Year end reflection: The truck drivers…….. and us!

I’ve wanted to write this for several months, but only know I finally find the right feeling on how to pour it into words.

Allow me to start with my astonishment toward truck drivers. Some of you may already aware that truck drivers are people with a kind of work not many people consider as something fun to work on. Put it this way: You have to drive in long distance to deliver something that is not yours, and sometimes, you have to do that from dusk till dawn just to make sure that people will receive it first time in the morning. Not to mention that you must have your meals on the way, and may be with the kind of meals that is just fine, considering you are in the middle of midnight route. I’ll say that these are not the kind of work situation many people are fond of.

That’s not all about truck drivers. They also bare high risk. Let’s play some empathy game here. What kind of stuff people will most likely use forwarder, and in this case, truck drivers? That must be stuff with high size, high amounts, high loads, usually bulky, and of course too difficult to deliver by themselves. In many cases, this kind of loads are also expensive and dangerous. Or even more, these load could be attractive for crime as well. And, when it is on delivery process, the truck driver is the one in-charge on assuring these are delivered safely and completely as listed.

In countries like US, many of these drivers have firearms with them, complete insurance in their pockets, nice paychecks and well equipped vehicles. In countries like Indonesia, I guess it will less happier with old vehicles with old machines, no insurance, paycheck enough for next week, and perhaps blades and steel pipes for protection against truck robbers. Nonetheless, they do at their best to deliver.

All these leads to one conclusion I’ve drawn about them: Truck drivers are one hell of a professional people whose values are real and essentials to our economy!

My fascination and respect to these people who work on transportation, particularly truck drivers. But I also acknowledge bus drivers, train drivers, ship captains, and other similar position. I also put a highly respect on people who work as transportation engineering and manufacturing. For me, all these people are the ones that makes our travel possible, faster and safe. They make it possible to us to have things we have at our homes.

You may wonder what is so special in that for me. Well, I just feel that these people display such an amazing service by providing a service that enable other people to travel. That, for me, is a wonderful contribution for others.

Let’s take look again at the truck drivers I’ve mentioned earlier. They drive during hours where most of us are dwelling in our warm bed. They take the risk in bringing things that are not theirs. This becomes even more riskier when it comes to high risk loads such as money and other valuable things. The same also applies for those who drive high risk vehicle, such as airplanes and sea ships.

They probably don’t wear nice suits made expensive fabrics, along with amazingly done make-up and hair-do. Some of them may seem greasy and sweaty, but they’ve done a great contribution to many people lives. Look at all the things around you. Those things can be at their place now, most likely because these people in transportation deliver them.

They deliver things, so those things becomes useful for us. They makes those things actually valuable, not just illustration in commercials, catalogs or brochures.

My amazement and respect to these people are mostly comes from my experiences using their service. I still remember how I really enjoyed the service of Metro bus driver in Seattle, which unfortunately is far better than most public transport we have in Indonesia. In fact, having those pleasant experience with them really made me aware how service can actually significant in showing a value of someone’s contribution to the job.

Now, I want to present a question to all of us: Have we done our job like these truck drivers have done in their job? How well have we done in delivering values to people who need those values?

We all are drivers. In our jobs, we are supposed to  deliver value to people who need those values, no matter what you are working for.

So, for this year-end reflection, I will repeat the question again: Have we done our job like these truck drivers have done in their job? How well have we done in delivering values to people who need those values?

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