Moving Words – Cold
Written by Timothy Brady.
“It doesn’t matter if the water is cold or warm if you’re going to have to wade through it anyway.” – Pierre Teilhard de Chardin (Teilhard de Chardin, a French idealist/philosopher and Jesuit priest was trained as a paleontologist and geologist and helped discover Peking Man.)
With just a slight update Teilhard de Chardin describes the challenge we face each and every winter in the moving business “It doesn’t matter if it’s cold or warm if you’re going to have to work and drive through it anyway.”
Winter is always a challenge in the moving business. Tonnage is typically slow, weather can change to frightful in a few short hours and revenue is usually down. Market forces drive rates to their lowest levels of the year as the law of supply and demand is on the low supply side. However, we still need to service the few shipments to the highest level of quality possible. And we do our best to keep the revenue flowing, not just for the company but also for the contractors and employees we rely on no matter the time of year.
Being prepared for the winter season requires far more than warm clothes, anti-gel and antifreeze: it requires dedication to finding and acquiring as many shipments as possible in a slim market, enabling diversification into other markets that are more active to keep employees and contractors cash-flowing above individual and company break-even points.
This dedicated, diversified effort by salespeople, move coordinators, and operations is imperative for the continued success of your operation. To do this requires well-trained staff provided with the tools necessary to accomplish each task. In today’s competitive environment that means having the right software for each department, and this is especially true during the slow times. The correct software programs ensure nothing drops ‘through the cracks.’
Keep in mind when looking for the correct software you require a program that is moving specific. It needs to be fully incorporated to provide easily accessible information from operations, customer service, claims, and the company’s financial information. It must be user-friendly with a short learning curve. And the biggest requirement of all: the software which will service your company’s needs must work across all departments so it quickly and efficiently generates the necessary reports for department heads as well as executive management. These valuable reports provide a window into the performance, efficiency and profitability of each department in the mover’s operation. They show a microcosm of just how each department is functioning.
Think of your software in the same way Noam Chomsky thinks of cold weather: “I like the cold weather. It means you get work done.” The correct software means you get the readily available jobs done, and find more and better-diversified markets which are still vibrantly active during cold weather.
