FirstFleet tenFour

*Unedited Transcript* Please reference the audio ensure the transcription software edited this audio appropriately.

Welcome to first fleet ten four.

Hello, and welcome to the first fleet ten four podcast. My name is Elizabeth Wyndham, and I'll be your host today. And I am joined by one of our driver trainers and one of our regional safety managers. So welcome to the podcast you guys. Okay. All right. So if you could go ahead and introduce yourselves to everybody who let them know my name is James McIntosh.

I am a driver trainer out of Oxford, PA Oxford, and I'm Roger Poulin regional safety manager of the Northeast. And I must admit to everyone that I've noticed, we've had a lot of very Southern voices on the podcast. So I'm making a very concerted effort to get some Yankees on here. So

welcome to the podcast.

Okay, glad you guys are here. This is awesome. So, Hey, I know that both of you are pretty into wellness and you're pretty fit dudes. And I know Roger, I was always carrying that bicycle with him and going on bike rides and what I've never actually learned what you do in the winter. Actually I went to time.

I basically, I do a lot of hiking and do some snowshoeing too when I find time and I do some indoor cycling too. And also when I'm traveling, if I don't have the bicycle with me, I'll hit the gym, hit the treadmill. Okay. Gotcha. Nice snowshoeing. That sounds very cold. It's a good workout. A good time. I actually actually made a joke at my expense on one of the previous podcasts about winter driving for southerners.

Um, Uh, no, go ahead. Laugh. I know. And I literally said to all the main guys, I apologized to all of you because anything more than three inches of snow is officially a blizzard in my world. So I know, I know, I know it's silly, but it's true. I mean, goodness sakes. I'm from South Carolina, you know, it means a national emergency and we don't get much, no, down here, we do not.

It is, it is a shock to the system, for sure. Yeah. I moved to Tennessee and I had to buy close toed shoes. So that first winter, it was the coolest thing ever, man. So I'm learning how to dress for Tennessee, but this is the farthest north I've ever lived. Yeah, I, I must've, uh, one day I might visit, you need to come live up here.

I don't know about that. About a week. I'll give you a week. Okay. But no. Okay. So wellness. So you got winter, you got your summer with. You got, when you're traveling, what would you say are some things that we can all do to be better about wellness? Because we're stuck in a truck all day. You know, we can't get around, we can't move.

What, what do you recommend? I would recommend developing a routine when you're not driving. When you get out of your truck, do some stretching, walk around the truck park, further away from the truck stop. So you get to walk to the right start and, um, build a routine, a routine of. Either like an exercise routine exercise routine or parking away and, you know, do some lunches, some squats each day.

Yep. Okay. All right. That's cool. Yeah, I, I do I go on a lunchtime walk and there's one side of the building that has no windows and that's this, I don't do lunges so much public embarrassment. Like you can take, you know, So a routine. So like every time you get out of the truck or like when you go and open the doors to go into the dock, do you like do lunges down the truck lane stretch a little bit.

It might stretch a little. Okay. It depends how far long I've been driving. Okay. But then I'm going to have in different for a long time. True. I'm driving a different vehicle. And when I get out to fuel up there too, I'll bend over, touch my toes and stretch a little bit to my calves. Okay. What about you, James?

Do you have any recommendations? Yeah. So in addition to what Roger said, You know, because I now unload trailers. Um, I don't go to the gym as often, but I mind revolves more around eating. Um, and I think a mistake made in the kitchen, not the gym. There you go. So I think a mistake that a lot of drivers make is, uh, they eat out a lot.

Okay. Um, and, uh, that costs you a lot of money, but. Horrible for your health. I was over the road for five and a half years. And when I came off the road, I lost 20 pounds right away. Um, and now is based on eating habits. Um, people should pack lunches, you know, pack a healthy lunch, um, something that's going to fill you up something that's healthy, but don't stay away from these trucks.

Stop, uh, eateries where. There's a lot of fatty foods and unhealthy things. Cause a lot of times you're, you're tired. It's the end of the day you're going to eat that meal. You're going to go to bed. What that food is sitting in your gut and it's not digesting properly. Cause there's no way of burning it off.

So, um, I really suggest, uh, Uh, drivers do that. Uh, okay. Bill, you know, it, it costs you less money. It takes a little bit of time, but you're also, you're, you're not spending that money on things I want to make you unhealthy. A lot of, a lot of drivers, um, have money and health, right. And a lot of drivers. Wait issues, but also heart issues because of poor eating habits.

So. Gotcha. Okay. That's what I would say. Yeah. I know mark. And I talk about, talk about wellness a lot. That's our favorite podcast topic, actually. So we, you know, we talk about all the other stuff, but mark and Mark McKnight, and I love to get on and talk about wellness because that's something we both care about.

And so I, I loved hearing more people's recommendations about, about wellness. And so we've covered physical wellness and working out. Uh, eating wellness, um, dietary wellness, I guess, but there's also financial wellness as well. Um, do you have any tips, um, for our drivers about how to, because cooking for yourself to save money.

So that is a guess a financial wellness tip, but again, if you buying fancy food that could cost more. I don't know what. Um, you know, uh, set a percentage of your income aside for saving, um, how much I wouldn't do a lot. I mean, I probably less than 10%, like for me, I don't, you know, Dave Ramsey might say something different and I do love his books by the way.

Um, but I, you know, I, uh, the majority of my check goes in the bank and then I'll pull, you know, a couple of hundred dollars. For myself, not much just enough that I could buy something if I wanted to, you know, and it helps you with saving as well. But, you know, I just think that like, you know, we have, uh, all that money that goes in a pot.

It's not all towards bills, but what I'm paying myself is not a lot is what I'm saying. So savings is a bill as well. You have to treat savings like it's a bill. So that's what savings is that that is one of my bills, but the money is genius. Right? So. You have to treat savings like a bill. So when I say I pull $200 apart away, that's just for me to do whatever I want with it.

That's nothing to do with something to do with savings. So you want to another percentage of, of your bills, which is saving one of your bills, your savings tasks to. You know, what's cool. Actually, I've really enjoyed when we switched over to Workday, I went in and updated my direct deposit and I actually now have two bank accounts and because I wasn't doing a good job on saving.

And so I actually set up one bank account just for a savings account. So I. Most of them, you know, 90% of my check goes into my checking account to pay bills and take care of stuff. But then I have another 10% that goes into my savings account. And then I never even see the money. Cause I'll be honest. I get tempted if it's there.

I'm like, Aw, look at that. I didn't know. I had that much money in my account. You know, it's like, and they say, don't put, don't put all your money in one place. I have several banks, I have several banks and. A lot in each one, but it's another it's, you know, it's for me psychologically, if I don't have to look at it, it's not there.

Right. Absolutely. And I know that right now, I think we can have. Four or five, four direct deposits. I think, I think we can have four direct deposit, like options. Like we can break up our money and our paycheck into four different accounts. So I'm like, why wouldn't we use it? You know, another great option is the 401k on.

For a fleet option, very true offers where they would a match 401k. You don't, you're not tempted to take the money out. Right. A match is free money. So why would you pass up free money? And I was called to financial consultants. See what they recommend to put away to depending on your needs and your costs.

Absolutely. And your lifestyle, anything else? What do you think your savings is? A pay is a bit. Savings is a bill, a bill. Okay. We're going to set up direct deposit, specially for savings. We're going to work on contributing to your 401k. Yes, absolutely monthly and sleep, sleep. So sleep's important.

Absolutely. I heard, uh, don't quote me on this, but I heard. When you're sleeping, if you get at least eight hours, there's like a chemical that goes to your brain that flushes out all the junk in the day. Who's told me that, and we don't get enough sleep. That all that junk is not allowed to get out of your brain.

So that's why you get all the fatigue and the illness and things like that. So sleep is very important. Eight hours sleep, which is hard for drivers to do. I know, like for me it is, but yeah, sure. If fatigue is a killer on the roads, so. I've made some dumb mistakes driving late at night and, uh, fatigue is very dangerous.

Okay. So you recognize when you are fatigued, when you're tired, when you need to pull off the side of the road and get that rest. Absolutely. And also James said you need to get at least eight hours a night. Sure. No. To say healthy. Yes. Yeah, cause I mean, you'll gain, even if you're eating the best diet working out, you'll still gain weight.

If you're not sleeping. I mean, I've, I've seen that in my own life. So, you know, when, um, when I was pulling four hours a night, I mean, you just couldn't, I just couldn't help it. It's just how your body works. So, uh, narrowed saying that there, there, there is some research that's coming out, that's linking, uh, Alzheimer's and dementia to people who don't get enough sleep because all the garbage isn't being flushed out of their brains.

So it makes total sense to have issues. Yeah. Essentially plaque in your brain, the whatever you call it. It's like, you got to brush your teeth every day. You have to Brit bays. You have to let your brain heal if, to let your brain okay. Cleaning brain and you do that by your eight hours of rest. Nice. Okay.

Love it. This is awesome. Tell me this. Uh, how long have you been with first fleet? I don't even know if we talked about this two years. I've been firstly since 2013, a driver for. Five years then the last three years I've been regional safety manager. Nice. Okay. Very cool. And what is, what is probably the first, what is the thing you love most about first fleet?

I like that you can make really good money as long as you work hard. And I know it sounds weird. Like it's like, well, Joel, but like, you know, there, there's not a lot of companies out there that can promise that. So I I've noticed with firstly, you know, if you, if you work hard, the money. Sure it'll come.

And one of the things I do as a trainer, my trainer did the same thing with me. Um, I show. Ma him or her I've had, I've only had two trainees cause I just started training. But, um, uh, I showed both of my trainees when they first started, how much I made the previous year. So they know like, wow, I could, I can do this.

And this was, you know, and I didn't really count the, the training part of it. I said, you know, take X amount of dollars off because of. This is what you can show. You could actually make an, their eyes are big. Like, yeah, you know, you can do this, but you have to work hard and you have to put the work out there and things aren't always going to be perfect.

You know, you're not going to work in perfect conditions all the time, but Pennsylvania's gonna snow. Right. But as long as you work hard, you can make really good money, especially, uh, here first. Cool. What I enjoy about record firstly is, is family atmosphere. People change each the respect and dignity on a regular basis.

Doesn't matter who you've been a president all the way down to the admin and the drive is the most valued commodity. We have drivers. We're not. Yeah. Oh 100%. So in my part of the, my, my job, I enjoy the fact that I get to meet people and help people learn how people learn new skills that they may not have or develop skills.

There might be a week on. If I can see somebody improve, it makes me feel good. That's awesome. Yeah. I love, I love hanging out with the safety guys and the trainers is I'm learning from this conference that he has just a wealth of information and I'm learning so much. Um, I'm learning, learning about trucks.

It's funny. I, I, I know how to do a great pre-trip. Can't drive. Can't drive one, but I can do a free trip. Yep. Well, after making all those videos with Ron Crow, Kind of stuck in there. Good stuff. Awesome. Well, thank you both for your time. I really appreciate it. Hey, absolutely. I'm glad to be here. So, uh, hope you all have a great rest of your day and, uh, as always drive safe.