When keeping your fleet safe, of course, you want to pull out all the stops. Nobody wants to leave their business vulnerable to accidents on the road. Fleet safety training is just one of the first steps you can take in defending your fleet against the dangers of driving. But what is the best way to implement fleet driver safety training? You’ll need to consider a few things when you’re ready to train your drivers, and we’ll go over those aspects here.
Steps for Implementing Fleet Safety Training
No. 1: Determine Training Needs
Of course, it’s impossible to start training if you don’t have a baseline of what your drivers need training on! The best thing to do is to start by building a driver safety program. During this process, you’ll use fleet analysis tools and technology to determine where your drivers are so you can make the best training choices. Gather data such as accident statistics, speeding incidents, harsh braking incidents, and other performance errors that affect your drivers’ safety and those around them. This will help you create a complete profile of your drivers’ behavior. Once you have developed this profile, it will be easier to focus on specific issues for training.
No. 2: Choose a Training Method
Once you know what topics you need to train on, it’s time to select the best training method. There are a ton of options out there! You’ll need to take effectiveness, time, and cost into consideration. Let’s go over a few of the options available.
Group Sessions / Training Workshops: If you have a lot of drivers with the same issue, this is the perfect solution! A training workshop allows you to train a large number of people at the same time. However, you won’t be able to give a lot of focus to individual drivers, so this is best for general issues.
Online / E-learning: This option is best if you want to save money but keep it individualized. Online training is also easier to schedule, as drivers can complete it anytime they want. With online training, you can target a driver’s specific needs. However, it may be less engaging than face-to-face training and may not be as effective for all drivers.
On-Road Coaching: This is an ideal method where the instructor and driver work directly together on the road. It’s perfect because it puts the lessons in immediate context. However, it is a more expensive and time-consuming method.
Driver Coaching: Driver coaching is a method that uses telematics and other technology to gather data and reflect on what caused an incident, helping drivers understand what went wrong and how they can improve their decisions. While this method has a higher cost, it also has immense benefits outside of training.
No. 3: Implement the Plan
This is the most critical step in the process. You must have a detailed strategy for rolling out training so that everyone is involved and on board. Have a clear set of deadlines and expectations, and ensure that you have a system to track the completion of training.
All parties should be engaged in the process, know why the program is being implemented, and understand how it will benefit the company. Communication is key. Emphasize your business’s safety culture and bring everyone together to pitch in for the effort.
Get Azuga’s Support for Your Safety Training
Azuga’s technology can do wonders for your safety program and safety training. With telematics and dashcams, you can easily pinpoint problems that need to be addressed, and custom reports help you track progress after training is implemented. We even have tools like Azuga Coach that create targeted coaching based on the issues you see in your data. Try a software demo with one of our experts and see how it can improve your training.
