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and only shows them jobs that they are
qualified for and with carriers that will
provide training.”
The technology impressed the
“i thiNk eVerybody is realiziNg that our real Hiring Our Heroes group, but what puts
problem as aN iNdustry is twofold: oNe is veterans in jobs after they have seen
we’re doiNg a terrible job matChiNg people to the right postings is the efforts from
our CompaNies. the seCoNd thiNg is a Cultural industry partnerships. The Trucking

problem. it’s a perCeptioN problem. aNd if Track has acquired 11 partnerships
that represent different segments of
we work together to solVe the perCeptioN the industry. There are nine carriers,
problem, it will make a big differeNCe.” a hazardous waste disposal service
and a CDL school who are commit-
—jim ray, hiriNg our heroes ting to help veterans find the right
civilian job in the industry. The part-
nerships include YRC Worldwide,
Holland, J.B. Hunt, Transport America,
TMC Transportation, Maverick
Track, Manufacturing Track, and the near their home base. One misconcep- Transportation, Con-way Truckload,
Trucking Track. The Financial Track and tion is that truck driving will just take Knight Transportation, Ryder System,
Insurance Track will be added soon. them away from their families again. Inc., Troops Into Transportation and
Early this year, Hiring Our Heroes The truth is that there are jobs available Clean Harbors.
and Jim Ray found each other to form with lanes that run right through or Each partner brings a commitment
the Trucking Track, as Ray tells it. He very near almost everyone’s home town. to process the new hires and help them
is the co-founder of a technology com- Finding those jobs can be a needle-hay- through all the steps of transitioning
pany named Fastport that matches job- stack operation. And there’s the rub. out of the military and into a truck. The
seeking truckers to trucking companies. A search for “truck driver” in Little procedure may mean assisting individu-
“My CEO talked to Tom Donahue, Rock, Ark. on Craigslist yields 372 pos- als with trucking school, sending them
the president of the Chamber of the sibilities. Each posting requires the to the carrier’s own school or helping
Commerce. He’s the former president job seeker to open the post, mentally them check all the boxes required to
of the American Trucking Associations, process the job details, and decide if become a trucker.
so he was really familiar with trucking. the position is a possible fit. The same Another requirement of the partners
He connected us to the executive of the search on popular jobsite Indeed yields is a video for the Trucking Track website.
Hiring Our Heroes program. So that’s 653 possibilities. All the job postings Because the veterans may be new to the
how the story began.” on these sites are formatted differently industry, the Trucking Track aims to pro-
The real story, of course, began so there is a lot of information to sift vide a basic education—what truckers do,
with serious problem solving. Hiring through. Fastport uses a job seeker’s why it matters, how military experience
Our Heroes puts veterans in jobs across location on the map and matches jobs has already prepared veterans with skills
industries, but Fastport had already to those drivers. This minimizes out- valued by the industry.
realized that traditional job searches of-route miles and maximizes drivers’ The partners also provide mentors
are more complicated in the trucking earnings. to interested individuals with a military
industry. “The program has all these In addition to matching locations background. A mentorship program
veterans that need jobs, and they have to drivers’ home bases, the technology has been one of the most successful
job posting technology for normal jobs. filters for experience. “Veterans are elements of the Hiring Our Heroes ini-
They were frustrated because traditional intimidated by the jobs, because of the tiative since it began. Any veteran can
technology [Craigslist, Indeed, etc.] does language. We use a bunch of terms they come to the Hiring Our Heroes web
not work for trucking,” Ray explains, don’t understand which scares them pages and request someone to mentor
“because it’s so geographical.” off. And then if they go on job posting him or her through the process. “It’s a
The Trucking Track was created in boards . . . they don’t know which ones selfless thing really,” Ray explains, “A
May to use Fastport’s JobMaps technol- they can take because most of them mentor will hope that the mentees will
ogy and help veterans find trucking require experience,” Ray continues. “So come work for his or her trucking com-
positions close to their homes. our technology only shows them jobs pany, but if there just isn’t a fit, it’s the
After military professionals arrive that are in their home towns, which
home from overseas, they look for jobs is just desperately important to them, 

36 ArkAnsAs truckinG rePort | issue 4 2014