The Freight Pod

Did you catch this week's episode of The Freight Pod? Andrew Silver was joined by Prasad Gollapalli, an industry veteran that has had great success in the freight tech industry. Prasad got his start working on product at Getloaded, a once common load board only remembered today by industry veterans. When Prasad was bit by the entrepreneurial bug, he founded Trucker Tools, building a driver-centric app that became very popular with small fleets and brokers for procuring capacity. After being acquired, Prasad chose to attack a longstanding problem in the space, appointment scheduling. A mundane task that has significant financial impact to the business, Prasad and his team at Qued are leveraging AI and technology to automate the process, improving appointment times for their customers and saving money along the way. This conversation between Andrew and Prasad is filled with nuggets around building technology to serve freight customers. We hope you enjoy! Available on all streaming platforms, and full video available on YouTube.

Charlie Saffro with some sage advice on how organizations can retain talent. Aligned values, connection, and much more:

Brent Orsuga was asked what candidates should and shouldn't be doing in interviews, and his answer is worth hearing. From the first impression, to knowing your numbers, to a positive mindset, he nails it.

The Freight Pod is global. 96 total countries. Just today, people listened to the most recent episode with Rebecca Brewster in England, Serbia, and India.

So much to learn in this week’s episode. In this clip, Rebecca Brewster explains the challenge with California’s vision for all cars and trucks to be electric. The reality is, the regulation simply is not practical today. Rebecca’s team’s research at American Transportation Research Institute is so valuable for educating our industry to make smarter decisions and regulations.

Cradle-to-grave or split model? Or a hybrid of both? These are questions every brokerage owner has to answer as they structure their organization. Jason Provonsha talks about why Steam Logistics was built on the cradle-to-grave model, the benefits of it, and how they're looking to evolve it to support every potential customer opportunity.

Corey Ritenour shed light on what solicitations from prospective carriers and brokers look like. He gives some great insight in the episode on do's and dont's for potential partners.

Rob Haddock shares his perspective on what Shipper of Choice means to him. No surprise, he intimates having empathy for the driver is a critical piece to giving them a better experience at their facilities. And he talks about leveraging data from facility ratings to make necessary changes within the business to further enhance that experience. Check out the full episode for more great insights from this industry veteran.

Empathy is an important characteristic of being a great carrier rep, manager, and brokerage leader. And data allows brokerages at scale to manage their rep performance accordingly. Drew Herpich recounts when he and Andrew Silver flew down to Atlanta to have dinner with their owner operator partners that came from all over the Southeast. This dinner featured drivers from Serbia, Jamaica, Nigeria, and Montgomery, Alabama. Together, though, they had developed trust and rapport to support one another’s businesses. Jay Gustafson then speaks to how Echo leverages data in today’s modern environment to ensure his team gives a quality experience to their carrier partners. No more 1 and done carriers; keep ‘em coming back for more.

Drew Wilkerson was asked what his responsibility is with respect to employees and customers through this acquisition integration. Check out his answer in this clip. Full video is available on Youtube. Audio available on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and other streaming platforms.