(Dawn Nyen, Courtesy of Dawn Nyen)
A co-worker recently suggested that I reach out to a customer who has an interesting history with entrepreneurship.
My conversation with Dawn Nyen developed into our most recent Success Story. And just in case you don’t venture over to that page on our website, I’ll share one of her lessons learned in this blog post, but trust me the interview is worth the few minutes it takes to read.
Dawn’s path to becoming a FedEx Ground Contractor started in a hotel ballroom. She answered a local newspaper ad instructing people to attend a local recruiting meeting about owning a business. Dawn and her sister were the “last ones standing” in the room. Then, her sister dropped out leaving Dawn standing all alone.
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Topics:
Business Results,
Management,
FedEx Ground,
Business,
Investment,
Metrics,
contractor,
Profit,
leadership
As we’re approaching peak this year, conversations with FedEx Ground Contractors reflect a sense of urgency caused by the expected increase in package volume. From California to the east coast, everyone is feeling the pressure. Rental trucks have long been reserved by others, new trucks are scarce, the competition for finding and hiring temporary drivers is tough, and the new pre-load technology is time consuming at best.
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Topics:
Business Tools,
Business Planning,
Business Results,
Business Metrics,
FedEx Ground,
Investment,
Profit
A common thread amongst FedEx Ground Contractors is the amount of time and effort required to handle everything that’s expected to stay compliant, safe and profitable. If you’ve been tracking our blog posts about time and task management, this is the third in a series.
First, we suggested tracking where your time is spent. From there, we looked at the likelihood that working seven-days a week has resulted in losing your identity. You’re known by your job.
Now, let’s examine how to improve your working situation.
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Topics:
Business Tools,
Business Planning,
Business Results,
Business Metrics,
FedEx Ground,
Investment,
Profit
If you’re like most FXG Contractors, you don’t spend much time thinking about your retirement. You’re caught up in the daily swarm of running your business. Tucked far away on a backburner of your brain, you understand your eventual exit will happen. Will you be ready?
Thinking about retirement isn’t enough. It’s not a plan. Developing and acting on a plan will provide certainty when the time comes to exit your business.
What’s holding you back? Maybe you don’t know where to start. Maybe you think it’s too expensive, or your company is too small.
Actually, setting up a 401(k) plan isn’t expensive nor is it difficult.
Here are six reasons why you need to set up a 401(k) retirement plan.
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Topics:
Business Results,
Management,
FedEx Ground,
Investment,
Metrics
Did you read FedEx’ Quarterly Results issued last week? The financial news outlets wrote absolutely glowing reviews.
Yahoo! Finance headline declared, “FedEx Corp. Reports Strong First Quarter Results” while Barron’s headline gushed, “FedEx Destroys Earnings Estimates. Things Are Getting Really Good.”
Reading further down the page you’ll find, “Operating results increased due to volume growth in...U.S. domestic residential package services, yield improvement at FedEx Ground..., and one additional operating weekday.”
Could Yahoo! Finance and Barron’s write the same headlines about your last three months? You don’t issue forecasts, but if you did - would you be blowing it out of the water, too? If not, why not?
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Topics:
Business Tools,
Business Planning,
Business Results,
Bookeeping,
Business Metrics,
FedEx Ground,
Investment,
Profit
July 20th, 2020, was the day that FXG announced via MGB that it would make significant changes to the way they will approach your End Of Agreement (EOA) process.
It is important to understand what’s going on here, as it will impact the way you think about contract renewals with FXG.
At first glance, it appears it’s just FXG flexing its muscles again, and in some respects that’s true.
However, when you study the process, it’s easy to see that it is really an attempt to ...
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Topics:
FedEx,
Ground,
ISP,
FedEx Ground,
Business,
Contract,
Investment,
model,
Agreement
We recently hosted a webinar that obviously struck a chord with many Contract Service Providers (CSP’s). Attendance for the webinar was sizable. The topic was Dynamic Route Optimization, more well known by its acronym, DRO, which has understandably created a generous amount of frustration.
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Topics:
Business Tools,
FedEx,
Training,
FedEx Ground,
Investment,
Dynamic Route Optimization,
DRO
Take a look around.
Do you see the number of contractors around you dwindling?
How many contractors do you see today, vs. how many there used to be 2, 5 and 10 years ago.
It's plain to see the number of contractors is shrinking, while the number of trucks grows
This results in fewer, but larger operations.
Think this is a coincidence?
It's not.
As you seek answers from FXG on how you will achieve scale, contiguous service areas and overlap, you are being told you need to "work it out" with those around you. Well that's great, but how are you supposed to do so if you have limited resources?
There is a way, but you'll need to ask yourself some questions first.
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Topics:
Business Structure,
Business Tools,
Management,
Payroll,
FedEx Ground,
Business,
Investment,
model,
Merge,
Purchase
Here we are at the end of another year.
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Topics:
Business Structure,
Business Results,
FedEx,
Business Metrics,
Business,
Investment,
model,
Metrics,
Selling,
contractor,
Profit,
vendor
