Unit 5 Assignment 1
The Distracted Driving Course
By
Thermdotcom Based on the continuing efforts to make our technicians the customer facing examples of our company, I am writing to suggest a training course I think will benefit out field staff greatly. The course I am proposing will delve into the distracted driving trend our technicians are faced daily. I have found an organization whose sole purpose is to make corporate driver’s safer.
I think it is best if we use an external vendor to supply the training. The organization is NSC or the National Safety Council. I came across one of the instructors last year at a conference, and feel they will be a great asset. A little insight into this organization: “The nation's leading safety advocate for more than 100 years, the National Safety Council is a nonprofit organization with the mission to save lives by preventing injuries and deaths at work, in homes and communities, and on the road through leadership, research, education and advocacy. Working to make the world measurably safer, NSC advances this mission by engaging businesses, government agencies, elected officials and the public to help prevent the fifth leading cause of death in the U.S. – unintentional injuries
The Council is data driven, relying on research to inform best practice solutions to safety issues. To make the greatest impact, NSC focuses on where the most preventable injuries and deaths occur - cell phone use while driving, teen driving, workplace safety, prescription painkiller use and safety in the community. As a catalyst for behavior change, NSC promotes April as Distracted Driving Awareness Month and June as National Safety Month.”(http://www.nsc.org) I will sit down and explore their curriculum and tailor it to our field personnel’s needs. Since, I have experience working in the field, I can pinpoint areas of concern from both sides, i.e. management productivity and customer service issues as well as union safety concerns.
I feel this training organization will be a good fit because Verizon can control the message it wants to get across. Also, they have a proven track record of reducing accidents. From their website: “NSC Defensive Driving Courses set a high standard in driver safety training and is a major reason our preventable accident rate per 100,000 miles has decreased from 1.28 to an all-time low of .74 per 100,000 miles.”(http://www.nsc.org)
Since we are working on a long term change in the way our tech use our vehicles, I think its best we schedule a week of training for the worst drivers we have. The courses will be a mix of: Driver safety training online courses, NSC-certified defensive driving courses with our vehicles, Driver safety training in an interactive classroom setting. This will give the technicians and some management personnel to ask questions and give their thoughts on the material given. I feel this setting will give everyone a chance to experience the information, as well as study. If we bombard with reading, and no hands on I feel we will waste our money and will not improve the one thing that plagues us year after year. For years we have sat the tech in a classroom and asked them to watch a video from 1980 or take an online course with questions at the end. I have experience 1st hand that this was not effective in helping make our techs safer drivers. We need to completely rethink how we teach, because how they learn is different than it used to be. Another suggestion I would like to add is more stringent punishment for repeat offenders. Sometimes that is the only way someone will apply what they know, unfortunately.
Since 6000 Hadley Rd in south Plainfield is empty, has a large parking lot, and the simulated city area in the back, we can use that for the urban driving setting. This will give the instructors a base line on the driving skills of the techs we send to the class. After the road courses, they will head inside for the 1st lesson. Then there will be a video game like driving simulator all the students will use on the provided laptops. This will be a question and answer/story line type game. Where the choices they make will determine the outcome of their story, a very engaging tactic.
There will be 2 ways to focus on the root causes of the accidents. 1st opportunity will be at the end of each class; there will be a questionnaire that will ask everyone what they felt was important, what they could have done without, and what they think should be added. Since we will have a few days with the same techs, there will time to curtail the last lessons to the needs of the students. This is of course after all of the information we deem necessary is provided. I think this will also provide the techs a way to feel we are listening and not just picking them out because are the ones with the most accidents.
2nd opportunity will be assessing how the techs responded to the urban on road experience. This will be targeted at bad habits and tips and tricks to drive safe while still fulfilling the duties of communication with management and the customers.
Here is an example of how the training will go:
Start time is 8:30 am.
Time Activity Instructions
2 hours 30 minutes 10 students will be introduced to the 4 instructors and be evaluated on an on road driver’s course. Set up cones and mock distractions in the urban driver’s environment.
15 minutes Class uses the provided laptops for the driver’s simulation game. Before the class starts, make sure all laptops power up and are at the ready screen for the simulation.
15 minutes Morning break Power down all laptops.
30 minutes Discuss results of the game. Down load all the results of the game and discuss the topics that arise from game results.
1 hour Lunch Prepare video equipment to show video
1 hour Show video with conversation pauses for discussions. Show video.
15 mins Afternoon break Prepare topic questionnaire and feedback form.
45 mins Fill out form and dismissal Discuss topics presented in the form for later classroom topics.

Once a technician has finished this class, it will be documented on the safety training website. As an incentive, we will forward any documentation needed to the state for point reduction or insurance discounts on the techs behalf. We feel this would be a great way to show we do care about more than how they perform on the job.
If there are any concerns or questions, please reach out to me later this week. Thanks for your consideration. Resources http://www.nsc.org/learn/about/Pages/about-nsc.aspx (Retrieved 2015, May 16th)