For those of you out their fluent in CB lingo, this is not the “10-100” you are thinking of! I owe a lot in my trucking career to a former mentor of mine, Mr. Gary Meserve, who was the Operations Manager for CSM Transportation, where I worked at for almost six years. My persistence in wanting to learn every facet of this industry is what clued him into the fact that there was more in my plans for the future than just driving a truck. Along with teaching me many roles within the trucking industry by learning alongside him, he taught me most of the safety and business rules that have led to my success as an owner-operator. This business rule that I want to share with you was introduced to me through some of his teachings and was always referred to as the 1-10-100 rule.
Most big problems start out as little ones. It is in our nature to want to stay productive and maintain our equipment, but sometimes there is no time for prevention in our busy schedules, so it seems. Whether you think you are too busy or maybe you are just a born procrastinator, there is always time for prevention! I like to think about it in the terms I was taught, in that a snowball rolling down a hill only gathers more snow to get bigger and bigger as it picks up speed. Eventually, this snowball gets as big as a house and has the destructive force behind it of a locomotive. Had it been stopped in the first few stages of its descent down the hill, it would never have had the chance to reach its full colossal destructive power. This is where the numbers in the rule come into play, stopping the problem in the “1” stage for the cost of repair which is the "10" stage, will prevent you from entering the “100” stage of failure altogether. We even used to joke that in trucking it was more like the 1-10-10,000 rule, since a small problem in a truck can become very large, very fast, if it is ignored.
This rule lends itself in every application of our daily trucking lives. From looking under the trailer to make sure your fifth-wheel latches with every drop-and-hook, to taking care of a weeping coolant leak before a blown hose leaves you waiting on an expensive roadside service call, this rule can save you a lot of time and money. As an owner-operator, I take preventative maintenance very seriously. I often change my fluids and filters prior to the factory recommended intervals as well as perform thorough routine inspections on all wear items. If something is getting close to needing replacement, it is a little too close for comfort in my eyes. The old saying that a “squeaky wheel gets the grease” is not good enough for me! I like to prevent it from being the squeaky wheel in the first place! Let the 1-10-100 rule sink in and try applying it to your daily operations and you too can prevent small mistakes before they really become costly!