Nope.
It's no different now.
You just need a set of balls.
Why are members so afraid of management ?
They won't be there.... in 3 years.
-Bug-
The most disturbing thing to me, is this fear climbs the seniority list every day. I noticed it about 15 years ago in package car. A small number of drivers would get intimidated when they got called into the office to answer for numbers. 5 years later, I would guess about 20-25% of the drivers walked around with their tales between their legs. When I left package car almost 7 years ago, it was nearly half of the drivers in the center who were candy-asses.
I would give some of our local union officials partial blame by not having more face time in the center. We had good stewards, but the new guys had to approach them, unless they were being written up. A lot of us drivers tried to counsel the new guys how things worked, and how to stand up for themselves, but most of the blame rests on the shoulders of those drivers. They just didn't seem to have the stones to stand up for themselves, and as such, did whatever management told them to do. And, of course, they would get angry when they had to relieve us, when we did stand up. You'd think they would have noticed how things worked.
Now, those drivers are making their way to feeders, bringing their weak ways with them. Same story, get called into the office about on-property times, turn around times, being late to sorts; so what do they do? They start work before their start time, neglect to pre-trip their equipment, drive over the speed limit on the road and drive spotters around the yard like someone is chasing them.
We have a pretty strong union presence in our three buildings, so we explain to these drivers how things are done, and why. But we have some pretty ignorant, hard heads who just can't seem to get with the program. You just can't talk to some of these geniuses. Some guys can't see the big picture, that if they crash, they could easily kill themselves or others, and in the process, lose their job. And for what?
Perfect example: a few weeks ago, a was covering a mileage run where my meet driver was an hourly. The guy I was covering for is a high seniority guy, who himself is an idiot. Good guy, but he starts before his start time, he doesn't stop to do a safety check, or pee and runs hammer down for 300 miles, one way. Anyway, I run it normal, do a normal pre-trip, stop twice on the way out and run the speed limit. Well, I get to the meet point a few minutes before midnight, and the hourly meet guy is already there. Before I even get my trailers dropped, the guy has driven his tractor to me, and is revving his motor as I'm outside cranking my trailer legs down. I disconnect, and drive over to the trailers he brought and hook up. As I'm pre-tripping the trailers he brought, he walks over to me and I have an interesting conversation with an irritated driver.
Him: Hey, I've been hear since 11PM.
Me: Yeah?
Him: Well, the regular guy gets here around 11 too.
Me: Yeah, he starts before his start time and takes a lot of shortcuts. I do the job the right way, I never work off the clock and I'm not starting now.
Him: So is this the time you're going to get here all week?
Me: Yeah, if everything goes right.
Him: Well, Bill helps me out, because (very irritated now) I've got
to do!!
Me: I do to, it's called my job.
And with that, he storms off. Now I'm not a real confrontational kind of guy, but I don't take BS from management, and I'm not going to take it from some hot head, burner, either. Needless to say, I that night was the earliest I got there all week, and he never said another word the rest of the week.
Long story, I know, but the point is this place is filling up with people that do these jobs haphazardly, either out of fear or sheer stupidity.
