Fleet departments must learn to market themselves to the CEO, according to Armadale CEO Ray Tame.
As CEO of the City of Armadale in WA, Ray Tame has a number of demands on his time from the
departments within his council. Fleet is just one of many vying for his attention.
Tame comes from a technical background within local government and so has a better understanding than most of the challenges faced by fleet departments. He share his thoughts with PWPro on how fleet departments can better tell their story within local government.
Central to Tame’s philosophy is regular reporting. In the first instance, he advocates that council technical and financial directors should receive regular assessments from the fleet department of their plant and their fleet.
“That doesn’t just mean they check the attribution of the whole of life cost of running their plant,” he says. “They should be requiring regular reports that the equipment they are using is fit for purpose and that it is delivering in a cost-effective manner.”
Market your department
The onus is on CEOs to sell their investments up the line to the council itself. Fleet managers who are able to illustrate how their departments are meeting the strategic objectives of the council will be making the job of their CEO easier.
Essentially, fleet departments must learn to market themselves, says Tame. “We need our fleet managers and our fleet departments to market themselves and market the importance of fleet just as much as other sections of the organisation.”
“Often fleet managers will assume that someone higher up the organisation is promoting the importance of fleet but they should never assume that.”
Fleet departments should report at business unit level, departmental level and organisational level to ensure all levels of the organisation understand the benefits the department brings, Tame says.
He personally prefers to be inundated with information by departments promoting their benefits as opposed to not hearing from them at all. His job, Tame says, is to filter that information so he has a full image of how the organisation is performing.
Don’t wait for someone to ask, write that report and put it in front of your CEO,” says Tame. “If you don’t market and promote your work, nobody else is going to come and ask you. You have to get out there and put it out there.”
Quantify and Qualify
In addition to the economic benefits of fleet, report the intangible benefits of fleet.
“If you use lousy equipment,” says Tame, “it quickly becomes known around the industry. It’s probably costing you money on the one side, but on the other side you won’t attract or keep get good operators because they prefer to work in an organisation that is well resourced.”
In today’s competitive environment, if the importance of plant and fleet are not promoted the organisation will simply be drawn to resource other needs. The result is outdated fleet that lead to a heavy cost for councils.
Three ways to sell the fleet department to your CEO
1. Don’t wait for someone to ask, report whole of life costs regularly to show the cost of operating, maintaining and replacing the fleet.
2. Report the intangible benefits of maintaining a strong fleet department, such as attracting and retaining staff members and risk management through the use of fit for purpose equipment.
3. Illustrate how your department meets the strategic objectives of the organisation to help your CEO justify investment to the council.