The People Behind the Wheel: Exploring the Policy Changes, Job Characteristics, and Social Stressors Driving Turnover Among California Truck Drivers

Trucking is a critical physical link in today’s supply chains and global economy. The industry, however, faces serious issues that continue to plague not only trucking companies in general, but trickle down to affect their truck drivers in particular. Despite industry-wide driver shortages, as well as high driver turnover rates, little research has examined retention issues that surround the truck driver profession. Among the limited body of literature, extant research suggests meaningful insights may be found by investigating individual level psychologi-cal processes. Thus, the purpose of this project is to fill gaps in both management and academic understanding of psychological processes associated with California truck drivers. We performed three related studies in order to explore this topic from different angles.

The first study focuses on the stress impact from three types of policy changes: national level policy changes, California (state level) policy changes, and potential national level policy changes; the results offer insight as to how stress related to different types of policy change may induce feelings of job burnout (i.e. exhaustion, cynicism, and professional inefficacy) and ultimately affect job performance and intent to remain. The second study examines common job characteristics/assigned tasks associated with the truck driver profession and the ways in which truck drivers categorize these stressors (e.g., challenge or hindrance); the results of this study offer insight into the ways in which tasks affect burnout and, ultimately, job performance and intent to remain. The third study analyzes the differential effect of truck drivers’ organization identification compared to their professional identification on their burnout and job performance; this study also examines the extent to which perception of oneself as working in a stigmatized profession, and to which being bullied on the job, have detrimental outcomes for both burnout and job performance. Importantly, all three studies contribute to the currently limited managerial and scholarly knowledge surrounding the truck driver profession. Recommendations are made aiming at assisting CA-based transportation companies in improvement of driver retention and logistical performance.