The Microscope and the Telescope: Shifting Your Focus

The highly anticipated school start is over and it’s time to think more strategically. All of that focus was placed on a short window of time and yet the entire school year still follows. Now, we must shift from microscopic focus to a telescopic focus, allowing us to look into the distance.

The thing about transportation is that we are always balancing the demands of the day with building a plan for the future. However, this balance also means that today’s demands can consume all your attention leaving little time or energy to plan for the future.

The other reality of transportation is that the problems of tomorrow are as real and large as the challenges of today. You have to worry about your budget, the technology you’re using, your operating model, staffing, and succession. But how do you tackle all of these issues?

Let’s look into near space and see what we see!

• Budgets – Budgets are driven (pardon the pun) by personnel costs and personnel costs are driven by how many routes you run and how many routes you run is driven by the structure (not the efficiency but the structure) of your system. As a result, you will need to focus on structure and then efficiency within that structure.
• Technology – Technology is both a cost and a benefit to your system. Therefore, you need to understand how well you really know your system; what challenges you are trying to solve, and what the incremental cost and return on the spend you may get. For example, the cost of a student management system may seem high, but like insurance, the first time it helps you find a student who got off at the wrong stop, the return can be exponential. Evaluating and costing these things are critical financial and operational analysis skills to build in you and your organization.
• Operational models – Sometimes it can be hard to admit there are things you shouldn’t be doing operationally and sometimes it is even harder to show you should be doing something you are not. However, one of the most important traits of transportation leaders is their ability to separate themselves from what is best for the kids. Designing and interpreting a service model analysis is an important ongoing skillset to ensure the most effective stewardship of public dollars. In some cases, it is going to be better for everyone if you bring in help in other cases you might be best off helping yourself. Assessing which of the three models (insourced, outsourced, shared source) is right for can and should be done on a service-by-service basis along with looking at your organization overall.
• Staffing – there are no easy answers here. The driver shortage is the gift that you keep on returning and addressing it is a systemic challenge that consumes significant time, attention, and resources. What leaders need to focus on is: Where will the people you need come from? How will you connect with them and let them know you want them?How much will they cost? How much are you spending not having them? What is the net difference? How quickly can you onboard them? What are the structural and our process impediments? How will you set expectations for the candidates, your leadership, and the public?)
• Leadership – Something that is hard to accept when you are in charge of an operation is that the best you is the next you. Thinking about how to create a leadership and technical pipeline of expertise and what skills you require now and will require in the future. Identifying the long-term issues your operation will face (e.g., school choice, enrollment decline, technology changes, personnel, vehicle specifications, legislation, and on and on and on…) means that this is inherently a telescope activity. Looking into the future and determining how to build the skills and capabilities is the ultimate in leadership responsibility.

School start is like a pie eating contest, you choose to be in it and there is a lot to consume. You also feel better after it’s over versus when you are in it.

The end of school start is the start of something else. Preparing yourself for all those “something elses” means you pick your head up from looking down the microscope at the small stuff and stare out the telescope at the things that seem far away but are not.