PT supervisor over drivers - PT OMS

[TrickyTrixie]

Hi everyone! I had an interview today for a position that would basically put me in charge of communicating with the drivers. It was emphasized (ALOT!) about how the drivers are union and very difficult to work with. If I get this job... I want to know... what is it that is keeping the drivers and the OMS from getting along? What issues do you find with your OMS that make you dislike them or not want to work for them? What could they do to make you want to work harder for them? I dont have the job yet but I would like to know what issues there are so if I make it to the next interview I can know what some of the common problems are and how I would want to address them. My management style is fairly decent I think. I want to work with people. I realize not everyone takes the same kind of "touch" to be motivated. I believe if I work for my employees they will work for me. I try to do everything in my power to make a job easier on my employees... not harder. But I would like to know... am I walking into a hornets nest? Is the blood that bad that it will be one heck of an uphill battle?

I have another question - does anyone know the general pay for this position? Kind of a high and low? Also I know the position is non-union (they seemed to imply this was a large part of the problem with OMS vs Drivers) so I am wondering what the benefits are like? I know union people dont get benefits for a year, etc. Is it different for non-union supervisors? Does anyone know?

 

[toonertoo]

We as union are not hard to get along with, and not to dis the job, but you are basically a an OMS an underling who will get all the crap and none of the glory.
The only ones hard to get along with, are the management. Hourlies are happy. We have some protection from unfair treatment, you will have zilch.

 

[brownedout]

The main problem I have had with OMS's is their "orders" seldom rival those of our center manager, and especially not those of my OC. I refer to OMS's as consignee advocates. They want what is best for the cosignee, usually because they promised it before they could DELIVER it. Most of the bad ones never heard a reason for a NI1 or any valid non-delivery attempt that they couldn't sympathize with.

 

[brownrod]

Our driver supervisors emphasize one thing to us. Production. Production in the form of SPORH (stops per on road hour) and over/under allowed. OMS oftentimes demand that us drivers do things that hurt our productivity and make us look bad in the eyes of the driver supervisors. You will have drivers that only care about productivity and looking good on paper at the cost of customer service. And other drivers that don't care at all about their productivity and happily go along with OMS requests to satisfy customer demands.

OMS is a demanding job. You deal with angry customers and angry drivers. all day. every day.