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Speaker 1: Hey everyone, Welcome to the Restless Ones. I'm Jonathan Strickland

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Speaker 1: and I'm excited to be back for another great season.

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Speaker 1: For those tuning in for the first time, I'm glad

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Speaker 1: you found us, and for listeners who have been with

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Speaker 1: us for the past three seasons, thank you for being

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Speaker 1: part of our community. As always, my focus is on

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Speaker 1: exploring the intersection of technology and business by having conversations

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Speaker 1: with the most forward thinking leaders. Throughout my career, I've

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Speaker 1: covered everything from massive parallel processing to advanced robotics, but

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Speaker 1: what truly inspires me are the stories of innovation and transformation.

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Speaker 1: In this season, we'll continue to discuss the unique missions, challenges,

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Speaker 1: and approaches of these leaders as they drive their organizations forward,

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Speaker 1: and we'll explore the innovative thinking and technologies like flexible applications,

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Speaker 1: more capable devices, and advanced networking like five G that

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Speaker 1: are helping business leaders act on their big ideas quickly

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Speaker 1: and unlock mission critical outcomes. What's become clear to us

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Speaker 1: after three seasons of insightful conversations is that we can't

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Speaker 1: change tomorrow by deploying solutions of the past. The advances

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Speaker 1: in technology that we'll be discussing this season offer an

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Speaker 1: unparalleled opportunity for leaders who embrace them. Leaders like Danny Lilly,

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Speaker 1: VP and Chief Technology Officer of Werner Enterprises. Back in

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Speaker 1: the nineteen fifties, a man named Clarence Warner bought a

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Speaker 1: truck and got his start in the trucking industry. Decades later,

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Speaker 1: that humble start has blossomed into a logistics and trucking

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Speaker 1: company that employs around thirteen thousand people. Warner works with

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Speaker 1: shippers to get payloads where they need to be and

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Speaker 1: when our guest Danny Lilly joined the company, it was

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Speaker 1: at a time when big changes were hitting the trucking industry.

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Speaker 1: We're talking about a time when stuff like cloud computing

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Speaker 1: and the Internet of Things emerged from being buzzwords into

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Speaker 1: real world applications where visionaries saw ways to leverage technology

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Speaker 1: to get a deeper, more complete understanding of their business

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Speaker 1: and how to improve it. And that's just the sort

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Speaker 1: of leader Danny is. I sat down with Danny to

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Speaker 1: talk about his experiences at Werner Enterprises, how technology has

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Speaker 1: opened up new opportunities in the sector, and the journey

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Speaker 1: Warner is on toward embracing a futuristic vision of how

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Speaker 1: a company can make use of tech to add value

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Speaker 1: to the business as well as empower employees to focus

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Speaker 1: on their core strengths. But before we get to all that,

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Speaker 1: I wanted to get to know Danny a little bit better. Danny,

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Speaker 1: Welcome to the Restless Ones.

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Speaker 2: I appreciate you having me on and I love to

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Speaker 2: talk about technology, so this is great.

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Speaker 1: So can you talk to me about what drew you

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Speaker 1: into a career path with technology in the first place.

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Speaker 2: Yeah. Absolutely, So I've started my career and focusing on

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Speaker 2: a lot of project and improving processes, eliminating waste, and

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Speaker 2: what I've found is that after you do that, the

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Speaker 2: best way to ensure that those practices are sustained is

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Speaker 2: by leveraging technology. So I've had an opportunity throughout my

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Speaker 2: entire career to leverage technology and then decide at some

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Speaker 2: point to turn that into my career long term. And

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Speaker 2: it's been a great opportunity to focus on how to improve,

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Speaker 2: how to make things better, and then applying tech to

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Speaker 2: maintain and sustain that long term.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, it's a very important perspective to have with tech

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Speaker 1: in general. I think there's always this temptation to jump

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Speaker 1: on the new shiny thing without first really considering does

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Speaker 1: this add value and if so, how and is it

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Speaker 1: actually better than what we're doing already. How long have

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Speaker 1: you been in the transportation industry itself.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, so I started in the mid two thousands, and

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Speaker 2: back then in transportation and trucking companies especially, they were

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Speaker 2: generally ten years or so behind most other verticals and companies.

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Speaker 2: The past ten years focused exclusively on technology, but the

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Speaker 2: first five to seven years started as a financial analyst,

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Speaker 2: focused on just understanding business and processes and profit spent

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Speaker 2: a lot of time identifying gaps and inefficiencies in p

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Speaker 2: and ls and things like that. So just a really

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Speaker 2: good foundation to understand how businesses work and profitability. That's

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Speaker 2: helped me throughout my career.

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Speaker 1: That's fantastic. It's a different sort of background than what

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Speaker 1: I often encounter when I'm talking with people in the

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Speaker 1: tech sector. I often get the feeling, especially in the

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Speaker 1: startup world, where you have these geniuses who have become

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Speaker 1: great innovators, but they perhaps haven't had the experience to

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Speaker 1: learn about the actual ways to run a business effectively,

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Speaker 1: so that you are maximizing efficiency, you're minimizing waste, you

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Speaker 1: are keeping an eye on costs, you're evaluating risk and

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Speaker 1: and also still taking risks, and you know how to

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Speaker 1: manage this entire enormous machine. And I've met a lot

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Speaker 1: of people are very good at building things, but they're

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Speaker 1: not necessarily good at keeping that thing running.

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Speaker 2: And as we look at any company that's going through

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Speaker 2: a modernization effort, that has to be the thought process.

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Speaker 2: We've been doing this same thing the same way for

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Speaker 2: twenty years, and we've built process upon process upon process,

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Speaker 2: and having the ability to step back and say, well,

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Speaker 2: if we didn't have all of that technical debt and

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Speaker 2: we're to look at this fresh oftentimes we would do

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Speaker 2: things very differently. I think as you look at change

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Speaker 2: and new opportunities, I think one of the most surprising

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Speaker 2: part of it is how reluctant people often are to

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Speaker 2: embrace change, and how important is as a technologist to

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Speaker 2: understand the end user and to provide capabilities that are

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Speaker 2: factors greater than what they're doing now, and it has

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Speaker 2: to be incredibly compelling to to make it do so,

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Speaker 2: and just the close alignment that is needed between business

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Speaker 2: and it. Some organizations try to operate those separately, but

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Speaker 2: it is really those synergies. The technology team needs to

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Speaker 2: understand how the business is run, how it works, and

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Speaker 2: it's also important that people on the operation side understand

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Speaker 2: technology and how to apply it. But I think organizations

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Speaker 2: that really get it and are really able to move

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Speaker 2: forward quickly, those synergies are there.

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Speaker 1: Well, let's talk a bit about connectivity. That is something

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Speaker 1: that we really value on this show because in my mind,

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Speaker 1: connectivity is the foundational technology that allows all these other

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Speaker 1: innovations to actually work. Without connectivity, you have a lot

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Speaker 1: of islands of tech that have limited use. How has

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Speaker 1: wireless connectivity transformed the trucking business?

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Speaker 2: So if you think twenty thirty years ago, right, You've

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Speaker 2: got tens of thousands of trailers out there there at

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Speaker 2: various places. You've got thousands of trucks and thousands of drivers,

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Speaker 2: and you have to get the right truck with the

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Speaker 2: right driver on the right trailer. So all of our

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Speaker 2: twenty five thousand trailers are cellular connected, so we know

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Speaker 2: exactly where they are, how long they've been there. We

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Speaker 2: have sensors to know if it's loaded or unloaded. So

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Speaker 2: what we're able to do with that is to eliminate

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Speaker 2: just a lot of waste in the process. So I

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Speaker 2: can know when a driver arrives at a shipper, I

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Speaker 2: don't have to go to a form and fill out,

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Speaker 2: hey i'm here, because that cellular device, that GPS device

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Speaker 2: is there, I know exactly when they've arrived. So it

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Speaker 2: really just facilitates the entire movement of freight across the

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Speaker 2: country and just makes it so much easier.

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Speaker 1: It's hard for me to even get my mind wrapped

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Speaker 1: around how big of an impact it has on logistics

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Speaker 1: and supply chain. Obviously, supply chain is something that we've

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Speaker 1: heard a lot about in the past couple of years,

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Speaker 1: because when the pandemic hit and we started to see

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Speaker 1: that massive domino effect, people suddenly became really aware of

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Speaker 1: things that you knew about already being in the industry.

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Speaker 1: It's something that a lot of people take for granted,

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Speaker 1: but it's the fact that we have these technologies that

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Speaker 1: allow us to keep all those pieces in play all

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Speaker 1: at the same time and know what's going on with

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Speaker 1: any individual piece at any given time. Phenomenal transformation and

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Speaker 1: also one that without wireless connectivity and the various technologies

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Speaker 1: we built on top of it, I don't think would

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Speaker 1: be scalable.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, behind that are millions of data points and freight

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Speaker 2: coming from overseas, So there's just so many components to

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Speaker 2: build out a supply chain that when one of those

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Speaker 2: things fails, it has just incredible downstream impact. So the

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Speaker 2: ability to know where those bottlenecks are, to know where

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Speaker 2: those challenges are and to quickly address them, I think

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Speaker 2: that was one of the major lessons learned out of

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Speaker 2: that supply chain crisis in twenty twenty.

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Speaker 1: Well, Danny, one other thing that we love to chat

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Speaker 1: about on this show is five G and the opportunities

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Speaker 1: that opens up. What kind of opportunities do you see

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Speaker 1: to leverage five G technology and trucking.

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Speaker 2: There are a lot of advancements happening right now. We

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Speaker 2: talk about autonomous vehicles and a lot of data intensive

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Speaker 2: things that are starting to happen. We're heavily involved with

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Speaker 2: all of the autonomous Class eight vehicle companies out there

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Speaker 2: understanding what they're doing. But what happens now is that

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Speaker 2: that truck thing gets back to the warehouse and they're

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Speaker 2: swapping out memory packs. So the ability to offload data

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Speaker 2: to provide data real time is I think a great

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Speaker 2: opportunity moving a lot of the processing to the edge

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Speaker 2: as well. There are a lot of analytics that are

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Speaker 2: happening as the driver is moving down the road. We

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Speaker 2: have forward facing video cameras we're analyzing situations. So the

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Speaker 2: more of that that can happen on the edge and

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Speaker 2: we can provide that real time data analysis and feedback,

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Speaker 2: I think is just a great opportunity. Something that we're

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Speaker 2: doing now is we have a group of drivers we

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Speaker 2: call our million milers, so they've been on the road

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Speaker 2: accident free for over a million miles. So we are

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Speaker 2: providing them with unlimited five G Wi Fi in all

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Speaker 2: of their trucks so that they have the ability wherever

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Speaker 2: they are to leverage that Wi Fi. So even as

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Speaker 2: a driver benefit for some of our exclusive drivers, we

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Speaker 2: are currently leveraging five G to do that.

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Speaker 1: Now, I'm curious how has that impacted metrics on the

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Speaker 1: business side.

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Speaker 2: Just simple metrics, like we're providing anywhere from thirty minutes

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Speaker 2: to an hour back to our drivers so that they

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Speaker 2: can do what they do in haul freight and move

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Speaker 2: freight across the country. And there's a financial impact to that,

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Speaker 2: of course, but the real impact is we're freeing up

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Speaker 2: non value time for our drivers, making their lives easier.

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Speaker 1: I love that message of giving time back because obviously

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Speaker 1: that's a resource that only goes one way. We can't

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Speaker 1: ever get time back. After the fact, that positive impact

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Speaker 1: on the driver cascades all the way back to the

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Speaker 1: clients and ultimately to consumers as well. And it's when

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Speaker 1: you start to take a step back and look at

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Speaker 1: that big picture that you really begin to appreciate the

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Speaker 1: impact that these changes have had on the transportation sector.

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Speaker 1: Are there any other sort of mission critical areas where

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Speaker 1: five G is starting to either play a part now

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Speaker 1: or play a part in plans everything from vehicle maintenance

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Speaker 1: to compliance requirements to driver safety or all of those

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Speaker 1: sort of in the mix when we start talking about

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Speaker 1: things like high speed wireless connectivity.

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Speaker 2: Yes, so if you look at a Class eight truck,

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Speaker 2: you see this big rig right, Well, in reality it

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Speaker 2: is a massive computer with over one hundred censors. We

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Speaker 2: actually have multiple cellular cards on there, and that's streaming

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Speaker 2: data back. So things like ambient air temperature or is

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Speaker 2: the seat belt buckled? Or what are the fuel levels

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Speaker 2: or what are the battery voltage levels? There are infinite

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Speaker 2: use cases there to leverage that data. So what we

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Speaker 2: are doing is we're streaming the vast majority of that

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Speaker 2: data back to the cloud, running that across event grids,

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Speaker 2: and trying to understand anomalies and opportunities in that data.

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Speaker 2: Just simple things like a driver sees a check engine

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Speaker 2: light on. So we're able to stream that data back,

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Speaker 2: understand it processes, and say, hey, you have a low

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Speaker 2: diesel exhaust fluid. If you don't fill that up, you're

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Speaker 2: going to end up on the side of the road

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Speaker 2: really fast. So let's change your route. Let's prevent this problem.

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Speaker 2: So we're able to get in front of things before

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Speaker 2: they become actual problems and to provide additional data and

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Speaker 2: insight to our teams.

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Speaker 1: I think, Danta, you just redefined IoT to be Internet

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Speaker 1: of Trucking, which is totally cool. Yeah, I'm curious if

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Speaker 1: you can tell us a bit about Werner Edge. Can

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Speaker 1: you talk about what that is and how it works.

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Speaker 2: What we did with Warner Edge is we're built on

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Speaker 2: thirty years of technology and we are in the process

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Speaker 2: now of modernizing and replacing every bit of that. I

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Speaker 2: think what a lot of companies do is they add

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Speaker 2: a shiny toy but still leave the base there and

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Speaker 2: you can't move forward like that. So what we're doing

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Speaker 2: with Warner Edge, and I know it's simple things, but

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Speaker 2: a SAS spaceed HRMS, a new finance system. So every

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Speaker 2: piece of technology is either we're moving to a SaaS

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Speaker 2: or a cloud solution and we're not leaving anything behind.

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Speaker 2: So when we get through this modernization effort, we'll have

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Speaker 2: an incredible connected tech stack that will help us to

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Speaker 2: innovate and to improve. Warner Edge is that umbrella that

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Speaker 2: encompasses that transformation, and we kind of have three core

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Speaker 2: components of it. So one is to modernize our base application.

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Speaker 2: So we built our own hr system, We've built our

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Speaker 2: own finance system. Why would you ever do that? Now? Right?

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Speaker 2: There are great off the shelf SaaS solutions out there

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Speaker 2: that provide those capabilities, and I have a certain number

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Speaker 2: of engineering talent. Let's leverage that talent to actually build

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Speaker 2: those things that differentiate us, that provide a unique competitive advantage.

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Speaker 2: So that's the second tier is to build those differentiators,

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Speaker 2: focus our dev teams on those things, and then the

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Speaker 2: third is look to the future, so what are the

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Speaker 2: newest tech, what are the latest capabilities and also partnering

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Speaker 2: with a lot of startups and venture capital to understand

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Speaker 2: where they're innovating and they can fill gaps.

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Speaker 1: That really hits home to the restless ones. This concept

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Speaker 1: of embracing the new and trying to avoid reliance upon

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Speaker 1: things like legacy systems. So many companies have spent decades,

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Speaker 1: maybe even up to a century, building up these legacy

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Speaker 1: systems that they cannot easily migrate from, and it can

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Speaker 1: be one of those elements that holds a business back

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Speaker 1: from the next step in its success story. So can

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Speaker 1: you kind of walk us through the various components of

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Speaker 1: the system and how they work together to provide value

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Speaker 1: to customers On the customer side.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, So as we're modernizing all of the efforts, we

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Speaker 2: have a very API driven approach, so we want to

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Speaker 2: make sure that whatever we're doing is extensible. So as

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Speaker 2: we will partner with shippers, all of that data that's

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Speaker 2: in our transportation management system we can share and we

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Speaker 2: can also ingest, so that allows us to take in

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Speaker 2: information from shippers. We work with our equipment manufacturers, so

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Speaker 2: there's a lot of third party systems out there that

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Speaker 2: have incredible data that we can ingest and bring into

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Speaker 2: our system.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, and again, this has that cascading effect right to

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Speaker 1: that end. I'm also curious how that impacts drivers because

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Speaker 1: I assume they also are able to benefit from a

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Speaker 1: lot of the information that we're talking about here.

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Speaker 2: So we've looked at the entire value stream of what

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Speaker 2: a driver does on a day to day basis. We've

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Speaker 2: looked at that workflow, and then we've found opportunities to

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Speaker 2: automate that. At one point, we've moved away from this

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Speaker 2: form based system. So there were like sixty different forms

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Speaker 2: and a rive at shipper, a departed shipper, and it

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Speaker 2: was a one way communication piece. So if I had

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Speaker 2: an error, it would go back, bounce back, and we

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Speaker 2: would ask fifty questions. Forty of those are acts relevant.

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Speaker 2: So what we've been able to do now is to

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Speaker 2: build that into a workflow. But even better, I've geofensed

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Speaker 2: all of my shipper locations, so instead of asking them

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Speaker 2: to fill an arrive or a departure form, I aut

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Speaker 2: I auto depart. That data is captured and yes, that's

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Speaker 2: great for the shipper, but for the driver, now that

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Speaker 2: takes fifteen to twenty minutes of just non value add

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Speaker 2: activity out of their day, it becomes more accurate. So

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Speaker 2: there's a lot of things like that that we've been

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Speaker 2: able to build out in our driver's day to day

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Speaker 2: workflow and just to streamline, why ask them twenty questions

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Speaker 2: when we know that data, I can just provide it

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Speaker 2: to them. So we've really simplified and had a strong

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Speaker 2: emphasis and focus on improving the day to day of

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Speaker 2: our drivers.

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Speaker 1: Is the Warner edge system an integral component in training

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Speaker 1: at this point.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, So we've had a lot of forms based and

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Speaker 2: other onboarding efforts where we've been able to digitize that

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Speaker 2: entire process. The edge Connect, which is our device that

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Speaker 2: we use to bring them these capabilities, starts at orientation

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Speaker 2: and follows them throughout their career. The first experience that

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Speaker 2: a new employee has is really really important.

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Speaker 1: Well, we touched on it earlier, you brought it up,

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Speaker 1: and now I have to talk about it because one

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Speaker 1: of the things that we do here a lot when

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Speaker 1: we're talking about the future of the trucking industry is

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Speaker 1: the potential incorporation of autonomous vehicles. So where do you

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Speaker 1: see the future if you were to think of a

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Speaker 1: spectrum between how can I make a driver's life easier

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Speaker 1: and their job more rewarding all the way to the

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Speaker 1: robots are driving the trucks. Where are you kind of falling?

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Speaker 2: As I look at the demand for drivers over the

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Speaker 2: next ten to fifteen twenty years, there's a driver shortage now,

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Speaker 2: and by the wildest calculations of AV adoption, we still

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Speaker 2: see their substantial driver shortage needs. So any truck driver

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Speaker 2: entering the industry now will have a career for as

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Speaker 2: far as I can see into the future. One of

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Speaker 2: the major benefits we've seen with autonomy is advancements in

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Speaker 2: safety capabilities and features. I expect that to continue and

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Speaker 2: to see downstream impacts of those technologies. But there are

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Speaker 2: areas where AV makes sense now where that technology is.

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Speaker 2: As I've gone on ride alongs and participated, it really

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Speaker 2: is impressive to be in a Class eight vehicle on

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Speaker 2: a freeway that can essentially drive itself. And if any

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Speaker 2: of us have taken an eight or a ten hour

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Speaker 2: road trip, there's certain sections of that road trip where

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Speaker 2: it might make a lot of sense. It's hard to

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Speaker 2: really say where mass adoption is. There's still a lot

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Speaker 2: of hurdles that have to be overcome.

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Speaker 1: I'm also curious, do you envision a future where we

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Speaker 1: have this connected trucking industry interacting with cities on almost

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Speaker 1: an invisible way through data.

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Speaker 2: I hope that we get there once there's autonomous hubs

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Speaker 2: outside of cities. We expect drivers to be doing those

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Speaker 2: intercity loads and capabilities, and if we could provide efficient

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Speaker 2: routes and help them move through cities better. Yeah, I

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Speaker 2: think it would be great to see some of that

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Speaker 2: technology move forward.

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Speaker 1: Before I could let them go, I had to ask

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Speaker 1: Danny one more thing, what's the best advice you have

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Speaker 1: ever received?

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Speaker 2: So I think two things. One is to embrace change

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Speaker 2: and to two is to challenge the status quo. I

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Speaker 2: think some of the biggest opportunities of any organization is

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Speaker 2: for those employees to say, you know, I don't really

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Speaker 2: understand this. This doesn't quite make sense to me. And

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Speaker 2: then as you go through that process, sometimes it just

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Speaker 2: doesn't make sense and there's a better way and a

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Speaker 2: new opportunit unity, and sometimes you know it's a lack

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Speaker 2: of understanding. But embraced change and challenge the status quo,

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Speaker 2: I think is what all of us should be doing,

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Speaker 2: and that way we can continue to advance and move forward.

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Speaker 1: That's a great, great answer, Danny Thank you so much

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Speaker 1: for joining us for the restless ones. This has been

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Speaker 1: a real pleasure.

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Speaker 2: Jonathan, thank you, It's been great to be here. I

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Speaker 2: appreciate the time.

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Speaker 1: Again, I have to thank Danny and Werner Enterprises for

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Speaker 1: joining the show. My guests frequently surprise and impress me,

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Speaker 1: and Danny was no exception. Learning how technologically advanced the

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Speaker 1: trucking industry actually is and how connectivity enables the automation

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Speaker 1: of tasks that normally but put increased demands on driver's

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Speaker 1: time and energy really made an impact on me. Knowing

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Speaker 1: that driver's safety and satisfaction will have an effect throughout

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Speaker 1: the business, ultimately benefiting not just the drivers, but Warner

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Speaker 1: Warner's clients and even end customers is pretty incredible. And again,

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Speaker 1: the foundation for these capabilities is that wireless connectivity. It's

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Speaker 1: the technology that gives businesses the opportunity to do things

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Speaker 1: differently and to explore alternatives and build new solutions. It's

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Speaker 1: what lets engineers move the needle on metrics that might

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Speaker 1: have been static for decades, increasing efficiency, decreasing waste, and

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Speaker 1: giving employees the support they need to do their jobs

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Speaker 1: at the top of their abilities. Plus it gives Werner's

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Speaker 1: customers insight into their own business, which means over time,

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Speaker 1: we'll see a rising tide lift all boats. Be sure

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Speaker 1: to join us for more episodes of The Restless Ones.

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Speaker 1: We'll be talking with more incredible leaders about their approach

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Speaker 1: to leveraging technology and how this tech creates opportunities even

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Speaker 1: in places we never thought to look before. Until next time,

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Speaker 1: I'm Jonathan Strickland, and this is The Restless Ones