What keeps the transportation industry moving forward? Let’s dive into trends in this fast-paced industry to see what leaders are doing to stay flexible, innovative, and profitable.
The $1 trillion transportation and logistics industry is essential in every sense of the word. Without it, goods would never make it to shelves, fulfillment warehouses would sit empty, and economies would grind to a halt.
But keeping things moving isn’t always an easy feat, with outdated and siloed enterprise technology throwing dust into the gears of this fast-paced industry. So how are leaders taking action to keep themselves moving forward?
Let’s dive into trends in the transportation industry as leaders look to stay innovative and, in turn, miles ahead of their competition.
Transportation leaders know they must work hard to improve frontline worker satisfaction and engagement. It’s essential to their companies’ success.
Take trucking, for example. Driving is a tough job, and if trucking companies don’t take a plethora of preemptive actions to improve engagement and retention, they can get trapped in a perpetual cycle of hire-train-lose-hire-train-lose, which is costly and unhealthy for sustainable growth.
Job satisfaction and engagement is particularly important in light of a pronounced labor shortage in the transportation industry, where roles often require a particular set of qualifications and experience. In trucking in particular, the workforce is aging, making it even harder to fill those positions.
Competition for the shrinking pool of skilled labor is as fierce and unrelenting as the midday sun on Interstate 40 in Amarillo, so transportation companies must make themselves desired destinations for their most critical talent. This comes through improving career development opportunities and using technology to improve the employee experience.
Fleet management leader Ryder deployed a self-service center that serves up benefits information and lets employees record their time, submit HR inquiries, and take training courses, to name a few examples. But more broadly, having deployed a modern, cloud-based system has helped to entice new drivers, warehouse associates, and technicians to join the company, says Luis Zayas, vice president of transformation and the office of the CIO at Ryder.
“By eliminating our previous antiquated systems—which meant new employees would have to do their jobs through work-arounds and manual processes—Workday has allowed us to automate, giving our employees time to think, innovate, and act,” says Zayas.
Addressing the skills gap is also part of the solution to the shrinking labor pool. More than ever, transportation companies are shifting to identify and bridge skills gaps within their workforce instead of taking a more restrictive approach defined by education or experience. A skills-based approach brings a level of freedom to the hiring process and results in finding employees who might not fit the mold on paper but who in reality are perfect fits for both role and culture. And with a deskless workforce, training and learning programs must be mobile-based to ensure that employees can complete required learning modules, stay engaged, and grow their skills from anywhere.
All this adds up to the necessity of taking a holistic approach to the employer brand and employee experience and building a culture that focuses on growth opportunities, continuous learning, and retention. Technology must be used to its full potential to make the recruiting and onboarding process as smooth as possible. Once employees are on board, that same technology can create a consumer-grade employee experience that fosters the best chance of long-term retention.
A skills-based approach to hiring brings a level of freedom to the hiring process and results in finding employees who might not fit the mold on paper but who in reality are perfect fits for both role and culture.
Transportation leaders also have to navigate a constantly changing compliance and labor law landscape. Driver safety is the number one priority, and so many of these laws and regulations are put in place to keep drivers safe. The stakes are high. So missteps are not only costly but also jeopardize safety, operations, and long-term success. Unions are ever present across the industry, which adds another layer of complexity, making negotiation and partnership skills paramount to keeping working relationships harmonious.
It’s critical to have the right technology in place to manage the necessary data to ensure compliance. Streamlined processes and real-time insights help transportation companies stay ahead of compliance and labor law changes and adapt quickly to new regulations. And by having safeguards in place from this potential disruption, they can focus on their core objective of keeping our homes and businesses stocked with goods for everyday life.
Volatility is the constant companion of the transportation industry, and markets change by the day with the effects of omnichannel and e-commerce demand. Meeting demand quickly and accurately is essential in a landscape where consumers have a very high expectation for delivery speed. An agile approach to delivery optimization and the ability to navigate supply chain disruption are linchpins for success in transportation.
Predictive analysis and operational agility must be prioritized, and a delicate balance between foresight and adaptability is the only way forward. Unforeseen challenges are inevitable, but with careful preparation and scenario planning, transportation companies can be ready for whatever comes their way.
How? Real-time, high-quality data must underpin every piece of the supply chain, from the time a consumer clicks “complete order” until the package lands on their doorstep or at the store. An end-to-end view of the entire supply chain is key, and it’s quickly becoming a nonnegotiable in such a competitive industry. The more analytics and real-time data, the better. This makes it easier to identify potential bottlenecks and optimize delivery routes, cutting down delays and boosting efficiency. When this happens, key KPIs, such as route profitability, on-time delivery, average delivery time, cost per unit, and freight bill accuracy, are more likely to be delivered on.
Predictive analysis and operational agility must be prioritized, and a delicate balance between foresight and adaptability is the only way forward.
But what is essential to all these aspects of a smooth-running transportation company? From strong employee engagement to easy compliance and a well-oiled supply chain, the common thread becomes clear: centralized, cloud-based enterprise technology.
Fragmented, disjointed, on-premise systems are the enemy of efficiency and informed decision-making. Foregoing the advantages of an enterprise management cloud is like starting out on a road trip without a map. When markets change, operations need to be optimized, and future disruption must be planned for, cloud-based technology makes the destination much easier to reach. And any system must be fully equipped to support the needs of a mobile-first, deskless workforce.
With this technology in place, communication is easier, and a unified view of operations makes strategic decision-making possible. When change inevitably comes, transportation companies can adapt that much more quickly and don’t have to stop innovating along the way.
With strong employee engagement and wise decision-making enabled by real-time, cloud-based enterprise technology, transportation companies are empowered to pour their time and energy into their ever-important mission: keeping the world moving forward.
To learn more about how Workday helps transportation companies achieve their goals, download the Workday For Transportation eBook.
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