Your First Year as a New Trucker
Your first year as a new trucker can bring many unexpected changes to your life. Not all of them have to be bad, though. There are some things about the job that you can enjoy. Here’s a look at what to expect coming down the road.
Your New Life
You can either be a short-run trucker or a long-haul trucker. Regardless, you’re going to be spending many weeks of the year out on the road. This means less time to see your family. Even so, you will still have some home days when you’re not hauling cargo. Before you can do anything, you need to get a commercial driver’s license. This is also called a CDL for short. You’ll also need to learn how to drive the trucks and operate all the equipment that you will be expected to encounter. Eventually, you’ll get the hang of it. Don’t get down on yourself!
Getting More Momentum
At first, you’ll get freight runs and jobs that you won’t want to do. As a rookie, you’ll be the low driver on the crew, which means you’ll probably end up with the jobs that your fellow truckers don’t want to take. Give it time, because you’ll gain more experience with more completed routes. Stay on schedule and get to where you are going when you are expected to do so. You’ll see more of the country and sometimes the world, depending on which company you work for. But make sure you take the time to keep in touch with your loved ones. Loneliness can lead to higher incidences of burnout.
In the Long Run
Ultimately, consider this: you can drive full time early on in your career. Even new drivers can get jobs worth of their time and effort. Your career can advance surprisingly quickly. There’s a shortage of drivers, so you won’t have a hard time getting a new position. There will be times you will be tired and there will be times when you feel like you could be doing a better job. But don’t get discouraged, there’s always a learning curve to any job. But if you can stick it out, you’ll get it, and you might find that choosing this life is one of the best decisions you could ever make.
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