Autonomy is one of those words that gets tossed around in trucking circles like everyone agrees on what it means. But out here, running freight in a straight truck with your name on the door, autonomy isn’t a slogan. It’s the oxygen of the job. It’s the difference between feeling like you’re steering your own life or just riding along in someone else’s schedule....

Stability in trucking does not mean regularity, it means consistency. Transportation is tied to market forces which tend to run in cycles, like everything else. Consistency in trucking is recognizing cycles and planning for them. When you choose your loads at random and don’t know your numbers for Cost Per Mile (CPM) or your daily rate needed to be profitable, planning for down markets is nearly impossible....

When you are the one who decides your fate, it brings about a new sense of urgency. When the 40-hour week paycheck is gone and you must rely on your own decisions to generate an income, you have to consider more than the superficial data like Rate Per Mile (RPM) and number of miles. As a company driver, miles matter and good base RPM matters. When you decide to transition into an owner-operator role, you no longer just wear the company-issued hat. This is where the realizatio...

Every week for over ten years, well almost every week, I have posted a blog meant to share trucking knowledge that I have gained over the decades of being an owner-operator. Most of the blogs I wrote were to help other drivers, especially new or newer drivers who didn’t come from a background in the trucking industry. Every owner-operator has knowledge to share that can help newer drivers settle into the role of owner-operator. Transitioning from driver to owner takes more ...