Werner Enterprises Omaha Campus rounds out third safe year

As the year is wrapping up for the transportation industry, Werner Enterprises gets to check off one more resolution for 2025: For the third time since 2020, the company’s Omaha campus shops went injury-free for 365 days, as they celebrated on X.

As this is no small feat, Fleet Maintenance caught up with Ben Murphy, VP of Maintenance and Equipment Resources, and Danella Doyle, senior compliance manager with Werner Enterprises, to see how they accomplished this.

“We really want to emphasize the long-term play here, we want our technicians to be healthy for the duration of their career here at Werner,” Murphy said. “We're emphasizing not only being aware of your surroundings right then and there, but taking the approach for long-term wellness while doing their job, because it is a tough job, but there is a right way and a wrong way to do it.”

Putting safety policies in place

For Doyle, Werner’s safety policies start from a proactive mindset and standardized safety protocols across the company, from continuous education for maintenance employees to strong leadership.

“Everything starts at the very top and goes down to the bottom,” Doyle added. “Every associate is empowered to stop a job if they don't feel like something is safe for them to do, or something is not right, so they can address it quickly and not have it pushed aside.”

For instance, Werner holds safety training once a month, and also provides a weekly newsletter on a safety topic. Doyle said that these topics can vary based on trends they’re seeing in the company or can be based on the season. For instance, their most recent safety topic discussed slips, trips, and falls for the winter.

Then, on a more regular basis, Doyle noted that Werner holds pre-shift huddles at every shop, and that their supervisors and foremen walk the shop daily to make sure everyone is safe and has no questions.

Additionally, both Doyle and Murphy noted that Werner is continually investing in safety equipment for their techs, such as wheel lifts, back braces, and safety glasses. Equally important as investing in safety equipment, Doyle also emphasized working with Werner’s technicians before purchasing new equipment to get their buy-in.

“We had mechanics try out safety glasses before we gave them to them,” Doyle recalled. “We [got] their buy-in on what safety glasses they liked before telling them to wear whatever we bought, so I tried them out at a couple different sites.”

Then, on a larger scale, Murphy noted that the Omaha campus specifically filled in their truck pits and switched to lifts instead.

“All of our new terminals that we build won't get built with pits… because we see that as a much more ergonomical and safe way for them to go about their day-to-day,” he explained.

Maintaining a safety culture

However, similar to the new equipment buy-in, Murphy largely credited the Omaha campus’ safety success to the technicians investment in their culture. This is particularly true between the company’s more tenured technicians with 30-35 years of experience passing on their safety and process knowledge to the new ones.

“It's incredible to see the tenured technicians helping out the new up-and-comers and to learn things the right way and pointing things out and how you can do it repeatedly and not sustain an injury,” Murphy stated. “It’s great to see the peer-level approach and emphasis on safety, because Danella and I can probably preach till we're blue in the face, but it's a culture, it's a mindset that's taking place on the floor, and that's what I really think sets those successful terminals apart from those that aren't.”

And that culture is rewarded by the company overall, as Werner held a safety lunch for the Omaha campus to celebrate their success, creating positive reinforcement and an example for other locations to follow.

“The even more enjoyable part is that when you hear individuals from Omaha talking to individuals at other terminals, they know where they're at in the pecking order in regards to injury-free days,” Murphy concluded. “It's a fun way for them to stay engaged and work and compare themselves to their peers, and want to stay at the top of that list.”