, sometimes thatis a large part of the driving
factor as well.
Now, if it's like, oh man, thisguy's got, or this, this team
rather has our limit, but thisperson, this team, would be a

(47:02):
perfect candidate to work withthem, then sometimes we'll talk
to the team and kind of massagethat out a little bit Right and
look at it, because sometimesit's like, yeah, I've got a team
that's been with me for a whilethat really is about to
graduate on.
So taking on a new team is nota big deal.
But that does lead me into ournext question how long does a

(47:24):
mentorship period last?
Typically last.

Speaker 7 (47:27):
So the mentorship program is a six month
commitment from a team.
You will build a rapport andlasting relationships with these
mentors.
You will continue that on wellbeyond that.
Six months, I'm sure, but theactual program itself is six
months cool.

Speaker 2 (47:45):
And if uh, a team uh gets to that six months and
they're like, oh, we really wantto stay a little bit longer.
Like, can we just get a littleextension?
Uh, how is that handled?

Speaker 1 (47:57):
it rolls over to month to month.

Speaker 6 (48:00):
Yeah, and we do.
We have had that scenario wherethey just feel like they need a
little bit more, like, oh mygosh, we're really getting out
of the mentor program.
Okay, I need one more month toreally get my act together and
make sure that I understand itNot that anybody's going
anywhere, because we are allstill here.
Your mentors will never nottake your call.

(48:20):
It's just more of a formality,so to speak, but it really is
putting you in literally thedriver's seat and venturing out
on your own.
But we also have a rebootprogram.
I've called it a reboot program, reboot program.

(48:40):
You know, I've called it areboot program.
I've called it continuingeducation, where some of our
drivers, when they've been outon their own, so to speak, for
six months or a year, will golike I don't feel like I know
anything anymore, like I feellike I'm not catching on freight
, like I don't know how thefreight's moving, and they come
back into the mentor program fora month.
It's just to kind of reboot them.
They're doing things all thetime, they're constantly on top

(49:03):
of the freight, they know what'sgoing on and it's not hard to
kind of go by the wayside ofthat.
Sometimes.
I think, when you've been outfor a year, if you don't have
that constant, if you don't stayin constant contact and you are
kind of doing your own thingand your business is successful,
but maybe not as much as youwant it to be, we reboot you, we

(49:26):
put you back in the program,give you a little kickstart and
refresh, because freight changeswith the seasons, it changes
every year, so just getting arefresher course.

Speaker 2 (49:37):
So we're always here to help and that's that six
month commitment, like y'alltalked about.
That really is a lot of.
It is because our freight isseasonal and so if you go in the
mentor program two months in,you're like I'm good, I got it,
which a lot of teams do.
Um, when that freight becauseit is seasonal changes.

(49:57):
So you know there's alwaysfreight.
It's just where is the freight,when is certain states, when
are they popping, when are theydead?
So, being able to like see thesigns and reposition yourself to
work a different segment ofbusiness or different freight

(50:20):
lanes or different negotiationsituations because it's a little
different right now and thenknowing when to pivot back or to
a third thing, and so the sixmonths gives you a chance to go
through, build some confidence.
Then let the naturalseasonality happen to where the
team goes whoa, this isn'tworking like it used to work.

(50:41):
What's going on?
And you have that mentor thereto go like, yep, you're right,
it's not working like it used towork.
It's going to be like this fora little while and then, when we
can get back to that, we willgo back to that, or sometimes
it's this is better, like, welove this.
You know it's a roller coaster,right, we love that cresting the
hill and that sudden excitementof going down the hill, but you

(51:03):
know, climbing back up the hillis kind of boring, you know,
and so freight kind of does that.
Sometimes it's very busy andfun and sometimes it's it's not
busy.
So you have to hunt for thefreight and getting those those
skills to hunt for it and knowwhere to go.
Um, I think that's that that isthe main purpose of the six
month, and Kelly kind of wastalking about this a little bit.

(51:24):
But they do want to know whatkind of qualifications or
experience does a team need tobecome a mentor?
Like, what would be the thingsthat we're looking for out of a
mentor?

Speaker 11 (51:35):
I would.
I would say from my perspective, um, to become a mentor, you
need to show that you have thatleadership skill, because there
are some leadership skillsinvolved with that, um.
You have to be able to showthat you have the success behind
you as well.
Absolutely, um.
I mean, it's kind of hard toteach someone else whenever

(51:57):
you're not grasping it yourselfand whenever you have proven
those along the way, then I'msure Dino would reach out to you
at that point and have aconversation with you.
But I would say the mostimportant thing is just having
that the ability to teachsomeone.
Not everybody's a teacher, Iguess is what I'm getting at.

(52:20):
There's multiple ways ofteaching someone how to do
something, and everyone has adifferent way of teaching.
But you have to have thecompassion, you have to have the
drive, you have to have theability to get your point across
to someone, because noteveryone's going to learn the
same way, sure.
So, you have to be able tochange your way of thinking and

(52:41):
put yourself in their shoes andbe that person to Okay, they're
not getting it this way.
Let's switch gears and do thisand hopefully get the point
across.

Speaker 1 (52:50):
There's so many different walks of life Coming
into trucking.
It's just not your smallcommunity from home.
You know, in my opinion, I love.

Speaker 2 (53:00):
I had the opportunity at the beginning of this year
and if those of you listen topodcasts, y'all know um, but I
had the ability to go down anddo disney's leadership institute
, right, and they talked aboutmanagers and leadership and how
in america we kind of twistthose two together.
If you, you're a leader, you'rea manager, you're a manager,
you're a leader, right, and theytalked about how a leader is

(53:22):
not someone who is appointed tobe in a position to lead.
A leader is someone who haswhatever it takes where people
want to follow right.
And so you can be a great leaderand not be a manager.
You can be a manager and be aterrible leader.
So I think that's one thing ourmentors do really well is they

(53:43):
are true leaders in the sensethat the people that they work
with want to get their advice.
They want to know what they'retalking about.
To be a good leader, you haveto be able to reach people on
all those levels like you talkedabout.
to be able to reach people onall those levels like you talked
about, right, um, and then uhpeople person is what I always
describe as you have to be ableto talk to anybody, whether or

(54:05):
not you have a similarbackground or not, because
sometimes you're not going tohave a similar background.
And so how do you build on meand this person don't see eye to
eye and we like not not in abad way, but we just we come
from two different walks of life, we live in different parts of
the country, we have differentvalues and belief systems.
So then how do we get togetherand work together and that's one

(54:29):
thing I love that our mentorsdo and it's funny because if you
talk to any of our mentee teams, they will typically tell you I
have the best mentor in thecompany, and it doesn't matter
who it is.
They all feel that way becausethose people are so good at

(54:49):
being those natural leaders.
And we do have a nice situationwhere we can cherry pick our
mentors and it is an invite onlytype situation and, um, the
people we have doing it are justfantastic.
Every single one of them are Um.
And they do ask one more thing,which is um, do the mentors go

(55:10):
through additional training?
And it's like well, kinda, Ithink it's fitting, because
that's what we're here this weekfor right sure um, so today, if
you're a mentor and you'relistening to this before you get
at the hotel, before you comesee us all, part of a large
chunk of what we're doing todayis to talk about being a mentor

(55:33):
and to go through and have someuh group sessions where we're
going to learn and get a chanceto kind of wrap our head around
some concepts and some thingsthat are out there.
We're also going to have awhat's the phrase I'm looking
for that is politically correct.
We are going to have agrumbling and complaining

(55:54):
session where A breakout session.
A breakout session where youknow we're going to be there and
we're going to take back yourcomments and your feedback.
Right, because it's not one way.
It's both ways, so um we aregoing to sit there and uh and
get berated.
We also do uh monthlyconference calls yeah, um calls

(56:15):
with each carrier, the mentorsfor each carrier, yep, and so
that's a chance for them to giveus information back, but also
for us to give them and reinvest.
And then there's a lot of like.

Speaker 6 (56:36):
I know Kayla and Kelly can really speak to this,
but the mentors are probablysome of your most frequently
talked to people on the phone,if I would imagine.
I just want to piggyback onwhat Jerry was saying and the
other part.
The answer of that question ishow do we choose our mentors?
It's not just their financialsuccess, their truck revenues,
it is how are you communicatingwith fleet support?
How are you communicating withKelly?

(56:56):
How are you communicating withKayla?
How do you communicate with ourmaintenance department?
When you call in to Don, jerryand now Eric, how do you
interact with them?
Are you taking care of yourtruck?
Are you?
Are you calling maintenance?
When you I know with the FedExside, when you call in and you
have something do on your truck,it says you have paperwork do.

(57:17):
Are you listening to thatmessage and going okay, what do
I have to do is do I have to geta DOT inspection?
Do I need my medical cardupdated?
Do I have to get somethingserviced on the truck?
So it's, it's that it really ourmentors.
It's not just it's not justthat peer-to-peer in how to run

(57:39):
the freight and how to makemoney running freight.
They are the first person youcall if something happens with
the truck, they're the firstperson you call.
If you're I don't know you'rebeing held up at the shipper or
something goes awry, it's likethey are your first point of
contact.
Then they will say, okay, youneed to call the carrier, you

(58:01):
need to call Jimmy, you need tocall maintenance, you need to
call Kelly, you need to callKayla, and so they're kind of
that buffer to direct you in theright direction until you learn
that yourself, until thatbecomes natural to you.
But it's how.
Our mentors are all goodcommunicators with our staff and

(58:22):
we all have that opendiscussion with them.
And so that's the other half ofnot just the revenue side, but
it's how are you communicatingand how, how do you interact
with the staff?

Speaker 5 (58:34):
also to piggyback on her.
What she said it's not just Imean again, everything that you
guys said is true.
One of the major factors tofinding the good mentors when
they check all of those boxes istheir willingness.
Their willingness to wake up at3 o'clock in the morning if a
team calls them, theirwillingness to stay on the phone

(58:56):
for 30 minutes to go throughand explain something repeatedly
to multiple teams.
Again, when I said when Itouched on it earlier and said
that they're invested in it, Imean that in every way possible
because they are available andtheir willingness to be
available 24 seven when we askthem to be mentors, because we
tell them that's just the firstthing.
So one of those two driversthat's a team that's mentoring
you is willing to do that.
So when we say they expect youto call them and they want you

(59:17):
to call them, they mean it.
Yeah do that.
So when we say they expect youto call them and they want you
to call them, they mean it.
Yeah, they're willing to bewoke up anytime, day or night or
wherever's going on.
Somebody's gonna answer thatphone as best they can because
they want to make you successful.
So, in a nutshell of one linerlike what is the most important
thing?
That the mentors want to makeyou successful absolutely,
absolutely.

Speaker 2 (59:34):
And and the flip side of that is what's the number
one uh complaint we get from thementors about their mentees
that they're not calling.
That they're not calling thatthey're not calling.

Speaker 6 (59:42):
And they don't understand why.

Speaker 4 (59:44):
Yep and it hurts our feelings it hurts, yeah, it does
, we're available.

Speaker 6 (59:49):
We want you to be.
You know our mentors want youto be successful.
I mean, they, that's what theyare.
That's why they have almostvolunteered all of this time to
help you be successful.
And we get the call.
They never call me.
I don't know what you know like.
Why don't they ever call?

Speaker 5 (01:00:08):
me.
What do I do?
Do they not like?

Speaker 6 (01:00:09):
me, yes, are they still driving for us?
It really is.
They're vested, yes.

Speaker 5 (01:00:18):
And fear.
The only thing fear does inthis career from being scared to
ask questions is hurt you, andI know it sounds that way and
it's easy to say because we'veall been there.
Again, we've all been therewith a couple of exceptions, but
either way, they still knowabout it.
So the bottom line is if you'regoing to make the commitment to
come out here and you're goingto walk away from your family
and your home and everything andleave it to go over the road

(01:00:39):
and be out here and do all ofthis, take advantage of
everything that's given to youbecause it's a huge commitment,
and if you let fear keep youfrom calling or asking a
question, no one can help youafter the fact.
Sure, so you've got to pick thatphone up and say something now,
because again, that's the solepurpose of why everybody is
sitting here.
Yep something now, because,again, that's the sole purpose

(01:01:01):
of why everybody is sitting here.
Yep to, because we want to besuccessful.
We create, or that everyone'screated, everything to try to
make everyone successful.
So again, it's just a dominoeffect.

Speaker 2 (01:01:10):
You're successful, we're successful, everybody's
successful yep, and I love whatyou said too about the available
, or the willingness rather ofthe mentee, our mentor, to uh do
it.
There are people, teams thatare driving with Highfield for
Panther and FedEx, that aregreat money-making teams, they
are natural leaders, they havegreat personal skills and they

(01:01:32):
have said no.
We don't want to wake up at 3o'clock in the morning and take
a phone call and that's fine.
If it's not for you, it's notfor you.
So, that being said, none ofour mentors are here against
their will.
It's not like hey, you're agreat team, so now you're going

(01:01:53):
to be a mentor.
It is an invite thing.
We do spend a lot of time.
It is an invite thing, we dospend a lot of time.
It's almost like and I'vedescribed it this way, described
this before when we've come upwith personnel or any kind of
interesting challenge of let'stry to talk the person out of it
.
If we pitch them what it is andthen we try and talk them out

(01:02:13):
of it and they still want to doit, then it's probably a good
direction to go.
And so we do and we say, hey,we'd like you to be a mentor.
There is a discussion of here'sall the reasons why you don't
want to do it, and then, ifyou're still interested in it,
let's make it happen.
Yeah.

Speaker 6 (01:02:28):
Well, and I remember when we first started, like I
said, jimmy and Kelly were righthere, so they literally taught
me how to fuel the truck.
But Jerry, I mean how to fuelthe truck.

Speaker 12 (01:02:43):
Um, but jerry, I mean jerry may or may not
remember this, I can't tell youhow many times I had to call
jerry to program.

Speaker 6 (01:02:49):
Say it with me to program the data logger yeah I
can't.
I can't tell you how many times, every time we had a
refrigerated load, I had to calljerry, or my husband did.
How do you program the datalogger?
Like there's just at the,there's steps to maybe press the
green button.
You press the yellow button,you know, but we just could not

(01:03:10):
like, and my james asked him onetime james.

Speaker 11 (01:03:13):
Actually it was like probably 3, 30 in the morning
and he asked me.
He was like, do you just dothis by memory?
And I'm like, yeah, you woke meup.
I'm laying in bed, I'mliterally doing it for memory,
so yeah,

Speaker 6 (01:03:24):
I'm not walking through it with you, but but
never fail like we could likeevery time, like seriously, a
day and a half later when we'dget another load, you know, but
but it was like that until wefigured it out ourselves and I
you know it could have been, itcould have been three, but, but
it was like that until wefigured it out ourselves and I,

(01:03:45):
you know it could have been, itcould have been three days, but
it felt like three months thatwe were doing that you know so
and that's what.
That's what the mentoring isabout.

Speaker 3 (01:03:52):
That's that's the heart of our mentors.
Melissa and I would would haveour mentees send pictures of
their Panther POD, their proofof delivery, before they
submitted them to Panther, so wecan make sure they were filled
out correctly and they get paidon time, cause if they weren't,
if they had things missing, theywouldn't get paid.
So you walk them through thosethings, all those steps.
You know you might be intrucking for 15 years, but not

(01:04:16):
with Panther and not understandPantherther's ways, and that's
what we were there to help withthat's a big advantage too,
because if a new person were todo it incorrectly and not know
they messed up on it.

Speaker 4 (01:04:28):
Panther's not going to call them and say you messed
up on this.
I need you to resubmit it,right when it comes out to
settlements settlement gets thecomplaint when I'm not getting
paid where's my pay?
Now the.
Panther mentor has to go findout what was wrong and get you
to redo it.

Speaker 2 (01:04:44):
Well, here's a question for y'all.
Real quick show of hands whowas a mentor?
So that's 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7,8.
Eight people in this room werementors.

Speaker 10 (01:04:55):
I was like a half mentor because Kelly did most of
the work.

Speaker 2 (01:04:58):
I believe it.

Speaker 10 (01:04:59):
She likes to talk a lot.

Speaker 2 (01:05:01):
I counted you and Don as one person.
No, no.

Speaker 11 (01:05:08):
This one wasn't even a quarter.

Speaker 2 (01:05:11):
He was supporting you in the back off.
What feedback have you receivedfrom former mentees and mentors
about the impact of our program?

Speaker 3 (01:05:20):
I hear from former mentees that are now mentors or
not all the time how how theprogram helped them be
successful.
Um, I mentioned pictures ofpod's and people getting paid
and then they didn't send thepictures of PODs and they
wouldn't get paid.
Well, okay, now I understandwhy you were doing that, or

(01:05:41):
understanding, when they becamementors, how the questions that
they thought were not worthy ofcalling us, how prevalent those
questions were.
People just didn't have thatexperience, absolutely.

Speaker 1 (01:05:55):
Yeah, yeah, I hear lifelong friendships are made
out of a lot of mentor-menteepartnerships.
You know they're takingvacations together when they
have time off.

Speaker 4 (01:06:05):
I see that.

Speaker 1 (01:06:07):
Maybe up at campgrounds, baby showers and a
wedding here and inviting ushere.
But I see something bigger thanjust something over the phone.

Speaker 2 (01:06:15):
I also hear mentors like mentees obviously say a lot
of stuff.
I hear mentors talking aboutit's reengaged them and made
them excited about the industryagain.
I've heard that from severalmentors throughout the years.
Has the program shown an effecton driver retention?

Speaker 8 (01:06:34):
I certainly think so.

Speaker 2 (01:06:35):
I certainly think so too.
I'm surprised it's quiet.

Speaker 8 (01:06:39):
I think the teams that come in and grab a hold of
the mentor program and use it asit was truly designed to be
used, last much longer.
They're happier.

Speaker 2 (01:06:51):
Yes.

Speaker 8 (01:06:53):
If you're making the money that you came out to make,
it makes more sense that youwould be happier.
Their transition overall isjust easier when they're making
those 10 phone calls a day forthe first week.
You know we feel like we'rebugging them, but we also need
to learn this information.
I think step of of a new job isso much easier and better when

(01:07:17):
they truly use the mentorprogram and we certainly see the
difference in um, in everythingthat I do.

Speaker 2 (01:07:24):
Fleet support you as well, so it's it's a it's a
noticeable difference yeah, andyou said the whole point about,
uh, the mentorship certainly theones that utilize it right.
So again, when a team does getinto a high-field truck, they
have the option mentor, nomentor, it's not required.
And even once they accept amentor.

(01:07:46):
Or if a team does accept amentor, rather we do see some
people who get into it and theyjust it's not for them, they
don't really want to call theirmentor, they don't want to talk,
they really want to figure iton their own.
When that happens that's whenCarla explained earlier you
usually see a huge difference intheir settlements.
You do see some frustrationbuild.
It's not what they thought itwould be, because they don't

(01:08:08):
want to utilize that mentorprogram, and so it's frustrating
.
Something we deal with.
It's something we've talkedabout before on here.
We don't force you to do it.
It is completely a la carte.
It's your choice.
That does happen from time totime.
A lot of our teams don't.
A lot of our teams do use amentor program and they're very
successful, but it's not alwaysthe case.

Speaker 5 (01:08:37):
Yeah, I'll 100% agree and back what Kayla said.
I will say this and it maysound brutally honest, but the
bottom line is a team that comesin and uses the mentor program,
like Kayla said, you may becalling five, ten times a day.
It's not always going to bethat way and the mentors expect
that they did it.
That's why they're successful,that's why they're mentors,
that's why the program works.
Sure, yeah, it's the circle oflife, so to speak, to make

(01:08:59):
successful teams.
So again, like and I see it allthe time the teams that do not
embrace the mentor program andcall and use and ask the
questions significantlydifferent income.

Speaker 1 (01:09:13):
They don't last.
Or they move along, or theydon't last yeah they move along.

Speaker 6 (01:09:15):
It's mostly that they don't last, because if you
aren't making money and yougraduate or you get out of the
mentor program at the six-monthmark but you haven't used your
mentors, you're not making money.
I mean, our statistics showabout a three-month If you are
not using the mentor program, asKayla said as intended,

(01:09:39):
utilizing your mentors all thetime.

Speaker 5 (01:09:42):
Three months, yeah, you don't know what you don't
know Sure.

Speaker 2 (01:09:46):
Absolutely, and it's funny.

Speaker 5 (01:09:47):
You don't know.
What you don't know, you've gotto ask.
That's the best way to learn it.
Otherwise, you're spinning yourtires and wasting time trying
to figure it out on your ownwhen you could have had it.

Speaker 1 (01:09:56):
Literally, just literally spinning your tires To
do it.
Yeah, literally.

Speaker 9 (01:10:02):
Like on my side.
When I see people on there Ican tell, because you're not in
the truck 24-7, all month long.
There's some time that you'reoff the truck, but the mentor
will show you how to work itwhere you're still getting paid
on that time that you're off.

Speaker 1 (01:10:22):
Yeah, yep, yep.

Speaker 2 (01:10:25):
Constant flow of money Absolutely, and that's
hugely important to what we do,because, you're right, you go
home for a week and if you lose,most of us don't really want to
take a $0 settlement, but thatcan.
And if you lose, most of usdon't really want to take a zero
dollar settlement, but thatthat can happen if you're not
careful.
And we do have constantcommunication with our mentors.
I think that's one thing thatwe can't stress enough is that,

(01:10:45):
like we hear, so when a teamdoes not utilize their mentor,
or they don't call or they don'treach out to the team, we know
about it pretty early on.
And again, we don't force youto anybody to use the program.
It's their choice, they'reindependent, they can do
whatever they want, but we doknow it and see it, and so when

(01:11:06):
we do see that we do follow thetrend and not always, but a lot
of times it goes to a bad place.

Speaker 5 (01:11:14):
I was going to say something funny to you.
Now I've been the one that'sbeen saying about how the
mentors feel that way too, I'mnot going to lie.
I can tell you as Fleet SupportKayla and I too.
When we see a team strugglingand we know they're not talking
to their mentor, it'sheartbreaking for us too.
Yeah, it's super frustratingBecause we just desperately want
to pick the phones up and goplease, because you could do.
You know what I mean and it'sjust hard.

(01:11:36):
So you know I can't push thisprogram enough.
I really can't.
Again, it made me successful.
It made everybody sitting heresuccessful.
They raised their hands andsaid they were mentors.
They also used the mentorprogram.

Speaker 1 (01:11:47):
It'd be a fool not to come in and use it.

Speaker 3 (01:11:49):
What made me more successful made us more
successful when we were mentors.
We learned a lot from ourmentees, because someone said
earlier you know we all havedifferent styles, different
walks of life, we have differentneeds.
So when your mentees come inand their goals are different

(01:12:11):
than yours, but you can teach totheir goals, that's true, and
then learn from the way they'rerunning their business to help
improve your business where itfits your goals.
And I'm going to be realspecific here melissa and I we
didn't run crazy hard.
We enjoyed ourselves, we madegood money, but we didn't run

(01:12:33):
crazy hard.
When we took on eric and kaylaas mentees, they came out, they
were super focused, they ranlike scalded dogs and they they
were very successful, but theyare mad pigs, exactly, exactly
or mad pigs.
They came out and weresuccessful and they listened to

(01:12:57):
what Melissa and I had to sharewith them and they made it their
own and we learned from them.
And then, when they becamementors, they taught their
mentees, they shared with theirmentees their way of running
their business.
They share it with theirmentees their way of running
their business.
And then they learned also fromand this is from conversations
I've had with Kayla and Ericover the years they learned as

(01:13:20):
well from their menteesdifferent ways of doing things
that made them more successful.
So, as mentors we're, it's atwo-way street.
Yes, I have the experience thatI'm going to share with you, but
I'm also going to listen towhat you are doing and learn
from that, and I might be ableto take that information and
share with other mentees, orshare with other mentors too,

(01:13:41):
because their experience couldbe different than mine and now
I'm learning from them andsharing that information with
other mentors and mentees.

Speaker 2 (01:13:50):
So it certainly is a two-way street.
Well, we also joke about youjoke about Eric and I being the
original mentors, right, becausewhen we started the company we
had seven or eight trucks,whatever it was, it was just
talking to me, there was nothingelse, right.
And it was one of my teams thatI was working with that
challenged me to thinkcritically about what we were
doing, because we had ideas onhere's some general parameters

(01:14:12):
to be successful, right.
We had ideas on here's somegeneral parameters to be
successful, right.
And then tightening up, kind ofgiving examples of like, okay,
well, you did this, but here'skind of what I would have done.
Or my favorite question back inthe day was so I see you took
this load, what were youthinking?
But I would tell them, likeanytime I ask what were you
thinking.
That's not a bad thing.

(01:14:33):
I may be asking what were youthinking, and it's a great load.
Like, I just want to know yourthought process.
I had teams that taught me tosharpen my skill set, because
there was a lot of what Eric andI were doing.
Driving the truck was kind ofby the seat of our pants.
We were decent and goodmoneymakers.
But if I had to write it downon paper.
I don't know that I couldexplain it.

(01:14:54):
Being challenged to get to thatpoint, and I think most of our
mentors are at that point, theywill tell you they do have.
I'm not going to say formulas,but I will say reasons behind
what they do.
That is explainable andteachable and so it's super

(01:15:14):
beneficial.
It's not just well, I have agut feeling.

Speaker 4 (01:15:17):
It's a technique Exactly yeah, I was going to say
because not all questions havea yes or no answer flat out or
formulated.
Sure yeah, negotiation theability to negotiate changes a
lot of stuff.

Speaker 2 (01:15:31):
Absolutely.

Speaker 4 (01:15:31):
Like yes or no.
Should I go to Montana orWyoming Flat out no.
But you can't make it worth it.
It is possible to make it worthit.

Speaker 8 (01:15:41):
There's a lot of networking behind the program
too that maybe our teams don'tsee.
The mentors are in their ownchat, so if there's ever a time
that the mentors don't have aquestion, they can throw it in
that chat and you might begetting advice from 10 different
people, but you don'tnecessarily know, or if they're

(01:16:01):
weighing in on a decision,unless you are a mentor's very
first team.
There's 10 different stylesgoing into it?
Yes, sure.
Exactly what you said.
These mentors learn from eachother.
They learn from their teams.
They've been mentored.
Now they're mentoring.
They might have changed theirstyle.
There's so many people andpieces of puzzles that they have

(01:16:25):
put together to be where theyare that it's not just like a
one track.
This size fits all.

Speaker 5 (01:16:32):
You've got to understand the thought process
behind it, to understand theload.
I know when jimmy and I werementors, you know.
Again it's like I'm gonna giveyou my advice.
We're under time crunch here,so here's what I would do.
Um, you don't have to do that,but here's what I would do, uh,
if we had time.
But let me tell you why.
It's not just here's what to do,that should never, be, the way

(01:16:54):
it is, but you've got tounderstand, because then the
rationale behind it is going tohelp you make decisions in the
future.
So you start it's a chess gameYou've got to be thinking
multiple steps ahead, and theseguys have done that Again.
That's why it's just sovaluable and we appreciate them
so much.

Speaker 2 (01:17:11):
We do, we do, and they're great with disruption,
they're great with hey, thisload just canceled.
So this perfect plan this houseof cards I just built just blew
over because this one loadcanceled.
So how do I pivot quickly andeconomically?
Hey, the truck just broke down,Jimmy, what do I?

(01:17:35):
You know, and I had this greatload lined up.
Well, a mentor can get thereand can look at that situation
and go like, okay, first offyour new team.
Here's what you need to know.
Trucks break down all the time.
All the money that we tell ateam coming into this business,

(01:17:56):
this is averages of what we seeacross the board.
All those trucks broke down.
You know what I mean.
None of this is we're notgiving perfect world.
No, we're not giving, ifeverything goes right, numbers.

Speaker 3 (01:18:12):
We're not inflating things to a.
This is theoretically possible,but not literal possible.
We're giving real world numbers.
We're getting real worldnumbers.

Speaker 2 (01:18:14):
We're giving real world numbers.
You're getting canceled loadsin those numbers.
You're getting truck breakdownsin those numbers.
You're getting slow seasons ofthe year, busy seasons of the
year.
You're getting all that dataright.
So a mentor can look at thatsituation and go like I
understand this is a panic andthis is frustrating, but it's

(01:18:35):
not the end of the world,because that's already been
factored into the equation.
So here's how we pull ourselvesout of that situation and we
roll on Right, right, right, andso I do think there's huge
benefit in that.
And also sometimes it's like Ithink it was said earlier my
truck broke down and I'm on myway to pick up a load and I've
got to be there an hour.
What do I do?

(01:18:55):
Like?
You do get that like especiallyif you have a new team, you get
that like oh dear, I don't knowwhat to do.
I'm just confused.
Your mentor is there to stepaside or go along with you and
go like, all right, we're goingto reach out to maintenance, let

(01:19:19):
them know there's a problem,and then we're going to talk to
your carrier, let them knowthere's a problem.
Uh, once you find out as amentor, sometimes they find out
what the problem is and they'relike, okay, you can roll with
this.
This is not a life or deathproblem.
This is not a safety criticalissue.
We can get that finished orfixed once we get off the road
or you know.
So there are some things thatcan kind of pivot and help and

(01:19:40):
and, uh and and guide youthrough things.
Uh, to make it a smoothertransition.
Um, and sometimes it's.
It is just like you need tocall jimmy and let it call it
maintenance, and let them knowyou're gonna need a tow truck
most likely.
So they're gonna tell yousomewhere you're gonna be down
for two or three days because weknow what that issue is and it

(01:20:02):
takes two or three dayssometimes to get through it.
your, your carrier is going to,uh, give that load to someone
else, right?
And and that's fine, becausethat's already been built into
the equation.
We go through the same thing,you're going to go through that
same thing and it's going to befine.
There are those, you know,there is some idea behind, like

(01:20:23):
well, they run great trucks, sothen there's never going to be
breakdowns, and it's like thatdoesn't work.
Every single truck, everysingle truck that's ever graced
this planet, breaks down.
It's just what it is.
It's how you respond to thatand how you react to that.
And I think you know one thingwe do Jimmy, kind of help me out
on this one when we put peopleup in hotels, we don't put them

(01:20:44):
in Motel 6s, right?

Speaker 10 (01:20:46):
No, we don't do the CLC dirt cheap, no, we are very
generous in where we put peopleand the type of hotel we put
them in, and I think that goesback to when you and Eric first
started, and I'm sure you had tostay in a hotel that you were
paying for yourself.
Yeah, we stayed in hotels, it'spart of it.

Speaker 7 (01:21:11):
You're going to be put in a hotel every now and
then, when a breakdown situationrequires it.

Speaker 10 (01:21:13):
We don't look at you know we're going to put you in
the cheapest hotel we can findjust for the bottom line of the
company.
We want you to be comfortable.
We want you to be safe.
We've all been there before.
Nobody wants to be in a seedyhotel.
We do our best to put you in acomfortable place to make it as
easy as possible on you, becausewhen that breakdown happens,
happens and it will happen.

(01:21:33):
Um, people have a tendency todwell on that and have anxiety
about it and focus on that, justnot unlike an accident
situation.
I tell people the biggest thingwhen you're in an accident is
learn from it but don't dwell onit.
You cannot go down the roadafter the accident situation
focusing on what just happened.
You're putting yourself in abad spot.

(01:21:54):
If you're just focusing on thebad part of a breakdown, you're
not going to see the big pictureof let's work the problem.
We'll get the truck back, we'llmake it back up down the road
and I can't tell you how manytimes Kelly and I were broke
down where you know.
The breakdown situation almostput us in a better position
because it made us work thatmuch harder for the next little

(01:22:14):
bit to make up for the money wejust lost from being down for
three days.
And the mentors have all beenthere.
The mentors have all brokendown and I'm going to give props
to the mentors right now,because it's not the mentor's
job to diagnose or troubleshootmaintenance and repair issues.
That's not their job.
We don't ask them to do it, wedon't require them to do it, but
a lot of them do it becausethey had been there and you have

(01:22:37):
no idea how much time andeffort they've saved off of the
maintenance department by simplytelling drivers you know hey,
do this, try this, the APU isnot working.
Hit the reset button on thebreaker and various things that
they have gone through before.
That they will tell the driversto get them back up and running
in quick fashion and we don'teven know about it, right?

Speaker 2 (01:22:58):
Yeah.

Speaker 10 (01:22:58):
And even though, like I said, we appreciate that
because it takes a little loadoff us and helps the driver stay
on the road, which is thebottom line.

Speaker 3 (01:23:07):
In ops, we tell our teams, our new contractors, your
first point of contact is goingto be your mentors.
Yes, our teams our newcontractors, your first point of
contact is going to be yourmentors.
Yes, because a lot of timesthey can help you resolve issues
right now, versus talking tothe carrier can't help you at
all sometimes on these things ortalking to maintenance.
Reach out to your mentors andif it's an issue that they can't
resolve, they'll point youtowards maintenance.

(01:23:29):
And until you get to the pointwhere you understand that this
is going to be a maintenancecall because you've dealt with
it before or you understand theseverity of it, your mentors
will be your first point ofcontact.
So those mentors a lot of timesthey have dealt with these
things.
They know where the resetbutton is on the carrier.
Apu can help you with that.
They know where your breakerpanel is.

(01:23:49):
They can help you get to yourbreaker panel, even though we
show them that.
We show them a lot and theyforget.
So we try and point themtowards their mentors first.
It doesn't always work, butthat's what we try to work with
them on and we appreciate that.

Speaker 2 (01:24:04):
A lot of times.
Your mentor can kind of helpyou figure out what urgency is.
Sure Like hey, one of my dualsis flat on my truck.
There's eight tires back there.
One of them is flat on my truck.
There's eight tires back there,one of them's flat.
I think I could probably makemy delivery.
Well, no, you can't.
It's a safety-critical functionof the truck.
So the mentor will help you.
But the good news is we canprobably get a roadside out to

(01:24:25):
you.
Or, oh, you're in a Love'sparking lot.
Well, they've got a tire carecenter.

Speaker 3 (01:24:29):
Let's get them over there.

Speaker 2 (01:24:38):
Let's get them over there.
Let's get that tire fixed realquick.
Your mentor can help talk youthrough that kind of stuff, or?
Um, hey, my apu died.
I don't know if I can finishthis load well, they can explain
.
Maybe that's not the mostcritical thing.
Let's get the truck, let's getthe load delivered and then get
you to a a shop.
And the cool thing is they knowthat if you know you're two
days out from making yourdelivery because it's a long
cross-country load, we know thatmaintenance can go ahead and
set up a generator shop ready tolook at it.

Speaker 10 (01:24:59):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:25:00):
So that when you get there you're not kind of
starting from scratch, You'realready kind of cutting the line
.

Speaker 5 (01:25:04):
Just another reason to use the mentor program
Absolutely.

Speaker 2 (01:25:12):
All right, so real quick, we're going to keep going
on.
All right, so real quick, we'regoing to keep going on.
How does the company gatherfeedback on the mentor program
to identify areas forimprovement, which I think is
fitting for today.

Speaker 6 (01:25:25):
Well, we talk to the mentors, yes, find out what kind
of communication they're havingwith their mentees, find out
what kind of communicationthey're having with their
mentees and, as a result of, aswe said, we change things all
the time questionnaires,processes and things that we're
doing.
Our fleet support and ourrecruiters have Delina and

(01:25:51):
Buttermilk and Buttermilk haveimplemented periodic
communications with all of ourteams after they come on board
yes, kind of a handoff and thena follow-up, and so we get
information, they getinformation from the teams.
I will call if there's an issueI talk to.

(01:26:12):
I mean good or bad.
There's one, two, three, four,five points of communication
outside of the mentors, outsideof maintenance, outside of Vince
, outside of talking withPatrick or Eric.
Five, five other points ofcommunication which, to a new
team, could be a littleoverwhelming.

Speaker 2 (01:26:35):
Yes.

Speaker 6 (01:26:35):
Just sometimes like who am I talking to and what's
your role in the company andthat kind of a thing.
We try to streamline it, butwe've made these processes,
times of communication,specifically that I have set up.
But then also like a graduation, at that six-month mark I send

(01:26:59):
out a questionnaire like how wasthe mentor program for you?
I just sent out to you today,like you know, you're getting
ready to graduate out of thementor program.
You know, how was yourcommunication with your mentors?
You know, just ask some basicquestions to try to get feedback
.
Do I generally get thatfeedback?
No, yeah.
I don't.
So it's real hard sometimes tomake adjustments and

(01:27:23):
improvements going forward whenwe don't get the feedback that
we ask for.
That's the hard part.

Speaker 2 (01:27:29):
Absolutely.
No one likes to fill outsurveys.
It's one of the hardest things.
We have to get that informationback.
But we have done things like wehave implemented monthly.
We did the beginning of thisyear.
We implemented monthly phonecalls with our entire mentor
group, two different calls everymonth, once with our Because we
do carrier specific so that wecan actually dive into carrier

(01:27:52):
specific issues.
Because the way they enter aredifferent.
If a mentor at Panther decidedthey were going to go to FedEx
or a FedEx mentor decided theywere going to go to Panther,
they would no longer be mentors.

Speaker 6 (01:28:02):
They would have to be mentored.

Speaker 2 (01:28:03):
They would have to be mentored because they operate
so differently.
So we do that.
Like you said, everybody hasyour five points of contact.
They do the follow-up callswith the teams as well once
they've come on board, and so wedo have lots of areas there
where people can get thatfeedback to us.

(01:28:23):
And they do, and we do makechanges periodically.
They also, you know, I've hadthis happen a few times where
people are like we don't knowhow to get a hold of Patrick.
Everybody, when they come onboard, gets an email that has my
contact information on itEric's as well.
So I think it always makes mechuckle when people are like,
well, Patrick's in his ivorytower and we don't know how to

(01:28:45):
get a hold of him, and it's like, okay, not quite.
We literally put thatinformation out there for
everybody.
I'm on the phone tree just likeanybody else is.

Speaker 1 (01:28:54):
You get it day one once you're approved.

Speaker 2 (01:28:55):
Exactly that's what I'm saying.
We give that information out toall the teams from day one.

Speaker 1 (01:29:01):
Actually, they get it day one with the application.
Your email address.

Speaker 2 (01:29:04):
Because you're CC'd.
That information is out thereand there are some people who
reach out to myself or Ericdirectly.
Most don't, I try not to.
Well, yeah, I get that.
Vince and I, we only really seeeach other for this recording.

Speaker 3 (01:29:22):
That's it.
We try not to.

Speaker 2 (01:29:24):
And anybody that's listening is like we hear you
talk about hanging out all thetime.
It's not true.
No, it's not true at all.
We do try to get that feedbackfrom you're.
Right, the survey thing,Because we've had that too.
It's been brought up multipletimes, Like why don't you all do
a survey midway through?

(01:29:44):
Because, every time we send asurvey out, nobody will answer
it.
So it's like it would be great.
We would love to have thatsurvey.
It's completely useless.
And then we're hounding you tofill a survey out and it's like,
well, that's not funny foranybody.

Speaker 6 (01:29:56):
But also really quick .
The phone rings both ways inthat sense.
And I don't mean that in a badway, but there are always so
many people for you to reach outto if you, as a mentee, are
having an issue and we have hadmultiple situations are having
an issue and we have hadmultiple situations.

(01:30:17):
I mean I've been doing this jobnow for three years and as the
mentor coordinator and we havejust transitioned.
I mean it's a constant changein how we as a staff do our jobs
, because we are trying to boband weave and adapt to the needs
of our teams that are coming onboard as well as the needs of
the teams that have been with usfor five or eight years.

(01:30:40):
You know, so it's a hugevariance, but we are.
Someone is always here toanswer your call.
We will have teams, and thepairing of the mentor and mentee
isn't always successful.

Speaker 2 (01:30:53):
Oh great, I'm glad you said that.
Yes, Because the very nextquestion is how does the company
address any mismatches betweenmentors and mentees?

Speaker 6 (01:30:59):
There we go, it's like you're reading my notes.
Well, it isn't always successful, and one we have to know about
it.
So, just because your mentormight communicate to us that
you're not reaching out to them,if you are not reaching out as
a mentee, saying I just don'tjive with them.

(01:31:22):
I mean, you are independentcontractors, you're not
employees, so we are not in yourbusiness, so to speak.
So we really do put it upon theresponsibility of you as a
business owner to say I'm notgetting what I need from this
business relationship with mymentees, and people will do that

(01:31:45):
and we are Johnny on the spotwith that.
I would say within a 24 hourperiod we will have you with a
different mentor.
Yes, can I guarantee that'sgoing to be 100% successful?
No, sometimes it hits off andit goes and people are really
successful with that, but quiteoften we have seen where they're

(01:32:05):
.
If you're not calling andcommunicating with one mentee,
one mentor you may not do itwith the second one?
yeah, and we've seen that moreoften than not, but we are
always willing to make thatchange and that effort to try to
give you the advantage and thebest way to make good revenue
for your truck and learn thebusiness.

Speaker 2 (01:32:25):
Well, it's probably you know a 60 40 split, probably
60 percent of the time.
If a team says I'd like to havea new mentor, we just don't
jive, or for whatever reason, alot of times then they don't
jive with the next one and theydon't jive with the next one.
But 40% of the time, which is abig number, it does work.
It does.
It's just like all of a suddenit's like oh, now we're speaking

(01:32:46):
the same language.
Kelly, who I adore and is one ofmy closest friends, but also
she's over the entire fleet, butshe also specifically works for
the FedEx fleet.
She was a great mentor and Icould think of one of her teams.
I would talk to Kelly and shewould be almost in tears because

(01:33:07):
she just could not get throughto this team.
It was super frustrating.
It's like all right, well,would you be okay?
It was one of our first timeswe ever did it.
Would you be okay if we swappedthis to a different mentor?
And Kelly was like heartbrokenbut she said, yes, they did it
and immediately the team snappedout of whatever funk they were
in and were great, like theyreally ended up being a great

(01:33:31):
team.
And it's not that Kelly was abad mentor.
She's a great team and it's notthat Kelly was a bad mentor.
She's a great mentor.
She was one of our really well,I can't say one of our best,
because all of our mentors aregreat, but she was a really
solid mentor.
She was one of the first ones.
She was solid.
Look at her track record.
The teams that came from herwere really, really great.
She has a legacy that stilllives on within the company.
You know what I mean.
Like that's huge.

(01:33:51):
It's just they just weren'ttalking on the same level.
You know, not the same the same, it's almost like.
Yeah, same frequency, Thank you.
It's almost like a Windows anda Mac talking to each other.
They just weren't seeing eye toeye and didn't, and they both
liked each other.
I know they still have afriendship today, Like it's
crazy, but it just.
They just couldn't get throughto each other and so that does

(01:34:13):
happen.

Speaker 3 (01:34:13):
I have that same issue with Kelly too.

Speaker 9 (01:34:16):
Kelly and.

Speaker 3 (01:34:16):
I, we butt heads, we just don't get along.
So I just call Kayla when Ihave fleet support questions and
I talk to Kayla and we getalong just great and issues get
resolved and it's no problem.
But Kelly and I are greatfriends.

Speaker 5 (01:34:29):
I love you too, vince .

Speaker 2 (01:34:33):
I don't say that to knock Kelly in any means.
I think you all know that.
It really is just to point outthat sometimes if you are in
that hot seat of like this isn'tworking for me, I can't, for
some reason I just can't get onthe same page as my mentor.
Call me yeah, talk to you.
If you don't want to talk toDina, reach out to.

(01:34:56):
Kayla Reach out to Kelly.

Speaker 1 (01:34:57):
Call Delina, Call Melissa.
I'm like start from thebeginning.

Speaker 2 (01:35:00):
Call your recruiter Send us an email at
theouterbeltpodcastcom.
There's lots of ways to contactus.

Speaker 5 (01:35:08):
We don't know what.
We don't know Exactly.

Speaker 6 (01:35:15):
We are here for your success.
Yes, it's really weird 100honest about that.
I mean, we we've lived it andwe're here because of what our
mentors did for us and whatpatrick and eric did the start
of this.
So it's tough when we have tomake those decisions, but really
our mentors do not take itpersonally, because they want
you to be successful in yourbusiness.

(01:35:35):
They understand the concept.
So if, if that happens, if thatis you in the future, if it's
you right now, call me, becauseit's okay, we will.
We will bob and weave and wewill do what we have to do to
give you the best opportunity wecan.

Speaker 2 (01:35:55):
And if you are watching this and you're like,
are listening to this and you'relike, well, geez, I was
thinking about going over andgetting a mentor and joining
Highfield.
But like I don't know now, I dowant to point out that this is
a very low number of peoplesingle digit percentage of our
teams that have these kind ofconflicts and we just handle

(01:36:16):
them when that happens.
Again, we've been there, thementors have been there.
Most of our mentors areseasoned enough.
They've had a team swap fromthem or to them from another
mentor.
It just happens.
But the high 90-somethingpercent of teams, that's not the
case.
But we want to put that outthere because it was presented

(01:36:38):
to us and also because we wantyou all to know this is a
well-rounded, thought-outprogram that we have.
It's something that we've put alot of money, a lot of time, a
lot of resources into.
We are not done developing it.
I mean, we've been at it now.
You've been on staff for threeor four years, three years and
before you we were probably fouryears into it.
So we're seven, eight years inthis mentor program and we do

(01:37:02):
not have it down.
It's good, we're slick.

Speaker 6 (01:37:04):
Well, it's one of the reasons why we're doing this
weekend too, because we are here.
Those breakout sessions are, sowe can re-evaluate what we're
doing, re-evaluate the processesthat we have with the mentor
program, with the questionnaires, with the duration, with
whatever, to make sure thatwe're still doing the right

(01:37:27):
thing yes for, for you yes,while at the same time giving
the mentors some information aswell, so that it's not just
one-sided.

Speaker 2 (01:37:39):
We're both working together to come up with a
greater good.
So I love this program.
I'm very excited that we arestill running it after all these
years.
It has truly been anindustry-changing game.
I tell you, go back to FacebookI don't know how you do this,
but go back to the ExpeditorsOnline, the forums.
A lot of that stuff is seven,eight years old, at the newest.

(01:38:00):
You won't see anybody.
Nobody will mention Mentors.
It doesn't exist.
Not a single company mentionsit.
If you look at people'sadvertising today, almost
everybody mentions Mentorsavailable or we can get you a
mentor or we could help you witha mentor and the reality is

(01:38:22):
nobody's doing what we're doingof investing into their lives
and making sure that the teamsare prepared, and none of them
are doing monthly conferencecalls with everybody.
Carrier-specific it's a hottrendy word because we made it a

(01:38:46):
hot trendy word, but I'mtelling you right now nobody's
doing what we're doing with thatat all and a lot of it goes to
the credit of you know, Dina,working with the staff or
working with the mentors, butalmost all of it goes to the
mentors themselves.
We've got an excellent group ofpeople who bust tail and work

(01:39:09):
their butts off and genuinelyget joy out of seeing you be
successful, and that's what it'sall about.
That's that's the joy of it.
I mean, the lifelong friends isawesome Yay, we got another
person successful, whatever isgreat but it's that joy of like
working with these people andand and seeing um man, seeing

(01:39:29):
people's lives changed we have.
I mean, people have we seenthat have come out here, um, and
they need to build X number ofdollars for their retirement
fund or they need to help getout of some insane debt or they
want to set themselves up for afuture.
We've got people that are, youknow we've talked about before,
where we've had the lease ownerprogram within our company,

(01:39:51):
where people are buying trucksand they're and they're now
owner operators.
We've got people who arestarting fleets of their own
underneath us and stuff.
It's like there are so manygreat things that come out of
this program.
Awesome to see what's happened.
It's awesome to see people'slives changed.
It really.
I mean it's it's really it'sreally, it's probably the joys

(01:40:13):
of what we do.

Speaker 11 (01:40:13):
That's very rewarding yeah, without a doubt
if you like what you heard, makesure you hit that subscribe
button, hit the thumbs up button.
It really does help us a lot.
Please, please, please.
There's a lot of you that watchbut have not subscribed, so it
really does help us.
With the youtube algorithm, youcan listen to this on all of
your favorite podcasts.
We're out there on all of thosespotify, apple, google, google
anywhere you like to listen toyour podcast, we are available.

(01:40:35):
If you would like to send usany email, if you would like
questions or anything else thatyou would like to hear on the
podcast, shoot us an email atthe outer belt podcast at
gmailcom.
I do not read that, butsomebody will, and I get that If
you would like to.

Speaker 2 (01:40:53):
It's on my outlook.

Speaker 11 (01:40:54):
If you would like to follow up with Highfield, to
find out more about Highfieldand what we do over here, check
out highfieldtruckingcom.
You can also reach out torecruiting from the website.
You can speak to Delina, or youcan speak to Melissa, or you
can speak to myself.
Sometimes I'm on there.
You can also reach out to us at1-833-HIGHFIELD, that's

(01:41:16):
833-493-4353.
And we would love to chat withyou and tell you all about the
program.

Speaker 2 (01:41:22):
Well, this has been a really fun episode.
I appreciate so much y'allhanging out with us.
We hope we made your ride downthe road a little bit easier.
We hope that we maybe broughtsome entertainment, at least
some education about what we doand why we do it.
And thank you for hanging outwith us.
Highfield staff, everybodyaround me right now thank you
all so much for joining us.
This was quite the feat to puttogether.

(01:41:44):
It's very rare we're all in oneroom together.
Jerry, thank you so much.
He had to adjust his lights andcameras and we messed
everything up and he had to comein early and take care of all
that.
So I appreciate that as well.
Until next time, stay safe andmake good decisions don't leave
money on the table and keepthose wheels a turning and
chicks out goodnight.

Speaker 1 (01:42:06):
Thank you you.

All Episodes

Episode Transcript

Popular Podcasts

On Purpose with Jay Shetty

Crime Junkie

Ridiculous History

.css-15opob5{left:0;position:absolute;top:0.8rem;} All Episodes

.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}Navigating the Roads with Mentor Wisdom

Episode Transcript

Popular Podcasts

.css-r6mb8g{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:1;overflow:hidden;}On Purpose with Jay Shetty

Crime Junkie

Ridiculous History

All Episodes

Navigating the Roads with Mentor Wisdom

On Purpose with Jay Shetty