Driver Recruiting Happy Hour Podcast

Darin:
Cheers everybody. And welcome to the Driver Recruiting Happy Hour podcast. My name is Darin Williams. I'm the president of CDLjobs.com with me as always is my co-host, the president of Ten4 Recruiting and the darling of the trucking industry, Matt Beach.

Beach:
I am.

Darin:
Beach, why do people love you so much?

Beach:
I don't know.

Darin:
I mean, I know why I love you, but why does everybody else love you?

Beach:
I don't know.

Darin:
Boyish charm?

Beach:
It's the handsome good looks. I'm just a

Darin:
Rugged, good looks?

Beach:
Mighty fine boy, mighty fine

Darin:
But I've got those things. I I've got those things and people just tolerate me. They love you.

Beach:
Our features are somewhat the same. I mean, we got a bald head.

Darin:
Oh,

Beach:
We got this.

Darin:
I cover it with glasses, which isn't very smart. You, you, you have a hat.

Beach:
I know, but still we got the same features. We got a good attitude. We're both handsome,

Darin:
But people love you. And they tolerate me. What's the key what's what, what am I doing wrong?

Beach:
I don't know. I mean, it's it, it could be the cologne.

Darin:
I should bathe more often?

Beach:
No, I mean, I got, I went down to the flea market and I picked up, I always picked up this Channel Number Five

Darin:
Channel number five. It's my favorite news show.

Beach:
It's it goes on. Boy. Smells good. I mean, so that, so

Darin:
I need to go, the key for me before the next trucking gathering is for me to visit the Soddy Daisy flea market and do a little cologne shopping.

Beach:
Yeah. Little Channel Number Five, a little Hai Karate.

Darin:
Hai Karate. There you go. Hey, do you know who our guest is today, Beach? We kinda, this is my he's kinda a big deal.

Beach:
He is a big deal

Darin:
I mean, not no offense to the other people that we've we've we've been on the show. Holy cow.

Beach:
He got, you gotta bring him down a little bit. He thinks he he's pretty good. He's alright. He's alright, guy. He's okay, guy.

Darin:
Well, I'm not trying to prop him up. I'm I'm trying to make us look better by having a special guest.

Beach:
Yeah, he's good. He's good.

Darin:
While you drink a beer, which is really bringing more, anyway. All right, ladies and gentlemen, I wanna introduce you the Senior Director at Hiring Our Heroes, Adam Rocke. Adam, welcome to the show, man.

Adam Rocke:
It is nice to be here. Thank you all very much. And Matt

Darin:
No, don't don't say that yet. It's it's early.

Beach:
Not yet. Oh, save that for the end.

Darin:
We've had people take that back after they said it.

Adam Rocke:
Yeah. Specifically Matt it's nice to see you again. So, you know, last time Matt and I were together, we went on this esteemed hunting trip to somewhere in Alabama with wonderful companies and camaraderie and a little bit of bourbon. I think

Beach:
A lot of bourbon, there was a lot bourbon

Adam Rocke:
But just to show you my, my expertise at, at, in the soldiering arena, I show up with no equipment. I show up with no gun. I have to be outfitted by somebody with the equipment. He hands me a gun. I take two round, shots. And then we go out to the, the, to the you know, the deer stand for the next three days. No one.

Darin:
So you were, you were sick on the day the military always taught you to be prepared.

Adam Rocke:
That's right. <Laugh> but I will tell you

Darin:
That course

Adam Rocke:
But I, I had tremendous mentor. It was Matt Beach himself. All right. Via texting me the whole time on what to do, cuz I'm not quite the hunter unless it's for terrorists. Okay. So but we,

Beach:
I kid you not we're in the truck going to the deer stand and Adam goes, "Is there anything I can't shoot?" He's like so and so and I'm like, please, nobody walk in front of this man's stand.

Darin:
<Laugh> He's he's ready. He's trained and ready to go.

Adam Rocke:
I was, I was so day one, nothing, no one sees anything day two, nothing. No one sees anything. The only thing I got. Oh yeah. Did you?

Beach:
I did. Okay. Now I did. I saw some stuff

Adam Rocke:
Day, day, day three. Actually it was time to, to, to ramp up my game a little bit. And I was very fortunate to, to be make a single shot, single kill. Only one to shoot a deer that weekend.

Darin:
Now is this at the infamous the hunt camp is, is it Sumey's? Is it Bill Summerland's?

Beach:
Yeah, but that's not Bill Summerland. It's the Southeastern Sportsman's Lodge down in, when he said in the middle of nowhere, Alabama, it is the middle of nowhere, Alabama,

Darin:
But it's the club those guys all go to Sumey and Brad and I mean, there's been, they've been going for years, right?

Beach:
Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's, it's a great place.

Adam Rocke:
Matt was such a good mentor to me though, Darin, that I want to follow suit and I thought growing a goatee like him, you know, I'd just be, you know, a better hunter going forward. So let's, this is why

Darin:
Next step.

Beach:
I can't wait. I can't wait to see what you look like, like this. This is

Darin:
I say going back to your military, day's time to get rid of that salad on your head there. Let's let's go clean shaven and, and we'll bring you in as a third cohost. You can.

Adam Rocke:
Thank you all very much though, but

Darin:
Tell us a little bit about your background, Adam, just personally, before we get into anything else.

Adam Rocke:
Well thank you very much

Darin:
Cause we are meeting for the first time.

Adam Rocke:
Yeah, thank you very much again. But so, you know, I joined the military at a very young age. You know, frankly, 17 years old out of high school was enlisted for a little bit and realized I really enjoyed the discipline, the education, the physicality of the military, but I did want to go get my college degree. So I went to ROTC at the University of Miami, got and, and got my commission through ROTC and then just continued to serve another 30 years. I'm a career infantry officer, retired at the rank of Colonel very fortunate to command at various levels and to take units like the 82nd Airborne Division, the Ranger Regiment, and then on to start the initiative with the Army Striker Brigade concept and was fortunate to deploy in leadership roles three times to Iraq with them. And then eventually to Afghanistan a couple times as, as an advisor.

Adam Rocke:
My final assignment though, was working at the Pentagon for the Chief of Staff of the Army as a Special Advisor, a Special Assistant to the, the Chief of Staff to stand up a program, Darin, that that was about helping our transitioning service members their veterans, their military spouses find meaningful employment. So using the grassroots connections of our great communities, where we all came from and putting our men and women who serve raised the right hand and served back into those communities with meaningful careers. So I was able to in uniform meet a whole host of folks our pillars were employment, education and health and wellness. So that really, I decided it was time. I have married four kids, you know, I'm going on 29 years of marriage. And I was time to really get out and raise that family.

Adam Rocke:
I thought Colonel was good enough for me, but I wanted to continue to serve. So I tell people, Darin and Matt, I'm still serving. I'm just doing it in a different uniform. Most of the times it's a suit, but I'm still serving, giving back, which was the segue to to my, my current career. You know, I guess I'm on my third job here as the Senior Director of the US Chamber of Commerce Hiring Our Heroes, but we have a mutual friend, the two, the three of us here in, as we discussed earlier, Brad Bentley, who took a chance on me and hired me at FASTPORT as one of the Vice Presidents for, to advocate for veterans issues. And I am very close with Brad to this day and I am grateful to him and that organization cuz they, they hired me and you know, it, it, you know, it's not a, it, they hired me cuz they saw something in me, all right.

Adam Rocke:
And they trained me and I'm always trained by Brad, especially in this industry just about every day. So I'm grateful to them, but I worked for them for you know, 18 months and went on to, to lead a nonprofit myself, which I thought was you know, just a unique opportunity. So I went and led a nonprofit that trained servicemen and women in IT skills. And so that worked out okay. But it was time to move on from that. So I, I am now with the US Chamber of Commerce Hiring Our Heroes Foundation as its Senior Director for we'll call it outreach and business development. And you both know what exactly what that means. And but I've been here for just over almost three years now. And I'll tell you a little bit about the Chamber if you want.

Beach:
Yeah.

Darin:
Absolutely.

Adam Rocke:
So let me just jump into what we do. The US Chamber of Commerce is the world's largest business Federation. It's got multiple chambers in the cities that, that you all live and so and so forth, but it has a foundation arm. And it has a couple efforts within that foundation arm. One of them is Hiring our Heroes. It is an initiative started 11 years ago to get at the unemployment rates, the very low unemployment rates we were having in 2010, 2011, 2012 with our men and women who served coming back from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, it was the staggering 24 to 29% unemployment rate. And lots of things came with that unemployment rate, veteran suicides were high, divorce rates were high, alcohol and drug abuse were high things of those natures because our men and women just didn't have, you know, meaningful careers a not only a job, but a good paying job with paying benefits that I say are commensurate to what they had in the military.

Adam Rocke:
So the Chamber started the Hiring Our Heroes, and we do various things. We, we go and do large transition career fairs, transition summits, if you will, actually career summits globally, where we use the power of the chamber and our partnerships with hundreds if not thousands of companies that are like-minded, that are veteran ready, ready to hire military talent. And we travel the globe. I just came from joint based San Antonio, San Antonio, Texas, where we had over a hundred companies and about 600 veteran military spouses and transitioning service member job seekers, it's unique, but that's what we do. And we partner with great companies who are like-minded to do that. We do virtual hiring fairs. We have a great fellowship program, which it puts people into some sort of middle management, program management, operations management, so on, so forth. And we have military spouse programs a ton of those cuz we really want to curb the military spouse unemployment rate, which is a staggering 30 to 35% right now.

Adam Rocke:
So, you know, that's an untapped resource that we could tap into and businesses are starting to, to understand that. I will say right now there, if there's a shining light in anything, as you both know, there is a war on talent right now. You two are operating on it every day, there are more jobs than there are people that fill them, right? So a lot of companies have come to us and said, we're looking for that military talent. We really want to recruit from that military community for various reasons. First thing is they're very well educated. Two they're trainable, right? They are drug free. They have a clearance, they are not obese. They come to work on time. They're disciplined, they've got all these soft skills, but they're trainable. So you might not have the exact skillset that some of these companies that we're dealing with are looking for, but those companies are willing to, I won't say take a risk.

Adam Rocke:
They're are willing to come to military community cuz they know the values that they bring and, and what they're capable of doing and they're willing to train them. So that's why we had quite the following of these corporations from big companies to medium, to even small business that that are coming to us every day, looking for our talent. And we've, we've proven that we're, we're a resource that people can count on. We give them not only great product, but great, great leaders. And so we've been very, very successful so far and we're gonna keep doing this cuz it's important. But the last piece I'll say in this whole thing, we don't do this alone. It takes a village. It takes folks like yourself that are doing what you're doing in the CDLs. We could talk about the initiatives we have in that, but or into the trucking industry, which desperately meets people. And we help. As a matter of fact, the Hiring Our Heroes does recruit into the trucking industry with a couple initiatives that we have underway as well. So thank you for letting me talk about Hiring Our Heroes.

Beach:
Yeah, I know. And you know, awesome. Adam, I love every bit of it. I'm hearing your, the first time at the deer camp was just phenomenal, was like, I'm gonna be, I'm gonna be keyed in on this guy. And you know, we we've had a few truck driving schools that's come on the show as well. How, how much do you connect with them? Especially with the individuals, you know, you have professional drivers who are currently in the military looking when they're getting out, looking for truck driving job, possibly. Right? And then you have individuals who are in the military. Like I wanna get my Class A, do you partner with a lot of the truck driving schools as well to help that transition or help that those people into those, those jobs?

Adam Rocke:
Yeah. We, we, we, first of all, we partner with a lot of, of trucking companies and, and well, if you remember, and you both know this very well, you know, FASTPORT created, you know, it was founded to help, you know bridge the gap between the trucking companies and those who were looking for truck drivers. Right? So now we brought them to the US Chamber of Commerce and we actually use their software still. Okay. And then we've expanded that software. But as you know, I mean, just think they started out in the trucking industry. So you can imagine the, in our database, the amount of trucking companies that are constantly searching for servicemen and women talent, okay. Then we have some other initiatives that we do. We have a, you know, again, Brad's gonna get a lot of attention here, but because of Brad

Beach:
And he should, he's such a handsome guy,

Adam Rocke:
I Know.

Darin:
Brad's one of the good guys, we don't mind. We'll talk bad about him

Adam Rocke:
In his, what he does in the trucking industry. We started the, the the Transition Trucking Driver Excellence award initiative. And you're

Beach:
Is there, what's the abbreviation for that?

Adam Rocke:
Yeah, that's a mouthful.

Adam Rocke:
Yeah. That is a mouthful, but I will say every year that's a competition and this is, this is a competition to help a rookie driver in the who just got his or her CDL. Right. And is a, you know, one year on with some of the great companies like that, you're partnered with Melton Truck Line, right? Stevens Transport, Prime, CRST McElroy, Amazon, Paschall. There's a whole bunch of other ones. So a couple of those right there, right. To award a T680 Kenworth truck, brand new, with the keys, to a deserving individual who has been mentored by these great companies. Right? Seasoned truckers and, and has proven that they can be a small business owner, right? An entrepreneur, an owner operator. Right? And that's quite the program. I mean, so you talked about other other companies that we have. I mean, just that list, that of the few that I just mentioned and, and that's growing and people are getting a word about that.

Adam Rocke:
So that's one of the many initiatives and we're gonna have, I think we're, we started 2016. We're gonna have another giveaway this year in on the 16th of December on the steps of the US Chamber Commerce. But that's about changing someone's life, right? That's about promoting the trucking industry and the value that the veterans bring to the trucking industry. That's one thing that we, we do, we are also, to answer your question Matt, partnered with some CDL schools. We have one in particular, it's called Troops into Transportation it's a Transforce Group initiative. I'm sure you're familiar with it, but our service men and women often they're on military bases. They're a skill bridge provider, which allows the service members, while they're on active duty to go to upskilling programs. And this is one of them and they get their CDL license and they are, you know, their partner with 500 plus companies that are looking for, for drivers. So that's a, another initiative. The other one we just did was have you, are you both familiar with the Drive for 500 initiative that we just did?

Beach:
No, I'm not

Adam Rocke:
Ground breaking drive sounds pretty cool though, right? Drive for 500. It's right up your alley. So we Hiring Our Heroes partnered with Indeed and that CDL company, I just talked about Troops into Transportation. Indeed is providing scholarships to 500 deserving service members or military spouses. How's that? I mean, so that are, that are very interested in getting their CDL Class A license and getting into the transportation trucking industry to be a truck driver. Right? They're just shy of 500. I think the president of the company told me this morning they are at 497 and they just have a couple other applications to review, but they'll make their mark. So since April, since they've stood this up and I mean, this is, you know, a scholarship to get your CDL license. All expenses pays other other than some meals and some incidentals, but, you know, and, and the testing, so into jobs and they're, I was also told they have all been offered a, a job.

Beach:
That is great. And here's here's, this is a typical situation that happens here. Darin has technical issues halfway through the thing. And we are, by the way, we're still recording Adam. You are now the host

Adam Rocke:
That's right.

Beach:
Of the Driver Recruiting Happy Hour. Adam, our new host. [clapping] It happens every time. I don't, I mean, I've tried to tell him like, dude, you, you just got, I don't know. I mean, I bless his heart. Bless Darin's heart. He, he tries

Adam Rocke:
He's way out there in Iowa. He told me though,

Beach:
He is out there in Iowa. You know you talk about Brad. Brad is like Brad and I had a instant connection because, you know, we started talking about bourbon. Brad is like the, the bourbon ninja. I mean, this guy knows every restaurant. So if I, if I want to go somewhere to eat and it doesn't matter if it's in Iowa or, you know, Key West to San Fran to Maine, you mention to Brad, Hey, I'm gonna go to this city. It's gonna be here. Brad goes, let tell you where to go eat. Let me tell you where the best bourbon is for this. The man knows the city, the United States. He knows where the good food, the great hangout spots. And, he knows where are all the great bourbon stops are. I mean, he's absolutely a bourbon ninja. Have you noticed that about him when you talked to him or back, it was just like, where we going gradually, we're gonna go here, here, here. He's like, how do you know this? And I know he is not researching it. And it's just like, ah, just someone might have took me I remembered it. And he just, he just finds those spots.

Adam Rocke:
And right now he's sweating it, trying to get reconnected with us. Isn't he?

Beach:
Now Darin is, now Darin is, yeah. Darin is definitely like, crap, I got, he, he's trying to text me. I'm just gonna ignore it. I'm gonna ignore it. Yeah. Adam, what you guys are doing is phenomenal. You know, I'm, I'm very familiar with the, the truck driving schools that you mentioned the amount of work that you guys, I didn't, I didn't know the full details. So a lot of stuff that you're mentioning with the Driver, Driver 500, right? I mean, that is that program. That's absolutely amazing. Do you do any work with the connection with the Wreaths Across America?

Adam Rocke:
Oh, we sure do. You know, we, we have, we, we're a partner with Wreaths Across America. We obviously, you know, there's, there's always a, a 501(c)(3) donation aspect of it. You know, if you, you donate a, someone buy wreath, you get maybe hiring here is, might get $5 of that sometimes. And so those, those kind of programs out there as well, you know, I was on the advisory board of Wreaths Across America for a number of years, what a tremendous, tremendous initiative there. And obviously, you know, the trucking industry is the hallmark of it delivering those wreaths to all the veteran cemeteries, you know, living across the globe, they're finally, they went over to, I guess, to Normandy and they've done some overseas some overseas cemeteries, maybe the trucking didn't drive there, but it got 'em to the ports where they were delivered and so on and so forth. So it's remarkable.

Beach:
Now you said 29 years, marriage?

Adam Rocke:
Yeah. 29.

Beach:
So is it 30 this year or did it hit 29?

Adam Rocke:
October will be October will be 29 October will be 29. I'm sorry, October will be 29. Thank you.

Beach:
Well, no, yet. Exactly. So I would, my wife and I, our it's 20 years for us, November 10th. And for, for all this year, I've been telling everybody it's November 11th. And I think I sent out November and she was like, absolutely not is November 10th. And of course I was in the doghouse and I'm still in the doghouse, but I'm like, come on 20 years. It's great. It doesn't matter. You know, me trying to play doesn't matter what day it is. It's at the first or the ninth, who cares? She's like, oh, it matters. So like right now, we're trying to figure out where to go. We have no idea. We have no idea.

Adam Rocke:
Well, come on down to DC. Not that it's the guards spot, but we got plenty of room

Beach:
<Laugh> but so the one, the one place I love. So I went to, you know, I brought my son to DC for the Wreaths Across America. And those places you told us to go and hit were spot on. But the oh my gosh, what's the, what's the bourbon place because I even sent Brad an email like text I'm here. He's like, I'm so jealous. Yes. But it was The Rose, is it The Rose or what was it called? The

Adam Rocke:
Brad's also told me I forgot the name, but it was quite the collection what I, I understand of, of bourbon.

Beach:
Oh, you've never been there?

Adam Rocke:
I have not. Brad wants to go.

Beach:
Yeah. It's like something Rose, not Roses and Crown, but something Rose. And right now I'm gonna get smacked for at some point, cuz there's a friend of mine who listens to this podcast and he loves DC, but like the Pearl Dive, that's one of my favorite places to go to get your oysters. I don't know if you've ever been there, but my goodness, I love DC. A lot of people are like, oh, you just go to DC and you see the monuments. I'm like, absolutely not. There's so much more to do in DC, just as you know, the typical, you know, monuments and all that. I love it there.

Adam Rocke:
We're glad you came to the city, but I'm glad I don't work at the Pentagon anymore. And now I live outside the city. You don't really have to commute anymore. So the traffic, yeah.

Beach:
How long did you, how long did you work in? Yeah, the traffic's a nightmare. Absolutely. How long did you work at the Pentagon?

Adam Rocke:
It's a total of seven years. So yeah. And it's a, it's a really, is people joke about it. It is a tough place to work, but it is a great place to work because that's where really the nation's defense business is, is, is, is done. And it was an honor again, to work there. Things that you work on are, are real, are real time you know, national security issues. So I, I never really minded going to work. The commute was the, the worst part as we just discussed. But a after that you get in there and you, you put your head down and you work hard and you know, it means something.

Beach:
So what's the next steps for y'all? What's the, what are the folks that what's yeah. What for y'all?

Adam Rocke:
For Hiring Our Heroes, first of all, we're gonna continue to grow, you know, continue develop these partnerships. We wanna, we're a big tent though, Matt, and, and we collaborate with just about everyone. So it's just, you know, not name the US Chamber Commerce Hire Our Heroes foundation. We really are inclusive. We we'll bring almost anybody in if they have the same values and the same mission that we do. We're, like-minded, we'll bring in the, and we, we want to grow to scale in various ways. We want to continue to do the in person, by the way, back on in person, these in persons transition, some as we're doing, Matt are, are, are superb, I mean, and I'm go there and I'm the host, I guess. And now I'm the host of this podcast, but now I'm, I'm the, I'm the host, if you will, of the of many of the summits, you know, and it's an honor to be in front of these men and women who serve or getting out. Welcome back, Darin, to we're, we're, you know, Adam's doing a great job as being the host here.

Darin:
I mean, so sorry, Adam. I, I live in Mayberry. I

Adam Rocke:
<Laugh>, yeah, we do.

Darin:
I don't know, man. The whole, everything went blank on me there. So I, I apologize. I

Adam Rocke:
That's alright. Just to bring you up to see we're talking about what's next. Okay. So he was just telling Matt about how we're trying to grow and scale. So bottom line is we're always looking for more, more like-minded companies. All right. And alright, we, we won't turn them away. And I, I, you know, like I said, I do outreach and business development and me and my team speak to folks every day who are interested and heard the good news from us, saw some, you know, social media or heard about us or whatnot and wanna be part of it because they know we have access to incredible pipeline of talent. Right? And why do I say we have access to them because we have a, an enterprise memorandum of understanding with the Department of Defense that allows us to do certain things. And so, because we've proven ourselves, allows us to be a skilled provider of certain programs that we have, which is upskilling.

Adam Rocke:
It allows us to get to the installations and because of who we are and what we've been able to do and the impact we're bringing, right? So we bring like-minded companies along with us. We, the other thing we wanna do, Matt, is our fellowship program, which is off the charts. We've got over 2000 fellows this year alone, right? With a 90% offer rate with a mean salary of $117,000. I'll say that again, a mean salary of $117,000. Now Darin out in Mayberry, where your at, it might be not, might not be that high. And, but, and, and then Chattanooga, maybe not be the high, but.

Beach:
We, we rollin big here in ChattaVegas baby.

Adam Rocke:
But you got my point. I mean, and, but just think about that 90% operate after an internship of 12 weeks, which is no cost to our companies, not at all, right, because they're on active duty. It's about, you know, really it's about, you know, trying it before you buy it. When do you get to do that? And you can give 'em an offer, you know, day one, if you wanted to, or, you know, six weeks in, or wait till after. And then the same thing from the military spouses, although we do pay the military spouses.

Darin:
Adam, maybe it's not as simplistic as this, but if, if I'm coming out of the military and I come to your organization and I'm looking for a career where does trucking fall into that? Like, is it depending on the individual or if there's an interest level, is trucking towards the top, towards the bottom, do you have to do more convincing for a guy to say, Hey, come on, let's get into trucking. Or, I mean, where does our industry fall in? Do you understand what I'm asking?

Adam Rocke:
I think your industry falls in very well for a couple reasons, right? But I do say the industry needs to do a couple things a little bit better. You need to promote yourself a little bit better. All right, you need to, you need to show the service members, and I think even the country, the economic value of coming into the trucking industry, that it is a career that you can make a career with really good money and that these great companies will have benefits. They'll pay some, I don't know won't and say everyone, but will pay for some college that you you're interested in going to, right? They'll take care of your family. You'll have medical coverage. You'll have, you know, all kinds, a nice compensation package. You'll get decent hours. And you know, you'll be at home at night sometimes, or it depends on what, which company you go through.

Adam Rocke:
But I, you, I think you have you, the trucking industry needs to change its image. Okay. It's not like it was Smokey and the Bandit back in the day. Okay. It's a little bit different. And we're more technical. Think about that T680, I talked about. You get in that thing and you got, you got your phones, you got GPS, you got, you know, you guys use the walkie talkie still probably, but but anyway CB radios or whatever, I don't know. And but the point is joking, joking aside. It is different and, and they need to know that it is different. And so that, that image you, you need to, to change first of all, the second thing.

Darin:
Well, that's good information. That's good for people to hear.

Adam Rocke:
The second thing is that, that, that many of these companies that you are are, are already partnered with and know have their own CDL programs, right? That are they're hurting so bad that they need is they're willing to train them, right. Or they're willing to send them to a training program and, and maybe pay that back so that the service member can continue to either keep their GI bill or use it for somebody else. Right? So, or it's a low cost school maybe, but, but they need to understand that. So then the last thing, Darin, and I, I will tell you is as I, I go to these transition summits globally, and I talk to these young kids, okay, these young kids who want adventure, they want to continue the venture. They want to be independent and see the country, right? I'm constantly walking them over to, you know, trucking companies, because it is a great way to get started.

Adam Rocke:
Is it a great way to start your group get really good pay? I mean, some of these jobs are $60,000 plus a year. I mean that's and with benefits on top of that. And so I have found a whole bunch of young, one day, as a matter of fact, I was at Camp Lejuene. I found three kids, all were interested in trucking industry. I walked them right over, you know, I figure it was to Chris Gonzalez, as a matter of fact, I invited him in and you know, I invited him in to set up a booth and I think I walked him

Darin:
And Chris scared the hell out of him.

Beach:
You know, I'm text Chris Gonzalez that his name came up.

Adam Rocke:
And, and they, they, they, his Chris has come to a couple events now. He, he has bought in because he completely understands the town pool we're dealing with. So, you know, trucking is, is, is right up there at the top for a lot of reasons.

Darin:
Good. It's good to hear.

Beach:
Yeah. That was my question that you went into though. Adam is you see so many, you know, hiring military drivers. That's almost like a buzzword and I don't mean to take that lightly, but it's almost like, okay, that's the new thing that we gotta go hire for. Let's hire for that. And then they, they create these materials and just marketing on all that. But really when the military driver, professional driver comes over, it's like, really? What does this mean? I'm just being treated just as a normal driver. I mean, where's the other benefits to this? You wanted me here, I'm here. What are you doing? Oh, you're just, it was just marketing. We just knew that that was just something we had to do because everybody else was doing. And we thought was the flavor of the month. It's not the flavor of the month. It's not. I mean, really it is a top notch professional driver that you're getting, being part of your fleet.

Darin:
Well, it's a real solution to a problem that we all have.

Beach:
Yeah.

Darin:
And we just need to embrace it.

Adam Rocke:
America needs truck drivers. I mean, just look at all the stuff in our, your offices and mine. And I mean, how do we get that? They got from point A to point B. And you know, I just but back there, image change wouldn't hurt. Now my, my uncle, Uncle Richard a Korean War veteran was a truck driver his entire life, you know, made a living doing it. And, but and I enjoyed as a little kid hopping up in the, that cab and, and going for a ride and pulling that thing down that horn horn and all stuff. But you know, that, that's what, until I got into this and started to really think about that was the image I had, but now it has evolved. I mean, it's, it's much more technical than it ever was. And you should celebrate that.

Darin:
Yeah. And trucking's wonderful, but if you have an uncle Richard, he missed a great opportunity to be a pro wrestler. Ricky Rocke. <Laugh> Are you kidding me?

Beach:
<Laugh>

Darin:
That's a champion of the world, man.

Adam Rocke:
Yeah. You got it.

Darin:
I'm sure he was a great truck driver, but Ricky Rocke, you know, you've got to seize that.

Beach:
This could have been a secret thing that he could have done on the side.

Darin:
Yeah. You never know. A lot of those guys wore masks back then.

Beach:
I could be a wrestler. I could. There's a Red, City of Red Bank.

Darin:
No, no, Nope. You, we would recognize the guy in the jorts and, and the captain America.

Beach:
Hey, I can't, I'm just gonna be honest with you. I think I'm gonna be honest with you with you two on this podcast and all the other 1 million listeners that are gonna hear this.

Darin:
And the four people who are tuned in.

Beach:
I can't, I can't fit in the jorts no more.

Darin:
What?

Beach:
I can't.

Darin:
I thought you were gonna start running?

Beach:
I did. I ran two 5Ks last week.

Darin:
You making this up.

Beach:
I'm not, I, I swear to God. I did. I ran two, five Ks. I am drinking this, this crap.

Darin:
That's yeah. Beer flavored water.

Beach:
I can't, I I'm trying. I mean, this is I'm counting calories. This is 95 calories. I don't even tell you what a shot of bourbon is. You wanna know how much a shot of bourbon is? Good bourbon?

Darin:
It's like 105.

Beach:
Maybe your shot

Darin:
About one ounce pour.

Beach:
Literally I put 'em on the other day. And my wife was like, yeah, try the jorts on. You know, it's our 20 year anniversary. Let's see what they look like. So I put 'em on.

Darin:
She did not tell you to try on jorts. That is not true. That's made up.

Beach:
Literally. I was like a can of biscuits about the just, and I was like, I can't do this. I can't breathe. I thought maybe I'll go mow in 'em. I did some, you know, I did some what we call dips and squats and everything else. No, no.

Darin:
Wow. That, that, that took a huge turn for the worst there.

Beach:
Well, even like so well, and here's, what's funny, this beer glass rights, like I think at Applebee's I didn't steal this from Applebee's. So Applebee's you didn't, don't don't come after us. They call this like a Brutus cup. And so I got it. And then I filled, I was able to fill this little skinny little piece of crap all the way almost to the top of this. And so like the whole, it's.

Darin:
It's just a 16 ounce glass.

Beach:
Exactly. Plus, you know what this was, Adam?

Adam Rocke:
Yeah.

Beach:
This was a vase that was had flowers in it. And then my wife was gonna throw it, I was like, no, I drink beer outta that. She still laughs, she was like, you're drinking beer out of the vase. I'm like, I've drank our of worse.

Adam Rocke:
Oh,

Darin:
That's culture,

Adam Rocke:
Someone calling in for, you know, maybe they have a question.

Beach:
That was it. We got a question. Let's go to the phones. Let's go.

Darin:
Well the, the caller ID says it's Applebee's so they wanna know why I've got a guy on here.

Beach:
Stop telling the secret.

Darin:
The Brutus, the Brutus glasses are rip off. They wanna know, speak to our attorney.

Beach:
<Laugh>

Adam Rocke:
How about, let me touch on a couple more things for you and it might help your listeners. Okay.

Beach:
Yeah,

Darin:
Please do.

Adam Rocke:
If that's okay? Instead, unless you had a particular question, but I, I think what's important for people to understand is the current landscape the veteran landscape. Okay? And, and why this all matters. But first of all, every year Darin and Matt, doesn't matter over 200,000 men and women will have, will be transitioning out of the service every year. Doesn't matter, that's a large number go right, going into civilian sector. It's just a matter of rotation. You know, people and retire, people decide that they're they don't wanna serve anymore or their, their contract is up. You know, whether it be 4, 5, 6 years or whatnot. So 200,000, that's quite a decent you know, talent pool that people wanna tap into. So organizations like mine are able to access that as we discussed. That's why we're pretty attractive. Right? And there are a host of other ones as well.

Adam Rocke:
But a couple things though we didn't touch on remote work. You're obviously you're not gonna be a remote driver. I got all that, but just for other, or companies, even, even in the transportation industry. I mean, if you're not a driver though you know, remote work nowadays based on COVID, we have proven look what we're doing here. I don't have to come to Iowa to be in a studio. Remote work is, is an option for a lot of people. So and many of the service members, especially military spouses are very interested in remote work, but now they're no longer geographically tied. Right? You can take that job and you, we, we call it PCS, permanent change of station, but you transitioned from one post to another post to another post. If you're a military spouse, right? If you're husband or wife, whatever is active duty still you can take that with you.

Adam Rocke:
That's that's important. I want to talk about mentorship for a minute, if that's alright, because mentorship,

Beach:
No, go for it.

Adam Rocke:
It's absolutely vital. Absolutely vital. I mean, I'm sure you two have mentioned hundreds, if not thousands of young men and women who wanted to get in the trucking issue, you're doing that now. We're having a conversation. But mentorship in my is so important for the service members, because they don't know what they don't know. It is a new culture. They left their, their communities. They're gonna go back to some communities. They lost their network. They've done a lot of things. Their identity's changed a little bit. They're discipline all these things, right? But they need two types of mentors. They need a personal mentor that could be, you know, father, mother, whatever that gives them some guidance. You know, like my son, Max, over there, I think I'm more personal mentor than a professional mentor, cuz he doesn't listen to anything I say.

Adam Rocke:
Right? So, but the but they need a professional mentor. Somebody like in the industry, somebody that they can trust. That's gonna talk to 'em about business. It's not gonna coddle them. That's gonna tell 'em the real deal. Put 'em on the path of, it could be education, it could be the path of where you should live, how much money, how to negotiate, how to, how to, whatever. It could be any of that. I think mentorship is really, really important. For the rest of your listeners, we we've improved our resume writing, but we haven't come there yet. So those companies looking to hire, if you have a veteran and your veterans employee resource group review the resume, that could be helpful. I'm not sure. There's lots of ways. You know, you don't some of the companies, you don't have to take a resume, you just apply online.

Adam Rocke:
I got it, but we've come a long way. FASTPORT's helped us with that resume engine that they built, ResumeEngine.org, which is great tool. So we, we, but we haven't, we haven't taken all the jargon, military jargon off of our resumes quite yet. So we we've got some ways to go. Your listeners need to understand that your military folks still have a difficult time communicating what they did in the military and communicating their skills. Right? It might just say I was an infantryman. Therefore, the only thing I can be is a security guard. Well, that's not true. You have leadership, right? You have critical thinking skills. You have that discipline. You have other attributes that you, that that need to come out. I tell people the resume is just an opportunity for you to get an interview. It's gonna, hopefully it's gonna, you know, just be enough so that you get the call back so that you get called in so that you can sit across the table like we're doing right now and have an honest conversation about what it is that you did in the military.

Adam Rocke:
And, and most folks will be able to draw that out. Right? And, and, and, and they can tell about all the things that they did and then you go, I really want some of that. Okay? rank doesn't matter, but the education and skills do. So I, I say don't always look higher, you know, for the Colonel. Don't always hire, I mean, just because its a Colonel. But look at the education, look at the skills that they have. Look at those, there are many young servicemen and woman in the cyber arena, cybersecurity arena who might not have a college education, but they got every certification known to man to be very successful in a cyber world. Right? So take a look at that is what I'm saying. Don't just always look for the, the four year degree, military spouses. We talked about that, untapped resource, right? Hire military spouse.

Adam Rocke:
I have a wife, she's a Swiss army knife. If she can do it all. But the military spouses are very well educated. They might have some gaps in their employment, but they're very talented. And, and you, you should not forget about that population. We are touching on it now with the CDLs and the things that you're doing, but workforce development is important. Upscaling the skilled trades are, are, are vital. Not every service men and woman has a college degree nor wants to go back to college, but they have a GI bill that they earn, that they can use as they see fit for upskilling opportunities. Or there are many folks out there that have free opportunities. But up, I mean, back to the point we started with a little bit ago is they, the men and women are trainable and you just give them an opportunity.

Adam Rocke:
Let 'em find their passion, whether it be it, whether it be a CDL, whether it be HVAC, whether it be refrigeration, you name it, right? Uh give them an opportunity to upscale, learn that trade and put 'em into the industry and they will thrive. And the last piece I tell you, and I think, you know, too, I go back, there is a war on talent. Companies are hiring. I associate with thousands of companies and I know they're hiring and they're looking right at the military community, which consists of the service members that are still serving, getting out, those veterans that are out, those military spouses, those caregivers, right? That community there, because they know that they can count on them and they have the talent that they're looking for. So that's what I'm seeing in the landscape, if that helped you and your listeners in any way.

Beach:
Well, it does for me, I get, I get greedy cuz I have my recruiting hat on and I'm just thinking recruiting truck drivers. When in fact, if I took that hat off and was more of a okay trucking industry as a whole, and I'm working at a carrier, I'm just not going well, we're only looking for truck drivers. It's like, hold on just a second. You have recruiters, you have IT like you mentioned, there's operations positions, there's dispatchers. There's the whole, there's tons of jobs, just with mechanics. My God right now, mechanics are, are needed just like truck drivers, but still internal people of just what you're talking about. Just operations side to recruiting. There's so many different departments that the trucking industry as a whole and your carrier as a whole can completely dive into versus keeping that, keeping that secret fishing hole to yourself. Right? And, and as a recruiting department going, this is, no open it up to everybody in your carrier. So I think that was a great point that you just mentioned. It's for everybody.

Darin:
Adam, how do people get ahold of you? What's the best way?

Adam Rocke:
So they can, they, they welcome to reach out to me directly at, at at my email. I'm happy to get that on LinkedIn or they can go to Hire Our Heroes, once they go to HireOurHeroes.org, which is our website and there's lots of resources, but I'm happy to get out my email if that's, if that that's helpful to the audience, its This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.. Shoot me a note if you want to get connected and if I can help somebody that's transitioning, would that get connected with our career counselors and a mentor? I, and put you in some to some resources I could do that. If I can help in any way, or if there's a company that's listing that wants to tap into the pipeline of talent, we have I'm happy to do that. And I know.

Darin:
Absolutely.

Adam Rocke:
I wanna leave you with

Darin:
We'll get, we'll include all that in the link when, when we when this is released. So that'll be good. And Adam, I, I, I can't thank you enough for your time. I'm glad I seem uneducated that I was unfamiliar with Hiring Our Heroes and that whole program. It seems I mean, I am uneducated, but I mean, this really made me feel uneducated and kinda worthless after I read your bio and then just heard your story. I've never really felt worse about myself. So I'm gonna go do some pushups and maybe read a book or something. <Laugh>

Beach:
Yeah.

Adam Rocke:
I'll, I'm gonna close with, if we have 30 more seconds, I'm gonna tell you,

Beach:
Oh yeah, you got all the time in the world.

Adam Rocke:
What all this is about, Darin, in my mind is about national security. You're gonna go, wow, Adam's getting big on the strategic level about national security and I'm just a Colonel, but I, I will tell you this, if we

Darin:
Just a Colonel?

Adam Rocke:
Yeah. If we, if we treat our young women, young men and women who raised the right hand and took an oath, right? To support and defend our nation and we treat them with dignity and respect as they get ready to transition, and we provide them opportunities with companies like the ones that you're partner with, or you two own and so on and so forth. Right? And it's a segue to meaningful employ and a standard of living. Right? And all those other things we talked about, I think will subside and they will thrive. They'll be civic assets. There'll be leaders. That'll be the coach, teach, mentor, the volunteer in your community. But what they will do is belly up to the bar, like I'm gonna do maybe tonight at the American Legion, I'm gonna talk to young kid, men or women, and I'm gonna talk to them about my service.

Adam Rocke:
There's some good things. There's some bad things. I had a wonderful career after 34 years. And I'm very proud of that and all the things that I did. And I want to share that with the youth and tell them that there's was one, there was a, a, a, a, a spree component of this whole thing. Two, there's an economic component of it. I'm retired. Right? And, and then three was just a great, great career. And that if we don't do that, are all volunteer forces at risk right now. Right? And it truly is the young men and woman do not have the propensity to wanna serve in our military for various reasons. We could talk about that for hours. But I mean, I go back to the war on talent, the war on talent that even exists in the military right now, we need young men, women who wanna serve for whatever reason, be for patriotic reasons like I did, or for economic reasons, right? It's a mixture of both, but we have, we've got to attract more people into our service to wanna serve, to defend our borders, to defend our nation, to want to serve. And then we've gotta show them that you may serve more proud of you, but there is an opportunity post-transition back in those great companies, those communities to take care of your family. So I believe you that I, I truly believe this whole transition piece comes full circle about national security in the all volunteer force. So thanks for listening.

Beach:
That's awesome, man. Thank you, Adam. Appreciate you brother.

Darin:
Yeah, Adam. Yeah. First. Thanks for coming on, one. Two, thank you for your service, Uh Beach, thank you for not wearing jorts anymore.

Adam Rocke:
<Laugh>.

Beach:
Oh, no, no, no, no. It's it's gonna happen. I've gotta work up to it.

Darin:
Maybe by Louisville.

Beach:
<Laugh>

Darin:
We'll set a goal. To everybody. Thanks for tuning in. We appreciate it. Be safe and keep on trucking.

Adam Rocke:
Thank you all, both very much.

Beach:
Yeah. Thanks Adam. Appreciate you bro. That was awesome. Hey, I'm gonna, I'll holler at you here a little bit, Adam.