11 Qualities that make you a Great Fleet Manager
Summary
The blog discusses the qualities required to become a great fleet manager in the logistics and transportation industry. The qualities include time management, multitasking ability, adaptability, goal-orientation, communication skills, leadership, tech-savviness, decision-making ability, and knowledge in fleet maintenance.
The article emphasizes that possessing these qualities can drive the entire organization towards better business development and increased productivity.
The fleet Manager job role is one of the hardest work profile in the logistics and transportation business. In his job role, the major job task is fleet management.
In the vehicle fleet management, he needs to maintain the vehicle at proper condition, driver management from training to monitoring driver behavior, expenses management including fuel expenses, trip expenses, vehicle service maintenance expenses, insurance, and the list goes on in logistics fleet expenses management.
Above all is an integral part of the job profile and company, whereas he will be interacting with various stakeholders like customers, consignee, warehouse managers, en route issues, and persons involved in the trip en route.
On a given day, the fleet manager will have loads of work and each demands different traits and qualities like communication skills, multitasking ability, decision making, and various other qualities which we are going to discuss in detail in this article.
Here in this article, we are listing the list of qualities one should possess to become a great fleet manager.
Qualities that make you a Great Fleet Manager
1. Time Management Skills
Be it any profession, you could be bank manager, fleet manager, Program Manager, Project Manager for that matter any managerial job, time management is not only essential quality but it is also basic quality.
As a Fleet manager, most of the time, your work goes according to the plan. But you should always have Plan-B and act according to the factors like situation, priority, etc.
Say, for example, you were in the meeting with the new customer discussing the company process and you get a call from the driver with an emergency alert, Now you need to act to the situation and address the driver’s requirement without affecting the customer meeting. Get 10 minutes to break from the customer to address the driver’s needs or assess the situation and get back to him once the meeting is done.
2. Ability to Multitask
It differs from person to person, few people prefer to concentrate and focus on only one activity at a time, there are people who handle various tasks at a given point of time. Few job roles demand the first ones and for the fleet manager role the latter one.
Fleet manager job profile demands the multitasking quality, he / she should juggle between the obligations and responsibilities according to the situation. The fleet manager’s major role is interaction with different people on various channels. He should be smart enough to communicate using phone calls, messages, WhatsApp, and situational decision making.
3. Being Able to Adapt to Change
“Changes is the only thing that doesn’t change”
In the era of fast-growing and technologies up-gradation in our day to day life, one should be mentally prepared to adapt himself to the changes in the world. Likewise, the fleet manager should also ready to adapt himself according to technology up-gradation.
When there was a GPS vehicle tracking system the logistics sector used the technology for vehicle tracking, used ERP software for resource management. Now in the market, there is the best fleet management software, which addresses the demands of fleet operations in a single web and mobile application (like FleetOS).
So, the fleet manager should possess the quality of adapting to the changing needs in his job profile and also in life, if he / she wishes to pursue or achieve greater heights.
4. Goal-Oriented
Fleet managers should always lead from the front. He / She should have clear goals and target month-on-month, year-on-year basis. If they have clear goals before them, they will have proper metrics and data to analyze, based on the reports fleet manager can improve or assess the issues.
Say, for example, if the fleet manager wants to improve the productivity of the vehicle, he should have clear metrics for the vehicle month-on-month, based on the metrics he can improve the vehicle productivity in the planned and set the goal accordingly to achieve it.
In a similar way, he can apply in other job tasks such as fleet utilization, reducing the vehicle downtime over certain periods. If the Fleet manager has a clear goal and vision, it will drive the entire organization for better business development and increase in productivity.
5. Strong Communication Skills
A quality fleet manager should have great communication skills both in writing and orally. He would send emails, messages, presentation to customers, memo to drivers.
The fleet manager should have a clear vision, conceptualize the ideas clearly and present it to people what he wants to communicate without diluting the idea. For this, the fleet manager should have a good command of language.
6. Leadership
“A Leader is one who knows the way, goes the way, and shows the way” — John Maxwell.
Leadership quality doesn’t come in one day, it is a process. As a fleet manager, you should guide your drivers, vehicle maintenance engineers, team members, and other stakeholders involved in fleet management.
Fleet managers with good leadership qualities will bring wonders to the logistics and transportation business. They lead from the front, guide the fellow employees and share the ideas and vision with the top management. If you are one such fleet manager you are blessed, gifted, and an asset to your life.
7. Tech Savvy
In the fleet management sector, there are numerous application and software advancements. The fleet manager should know which is the best fleet management software, how to choose the best fleet management system for his organization.
He should utilize the tool properly in order to improve vehicle productivity, driver efficiency, business development. Tech Savvy employees are like smart worker, using technology they bring better results to their respective logistics and transportation industry.
If you are using the best fleet management software you can know the vehicle trip status, driver behavior, fleet expenses managements, various reports, and data to understand business progress with the aid of technology.
8. Decision making
Crunch situations, emergency scenarios, What next conditions all make fleet managers difficult in decision making.
On a given day, say, for example, the driver met with an accident and load in the vehicle is delayed, vehicle damaged, driver injured — Now you are the fleet manager handling the situation and need to take vital decision to address the situation.
Like the situation mentioned above, the fleet manager will take n-number of decisions on a daily basis. Not all decisions will bring fruitful results but the fleet manager should make the decision after considering logical, situational, and priority factors.
Decision-making is an art, as time progress and based on experience fleet managers know what to do and what not to do.
9. Resource and People Management
In-vehicle fleet management, the fleet manager is responsible for the fleets, drivers, and other employees work in his team.
The fleet manager should maintain the vehicle in proper condition and plan the vehicle for regular maintenance, so that, it won’t affect productivity.
Proper guidance, support, and direction to his team members should be taken care of by the fleet manager.
10. Accountability
The fleet manager should accountable for his activities and tasks. he should take complete responsibility for the entire fleet. He should understand his position in the logistics organization and act accordingly. Because in the logistics sector fleet manager plays a key role in company’s success and growth.
11. Innovative
The fleet manager’s tasks are not only vehicle maintenance, driver management, he should also be creative and think out-of-box ideas for the company’s business development.
Possessing a unique combination of analytical and conceptual abilities, great fleet managers implement innovative initiatives to reduce the cost of fleet operations through the use of fuel management systems.
At VAMOSYS, we understand the demands and challenges faced by fleet managers. We have developed the next-gen fleet management software system (FleetOS) to address the requirements of the logistics and transportation business.
