Brandon W – Status Trucks Dispatcher

My name is Brandon, and I am a dispatcher at Status Trucks. There are three main skills you need to have to be a good dispatcher: communication, patience and negotiation skills. There is one more thing, what you need to be able to do is to be a people person because you are going to be dealing with people all the time. Those are the main things you need to be a good dispatcher.
My driver is the most important person that I have to work with in this whole process. The strategy that I go with is talking to the owner operators in the morning, figure out exactly where he needs to go, what he wants, what he is willing to carry, whatever he or she needs. To get the owner operator loads picked up and done. That’s the basic strategy that I deal with every day.
At first, when I first started dispatching I would beat myself up because I could not get the best owner operator loads immediately, but as I gained more experience, I learned that the good loads don’t pop up until the end of the day. So patience and communicate well with your drivers because at times I think I’m listening, I hear what you are saying, but I have a whole other plan I want to do. I need to take more time to listen to what you guys need and then it will help me to really figure out and build a real relationship with my owner operators.
I think personality is an important factor in being a good dispatcher. Just because some dispatchers are outspoken, and some are reserved that doesn’t mean that they are not able to do their job. In reality, it’s like relationships. Some girls are going to be good for me, and some girls are not going to be good for me, same with dispatchers and same with truck drivers. Just because I don’t mesh with one driver, that doesn’t mean I can’t be a great dispatcher for another driver. It’s all about relationships and not taking anything too personal, do the best that you can at what you are doing.

The most challenging part of the job is not having as much control as you would like. I say that because there is a lot of times when the shipper will tell you one thing, you believe the shipper, and when you get there, it’s a whole other thing. We do everything we can to rectify and resolve the situation, but there’s still times when you don’t control the situation, but we do our best to solve it every time.
As a dispatcher for our driver what I enjoy the most is knowing that I helped somebody, helping you as the driver with your owner operator pay so you can take care of your personal needs and your family. It makes me feel good at the end of the day to know that I’m helping you, helping me. And also at the end of the day, we are helping the shippers as well, we are moving things throughout the U.S. we are making sure things keep moving, I enjoy that.
I talk to my drivers all the time; I remember when my driver was moving. There have been some tough times when my driver’s lost family members, but I’ve also lost family members as well, and we have opened up to each other through those experiences, and it helped bring us closer together. You don’t always have to do that like I said it varies from relationship to relationship.
Building a closer bond helps to move the process along when you are looking for owner operator loads, and you are negotiating. If you know your owner operators and you trust them the same as they trust you, you can book loads quicker for them.
To the owner operators who are already with Status, thank you! To new owner operators coming in thank you for joining this great establishment Especially to new owner operators I encourage you to be patient, this isn’t a situation where you are going to make one million dollars during the first week. If you take the time to build a relationship with your dispatcher I guarantee you within some time you will be able to bring in the money that you are looking for. You just have to give it some time.