30. The Life and Times of Sheldon Miller

Andrea and Griff welcome Sheldon to the pod, where we talk about safety, the challenges of being a ready mix driver, barging on the I-74 Bridge project and diarrhea on the walls.

IRMCA Scholarship Link: IRMCA Scholarships - ConcreteState

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:09

Welcome to Loaded, the Hahn Ready Mix podcast with Andrea Meyer, Griffin Hahn, producer Lex. And today, special guest Sheldon Miller is with us.

SPEAKER_02 0:19

Hey, Sheldon. Hello. How's it going today? It's going good. Excellent. Excellent.

SPEAKER_00 0:24

I actually think you're going to be able to hear Sheldon on the podcast today.

SPEAKER_02 0:27

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 0:28

Last time he tried to carry the team and do it with Sam, and they had some technical issues, but I think we're going to make it happen today.

SPEAKER_03 0:36

Producer Lex ironed them out.

SPEAKER_00 0:38

Thank you, Lex. Thanks for being here. Let's start with some announcements. What do we have today?

SPEAKER_01 0:44

Uh, I have a few things. Um, first one, I got a really nice text from um one of my wife's old coworkers, who's a veteran. Um, and he took place uh took part in the 9-11 ride that the uh Combat Veterans Motorcycle Association did. And uh uh Jason had Joe's truck out there, the veteran truck. And they sent us a really nice text about how much it means to the organization and all the veterans that participate in that that were supporting him in that way. So I just thought that was pretty cool and wanted to pass that on.

SPEAKER_00 1:19

That is really good to hear. It is uh challenging in my brain to think about having parade-ready trucks and also having trucks that deliver concrete every day, but I guess it's worth it when we hear good messages.

SPEAKER_01 1:31

And extra uh kudos to Jason. He's got the extra pressure of keeping Joe's truck clean. Yes. That can't be can't be easy. So yeah, that's great.

SPEAKER_00 1:41

Good. I also wanted to let everyone know uh Dennis Miller, who drives the dump truck, uh I think it's a pink truck right now, right? Pink, pink tandem dump truck. He is retiring next month after over 30 years with the company. So we are gonna try to get together a lunch for him on Monday, the 29th. So that'll be a week after this podcast comes out. Uh tentative, of course, because whenever we plan a meeting or a lunch, it ends up being a busy day or some other reason why we can't execute it. But that's the plan right now. Hopefully everybody can get in to grab some lunch and celebrate uh his retirement.

SPEAKER_01 2:17

Yeah, that's wonderful. I'll be firing up the grill. Oh, you always know it's good when Sheldon's on the grill. That's great. Yep. I have one more thing. Well, really, two more things, but um the Iowa Ready Mix Concrete Association scholarships opened up today. And we will link the scholarship application uh in the show notes here. But basically, um they have kind of strict eligibility for that. And one of the one of the eligibility options, I guess, is if you are a family member of an RMCA member. So any of our employees, if you have any children or grandchildren that are um enrolled at a two or four-year institution in Iowa, college institution, um, they're giving out a lot of scholarships. So last year was like over$80,000 in scholarships, and they had like 30 different recipients that got somewhere between$1,000 and$5,000 each. So big deal. Um, so we'll we'll we will link that in the show notes and don't miss out if you have kids, you know, and that are that are in school and and that could be a help. It's pretty huge.

SPEAKER_00 3:30

Great.

SPEAKER_01 3:31

I think um also I you know I was just thinking today, we we have a relatively busy day today, and I was hopping around job sites all morning, and I just want to give a shout-out to everyone. All the job sites were going basically flawless, and it just seemed so easy. You know, we're running out of you know, out of multiple different plants with with you know, not always the somewhat complex mixes and and pours, and and it just felt like it wasn't taking any effort at all. And I know how much it goes into it at the plants and dispatch and planning and with the drivers, and and um I know everybody's working really hard to make it feel like it's easy, but we're on the job sites, all the customers were just really chill because it seemed like it was flawless and they didn't realize that um there's a lot of things in motion in the background. So I just was really proud of um how well today was going and and so I just wanted to give a shout out to everybody.

SPEAKER_00 4:30

That's really great. It leads right into my next topic, which is uh sort of the opposite of what you said, are one of the things that we should do better to make those things work like clockwork. We've had a couple incidents just this past week where um someone was off for the day and their key was not on the board, and the key was not in the truck. And then we finally got into the truck with a spare key and the truck was not properly fueled to start the day. So that is just such a delay uh when we're urgently needing to get someone in a truck and get them loaded. It just has happened twice in the last week and it just crushes me. So I'm asking everyone again to to fuel and put your keys where they go.

SPEAKER_01 5:15

Yeah. Yeah, for sure.

SPEAKER_00 5:16

I will not stop saying that, I guess. All right. Should we get started with Sheldon?

SPEAKER_01 5:23

Yeah, let's dive into it. So, Sheldon, you've been on the podcast before, but it was the the rogue episode. Yeah, what and so we weren't sitting here with you.

SPEAKER_03 5:31

No.

SPEAKER_01 5:32

So we can give you a formal welcome to the podcast and thank you for for being on.

SPEAKER_03 5:36

Well, thank you.

SPEAKER_01 5:37

Yeah. Um let's let's start a little bit. What your journey to Han Radio Mix? Where did you come from beforehand? What what um what did you do before you came to us?

SPEAKER_00 5:49

Uh also this is a 20-minute podcast. I'm gonna remind both of you as we get started.

SPEAKER_01 5:53

So 20 minutes podcast. It's pretty long-winded.

SPEAKER_03 5:57

Um, well, uh I started out in uh I went to auto diesel school and then decided I didn't want to be a mechanic. And then shoot, we could have used you there too. Warehousing, and then I ended up finding a passion for low voltage cable TV, and I I was a cable guy for about 10 years and also with uh ADT for about five. Um, and then I was I've been friends with Johnny for a long time, like 20 years. I was best man in his wedding. And were you really? I didn't know that. Yeah. Oh, cool. And uh he uh he and I met for lunch one day. We just it the stars lined up and it was right before the 74 bridge. Yeah. And you know, about a week later he called me up and said, Hey, you thinking about jumping ship? Because I think I got something for you. And then I came over, had a really unusual interview with like five managers at a round table just shooting from the hip. And then they sent me to Wayne's office, and Wayne asked me a few questions and said, Okay, go talk to Andrea.

SPEAKER_01 6:59

Yeah. And that was that was pretty much it. And uh correct me if I'm wrong, but your first title was uh officially Barge Bitch, right? That was my job. Yes.

SPEAKER_03 7:08

I applied for the job of barge bitch. That's correct.

SPEAKER_01 7:13

Which was, you know, we had to have someone on every barge, uh barge load of taking four to sometimes six trucks out into the river, and somebody had to make sure the trucks got on and off safely and and kind of managed what happened on the barge because yeah, that was surprisingly more difficult than you think. Yeah. Yeah. I I definitely it was a it sounds like a uh, you know, set up a chair and sleep all day the job, and it was not. That was high intensity.

SPEAKER_03 7:42

10 hour, 12 hour days on your feet on a hot or cold barge, depending on the weather, and just go, go, go. Towards the towards the end of the job the project when we were getting close to being done barging, it got to the point where the the boat pilots were arguing over who got Sheldon on their boat. Yeah. That was pretty fun.

SPEAKER_01 8:01

Good. So over time, your kind of responsibilities have evolved and um you still wear multiple hats today, but um you're you know, you're kind of managing the the quad city driver group. Yeah. And also serving as our safety manager at the same time. So how do you balance, you know, those two roles and and the various responsibilities that come with them?

SPEAKER_03 8:27

Well, it all it's mostly just like being a firefighter. You run around putting out fires all day. You you deal with everything situational right when it happens. You don't you don't want to try and follow up on something that happened like the next day or the following day, um, trying to trying to handle something that you know it five other things have happened since then, you know. So you you gotta you gotta deal with it quickly. Um on the safety side, it all rolls together because we have the the quad city side has the largest portion of the mixture drivers, so that's where most of the stuff happens.

SPEAKER_01 9:01

Right. So yeah. Well, and you're you're also the first one to jump in uh whenever something crazy happens, like an applicant diarrhea is all over the wall in the bathroom. That that actually happened.

unknown 9:15

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 9:16

And I can't tell you how much I appreciate you for being the point person on stuff like that.

SPEAKER_03 9:21

Yeah. No, I I I get to uh I I I get to pick my poison, you know, because I'm interviewing the drivers, I'm I'm bringing them in, we're talking. I try to I try to figure out where they're at with their head on how they work. You know, and you don't get a lot of time, you only get about 15 minutes in a yeah in a conversation on an interview, and you gotta gauge out their personality, you gotta gauge out how how they would fit in the team. Yeah. And I think a big part of it is is you you've got to be able to find a quality in the applicant that you're looking for, but also that quality has to be able to mesh with what we've got here already with the great team that we've got.

SPEAKER_01 10:05

Yeah. So yeah, that makes sense. Okay. So you find somebody that has a a good quality, right? Somebody that's willing to learn or hard worker or whatever. And you start the the process of um onboarding. What do you what do you prioritize? What's most important to teach or to make sure that new drivers understand? Like, how do you help them adapt to our industry? Aaron Powell I think honestly, people skills is the most important part of it.

SPEAKER_03 10:32

Any part of this. Yeah. Um if you if you can't take criticism well, this is not the gig for you. It's construction. But everybody's always so polite on a job side. I don't understand what you're talking about.

SPEAKER_00 10:46

Criticism, following directions, asking questions. That sort of interactive people person is way more important than you would think initially for a truck driver. You know, a lot of them are thinking they're just gonna jump in a truck and be on their own all day. And that is definitely not the case in this particular trucking job.

SPEAKER_03 11:05

Most interviews I've I've said after explaining the job to uh an applicant, I I asked them, have I talked you out of it yet?

SPEAKER_00 11:14

Yes. Yes. I did this when I was interviewing, it was the same thing. I was like, I'm gonna tell you all the reasons why this job is hard.

SPEAKER_01 11:21

Yeah, yeah. Wards and all. Yeah. Well, that's good. I mean, you want people to come in eyes wide open. This is a challenging industry. And driving a ready mixed truck, or you know, a lot of the other roles here are all challenging roles with um unique time constraints. And, you know, it's not like everybody's start time is the same every day. You know, it's just it's it's different than most industries.

SPEAKER_03 11:43

And once they get trained up and out on their own, they're kind of by themselves unless it's a big job.

SPEAKER_01 11:48

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 11:48

So they have to be able to make judgment calls and and know that they're trusted to do that.

SPEAKER_01 11:53

Okay. So that's a great segue. My next question was um how do you foster like teamwork and culture with a group of people that are so you know so disparate? They're they're out and away from each other, right?

SPEAKER_03 12:09

Right. Um, well, they all end up back at a plant. Yeah. Right. So if you run into a snag, you've got a good support network already at the plant. You've got the plant manager, you've got the loader, you've got QC people, you've got management popping in and out, you've got salespepping in and out of job sites and and the plant. You get uh you you get that opportunity to touch base with someone if something crazy happened, or if you just ran up ran across something crazy and it's like, hey, I I don't understand this. Ask the question. Yeah. I always tell them, ask the question. If you see somebody out at a job site and you're not sure, ask the question. Don't be so proud. You can't, yeah, you can't be that kind of proud in this job. You have to get the concrete out of the truck and give back to the plane.

SPEAKER_01 12:51

Yeah. Right. Well, and I appreciate that you're there in that role to support our drivers. I know before you were in this role, uh, we didn't have anybody that was kind of dedicated to um the quad city group of drivers. And um it's not that it that that group needed um, you know, extra managing. It's that they needed more support, right? They needed, they needed a first person to come and talk to about, you know, I have this problem and I don't even know who to where to start, you know, and they they didn't want to come bother us up at the front office. Um, you know, so it it felt like they had nobody to talk to, right? So I you've really filled that gap where um you're you're a first line of defense and most time the last line, but of you know, uh there to support the drivers and make sure that they're successful and um that you know the company and and the drivers can both achieve our goals for the day, right? And so yeah. Yeah. Um talk talk us through like what is a a normal day look like for you? Like what I know that you said you're a firefighter running and jumping around, but what what what happens on a normal day?

SPEAKER_03 14:02

Well, it it's easy to just go go off of what you did yesterday. Um mine it it's different every day. Um, I have a desk, I don't see it very often. Um the uh the day usually starts with me going out back, making sure people have a truck to drive, um, helping them if they run into a snag like, hey, I something's wrong with my truck, I got to get it taken care of, help them find another truck to get into if it's necessary. And then as the day progresses, I just jump into whatever's in front of me that needs dealt with.

SPEAKER_01 14:34

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 14:36

That's basically right. And then from there, it's just all of a sudden the day's over.

SPEAKER_01 14:41

Yeah, it's whack-em-all till the end. Yeah, yeah, for sure.

SPEAKER_03 14:44

Uh what do you see like what are the biggest challenges that drivers face kind of continually that you see that you have to help and and just I'd circle back to the how to deal with people giving you constructive criticism.

SPEAKER_01 14:57

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 14:58

You gotta this is something Andrea told me a long time ago. You have to assume that they're coming from a positive place.

SPEAKER_01 15:05

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 15:05

You know, you can't you can't just assume, hey, they're attacking me because they don't like me. Right. No, there's some there's there's a nugget in there, you gotta find it, fix it, and and move on. You know, it it's not necessarily an issue of uh issue of this person doesn't like me, so they're picking on me, and and that that's why. No, there's probably something that needs adjusted. Right. Um a big thing with being a mixture driver is you have to have a routine. You know, right down to, you know, once you get loaded, you pull up, you you check your load, you get your ticket, you read your ticket, you go, you know, you stick to the routine every time it gets faster, it's get it gets easier, and it's similar to right excuse me. It's similar to climbing a ladder. You go up the ladder just fine, but when you're climbing down, if you miss a rung, boy, do you notice?

SPEAKER_01 15:50

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 15:51

Same thing. You know, if you miss something on your normal, your normal routine, it's like missing a rung on a ladder.

SPEAKER_01 15:56

You know, it's funny. I think about that with um Larry Otzman that's retired now, but um, he was a guy that just exemplified routine, right? Every single load was so consistent as far as um, you know, he you it wasn't like he was running to his truck or he wasn't hurrying. I never said and he would still lap people. Yeah. And it was just consistency and efficiency of movement, of effort. Um, and and of course, he would end the day completely spotless, uh, not a single.

SPEAKER_03 16:29

Yeah, he'd show up looking like he was ready for Sunday school and leave, still look up for Sunday school.

SPEAKER_01 16:34

Somehow he'd look nicer when he left at the end of the day. Yeah. Um, which is, you know, yeah, just really underlines that that he the routine, what he did, every single load. He did it a million times, and he was so good and so efficient at it, and it just made the whole job way easier.

SPEAKER_03 16:51

And and I think it'd be frustrating for a lot of people seeing somebody that's they don't they may not know him, but he's older, you know. He he'd been here for what 40 years. Almost I think by the end it was 65, wasn't it? Oh, I'm way off. Yeah. Yeah. So he he was in his Darren's been around for 40 years. Yeah. So anyway, we're still waiting for the consistency. Yeah, I'm losing. Um no, him being him being an older fella, and he he doesn't look like he's he's breaking a sweat doing the job, and then you've got these younger guys coming in and they're just struggling, they're covered in concrete, and they're like, How is he doing it? Well, pay attention. Watch him do it.

SPEAKER_01 17:29

Right. Yeah. All right, let's shift gears a little bit to the safety side. Okay. What do you see is um kind of the biggest hazards, the biggest risks in our industry?

SPEAKER_03 17:43

We take trucks where trucks aren't supposed to be.

SPEAKER_01 17:46

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 17:46

And that's not even the scariest, easiest way to get hurt. Yeah. Climbing in and out of the truck, climbing up and down the ladder, that's that's probably the hardest task that we've got.

SPEAKER_00 17:57

That is our most frequent injury is climbing in and out of the truck on uneven ground.

SPEAKER_03 18:02

Yeah. Stepping off the truck, you you you didn't see that there was some loose material or something, and you just biff it. Yeah. Next thing you know, your back's thrown out, or you rolled your ankle or something crazy like that. It's the three points of contact. You you've got to you you've got to stick to that routine, you know, climbing in and out, keep everything the same every time. Um, we've had people multiple times just you know, you it's like it's like it's raining sometimes when somebody's climbing down the ladder and that's when they slip and fall, or they're it's wet when they're it's not normally wet there.

SPEAKER_01 18:38

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 18:38

That's you just gotta be prepared for it.

SPEAKER_01 18:40

Well, swimming in the job sites that we are at, like you said, we put trucks in places where trucks aren't supposed to be.

SPEAKER_02 18:46

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 18:47

And but by on purpose, not saying that that's wrong to put a truck there, but then when you step out of the truck, it's uneven ground, or there may be, you know, mats of wire mesh to trip on, or or whatever. Yeah, you know, so it's it's uh You just gave me a flashback. Uh yeah. I mean, there's there's all these things we've heard happen so many times, right? That these these um some of these injuries or or accidents.

SPEAKER_03 19:12

Yeah, it's the story repeats itself because a good example, Kelsey was on the podcast a while ago. Yeah, um, Kelsey was out at a uh out at a job, he's climbing out of his truck, he steps down off of his truck, and he stepped right where they had recently filled a trench. And he was like buried up to his knee and and just total mess for it.

SPEAKER_01 19:32

And you probably couldn't even tell before you step for it, you know.

SPEAKER_03 19:35

Yeah, yeah. It just it just yeah. But another another nice thing about Kelsey is he got back in the truck and finished the job while I was on my way out to go pick him up and take him to go get checked out.

SPEAKER_01 19:46

Yeah. So well, uh I appreciate that, Kelsey.

SPEAKER_03 19:49

He's a heck of a guy.

SPEAKER_01 19:50

Yeah, absolutely. So what do we how do we mitigate all these things, right? So we're putting trucks in in difficult and dangerous places, we have uneven footing, we have um slip trips and falls, like you said, or right. So how do we how do we mitigate that? How do we be better um and and have less incidences?

SPEAKER_03 20:13

Um well, uh control the things you can control. You know, stick to your routine. But the uh a lot of the videos we have, there's uh there's one that kind of circles back to it all the time, the circle of safety. You you walk around your truck, you know, look at it. When you're doing your pre-trip, do the walk around, look at your truck. But when you're out at a job site, don't just walk from the back of the truck, oh, I'm done, I hung my shoes, walk straight back to the driver's seat. No, walk all the way around your truck and look at what you're about to drive on. Make sure there's no tools, kind of plan your route on your way out. Yeah. That that sort of thing. So you're not running over the customer's tools or running over the form boards that they just spent like two or three days trying to get just right, and now a mixer truck just drove over them. Um things like that, that helps on the customer service side, but also it it it raises your awareness of what's going on around you. And if you pay attention to what's going on around you, you're less likely to run into problems where you're getting hurt.

SPEAKER_01 21:08

Yeah. I know one of the things you deal with a lot is windshields from vehicles following our trucks. I get so many phone calls. Yeah. So okay, so there's a question. How many in a year, how many times do you think we have, you know, a claim or a situation relating to that?

SPEAKER_03 21:27

Um we probably get about three or four calls a month at least. Yeah. Um That's what I was gonna say.

SPEAKER_00 21:34

Credible. Once a once a week, basically.

SPEAKER_03 21:36

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 21:37

Uh yeah, some some legitimate, some not, but I bet we get a call about what's credible, credible at least two.

SPEAKER_03 21:42

Yeah. You know, and the the big thing is is if we're if we're being diligent on our rinse down after leaving a job or leaving the plant, we shouldn't have material falling off of the truck. Yeah, like there's rock that splattered and stuck to the side. Now you hit a bump and now it's flying off your truck, and now somebody has a busted windshield. Yeah. You know, so you it it's a it's an awareness thing, it's a it's a diligence thing. It's one of the things where we just gotta address it, deal with it, take care of the person with the busted windshield and talk to the talk to the driver that if if we can verify that whichever driver it was, uh talk to him, say, hey, we gotta try harder.

SPEAKER_01 22:21

Yeah, we just gotta make sure the back of the truck is clean and and you know that we are hauling heavy materials. There it's we're not gonna get that to zero, right? We're not gonna get it, you know, where there could be a rock stuck between the tires or something like that. We we understand that. Um, but anything we can do to minimize it, because if you're talking, you know, that there's almost once a week, one a week, and what does it cost a thousand bucks to replace a windshield?

SPEAKER_03 22:46

Uh well, the uh the cost is going up because of all the smart driver smart stuff, you know, the the auto.

SPEAKER_00 22:53

But you can see your digital readout of your speed or whatever in the windshield, like those are outrageous.

SPEAKER_03 22:59

Yeah, and and the what the adaptive cruise control, that's there's a camera built into your rear view mirror that's on the other side, aiming towards. I mean, there's there's so many things in it. So you we have a we have a company that we work with average so that we don't have so we can have a faster response for the person who we break the windshield for. Uh break them for. But uh it's like we did them a few years.

SPEAKER_01 23:26

There you go.

SPEAKER_03 23:27

You get a new windshield, yeah. Uh cost per windshield. With our with our the company we work with, anywhere from$250. Uh the most expensive one, I think, was almost$1,500.

SPEAKER_01 23:38

Okay. So I mean, we could be talking$30,000,$40,000 a year in windshields that we're doing. I mean, that's a big thing. That's just windshields if we if we hit the paint. Yeah. Right. Well, it's always a BMW, right? It's never a 95 Ford pickup, right?

SPEAKER_03 23:54

It's it's even worse when it's one of our customers' wives. Yeah, right. That's happened.

SPEAKER_01 23:58

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 23:58

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 23:59

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 24:00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 24:00

Yeah. Cool. What other uh safety? I mean, this is um, I guess, a platform for you to to any other safety things that are on your mind that you want everybody to hear about, you know, what what have you got?

SPEAKER_03 24:13

Um keep the basics, you know, wear safety glasses when necessary. Like if you're at the back of your truck, you know, we're moving concrete. The last thing you want in your eyes is concrete. Yeah. Um, wear safety glasses. It'll hopefully help.

SPEAKER_01 24:26

Yeah. We've had a lot of uh eyewash situations. Eyewash. Yeah. That's awful. I think our PPE usage hasn't been awesome this year in general. I would say I see a lot more guys, you know, not with their hard hats on, you know, on a job site, which that's our I get that not every job has overhead hazards, but you know, we should be wearing our our full PPE hard hats, high viz, safety glasses.

SPEAKER_03 24:55

For when you're not ready for it.

SPEAKER_01 24:57

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 25:00

Anything else? Uh just stick to the basics. Yeah. You know, go back to go back to the original the original game plan and wear your safety gear and look out for yourself, look out for others. And don't be afraid to say something to anybody if you see that there's a risk.

SPEAKER_01 25:18

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 25:20

Absolutely.

SPEAKER_00 25:21

Thanks for being here. Good job, you guys, sticking to your time limit.

SPEAKER_01 25:24

Yeah. Appreciate it. I'm very proud of us, Sheldon.

SPEAKER_00 25:28

Luckily, we don't even have a loaded question today, so we can wrap this up, but we are always looking for loaded questions.

SPEAKER_01 25:34

Please, people, send them in. Send them in.

SPEAKER_00 25:37

Questions, topics, guests that you'd like to see on the podcast. We're we're open to ideas. Thanks for listening. Please remember to subscribe and share this podcast with your friends, and we will talk to you again next week.

SPEAKER_01 25:50

Thanks so much. Thank you.