Let’s talk about the NAFA Safety Advisory Council. Tell us what you are doing.
As the head of the NAFA Safety Advisory Council, I was really excited about doing the safety award. As we started talking about the criteria as a group, I thought it would be easy. It was a lot harder than I thought putting together really measurable criteria as to how to give somebody an award and differentiate them from other people who might be nominated. Although I think we are where we need to be as far as the criteria goes, we didn’t do it quickly enough to put it out and get nominations for this year. So, instead, we decided to kick it off with some special awards. We awarded them to Ray LaHood, U.S. Secretary of Transportation, for his safety initiatives; Jack Hanley, Executive Director of NETS, the National Employer Traffic Safety organization; and Janet Froetscher, President and CEO of the National Safety Council.
I think that those are really important first awards to give out to show that we are really serious about this award, and next year we will definitely give it to a fleet manager. That won’t preclude us from giving out more of these special awards to people who are really showing that they’re important in the fleet world as far as safety goes; because safety, especially distracted driving, is a topic that is really on the forefront of a lot of people’s minds these days.
Have you talked with fleets about the safety policies that they have in place?
This is a question that comes up a lot in the NAFA communities. People are asking questions: Do you have a safety policy? What does your safety policy say? I would say it is probably half who do have safety policies in place.
One of the things that we are also doing as a council is setting up a website under NAFA so there will be a safety page under the NAFA website. We want this to be a “go to” page where you can get all of your safety information. We are looking at having samples of safety policies that people could use to start their own policy or compare to their own policy.
We are also looking at having links to places like the NETS site and the National Safety Council’s site and other educational content so that everything will be in one place for the fleet manager.
Let’s talk about Novo Nordisk; what are some of the initiatives you are pursuing now?
Happily, Novo Nordisk is growing so we have a very large expansion going on this year and next year. I expect to add 565 new vehicles this year and another 200 next year so that will bring me up to about 4,000 vehicles in the U.S. and Canada. Unfortunately, along with that I am not getting any new help so it will just be me, and it is just half of me because the rest of me is Travel, along with one fleet associate.
Our initiative is to outsource all of our transactional day-to day-type stuff to our leasing company, which is Wheels. Along that line, they are going to dedicate one specific person who is going to become, as we were saying, our Mary or Frankie Fleet. And we are actually going to introduce this person as our new fleet administrator. He or she, although they will be located at Wheels, will have a Novo Nordisk phone number, a Novo Nordisk email. That will take some of the burden of the day-to-day transactional stuff off our hands so that we can be more strategic; and strategic is where we need to be. We need to be looking at those strategic initiatives and finding time to be looking at our numbers and analyzing our numbers and seeing where we have opportunities.
I happen to report to Human Resources, and one of Human Resources’ top goals for 2012 is to improve the employee experience. So everything that I do, I ask myself first – how will this improve the employee experience? Can I provide mobile apps that will make it easier for them to report their mileage, find a gas station, make a maintenance appointment? If so, then I am looking at implementing that app. Is there information that I can put online that will be more timely for them or is there another way I can communicate with them in a more timely fashion? I am still probably looking at becoming the Twitter Queen of fleet sooner rather than later because there is so much information that I could put out to them.
If people haven’t heard the term “gamification,” they will become familiar with it going forward. That is making a competition out of the things that you want people to do. Salespeople are nothing if not competitive. So if you can put a competition or a game around making them more fuel efficient or having less accidents and driving better, they will buy into it in a minute, even if it is only a small reward, even if they are playing for pure recognition because this is going to show up on a website – who is doing the best. For a $25.00 gift certificate or ten perk points, which are worth about $2.00 a piece, they are going to jump into that. We are looking at doing this both on the fleet and the travel side.
Let’s talk about your global initiatives.
Globally, we are concerned about sustainability and CO2 emission goals and how we can work across the company to achieve those goals. We say that we are a global company, but we don’t really act like a global company in a lot of instances. I work very closely with the people who are involved with travel and fleet because they report into the same area in Denmark. We are talking about how maybe we can be the trailblazers as the first global area of the company and how we can work together. We are trying to do manufacturers’ deals globally and see how that will work.
We did do a fleet initiative from a leasing company perspective a couple of years ago so that we would be aligned with that; and we are looking at other ways that we can become more aligned. In a lot of ways the U.S. is a lot more advanced as far as fleet management goes over Europe, and in Europe they do leasing differently. It’s seen more as a perk vehicle, so it is a little hard to align policies; but we are working on where we can do that, at what level we can do that, and where we can leave countries to still do their own customization.
What are the challenges you are facing with your fleet?
The biggest problems that I see come from our company growing so much. We were a small company, and before we were able to do a lot of things on a case by case basis. As we continue to grow we need to put more structure around it. And we need to follow our policies to the letter. A lot of times I have to say to them when they are coming to me and asking for special things, “I can’t do that for you because if I do that for you, I have to do it for 3,000 other drivers.” Or, “I can’t spend that extra money for you because I do have a fiduciary responsibility to the company to manage their money wisely.” Although the drivers don’t really like that, they do accept it and do tell me they understand where I am coming from. I see it in a lot of areas of the company where we used to be able to do things on a whim and on a case by case basis, now we can’t do that anymore. We must be much more structured as we become a big pharmaceutical company rather than a small one.
What types of vehicles are you going to be offering your drivers now?
We want to be seen as one of the premier pharmaceutical companies to work for, and we want to attract a very specific, highly talented, highly effective workforce. We see the cars as one of the offerings that can do that so we are not only looking at vehicles that will help them do their job; we are looking at vehicles that they can still use as family vehicles even though they might pay a little bit more for them.
We are still looking at vehicles that will appeal to whatever generation they are. If they are a millennial, what kind of vehicle would they like? So I am still looking at Audis. I am possibly looking at BMWs. If they are Gen-X, what kind of vehicles do they like? Do they have families? What kind of family vehicle do they want? My president just said, “Well, we don’t need just Snow Belt vehicles. Anybody who wants an all-wheel drive vehicle should be able to have one.” That didn’t go over real well with me because, of course, that is a hindrance to my efforts in CO2 reduction. But whatever my president wants we do, so we found a way to still provide all wheel drive vehicles for anybody who wanted them while still providing fuel efficient vehicles.
We have looked at Volkswagen and offered Volkswagens for the first time. We offered diesel vehicles for the first time this year, and we are seeing really good results with them. Of course the manufactures help us out a lot because they have to meet the CAFE’ standards. They are coming out with new ideas to get more fuel efficient with their vehicles, too. We have looked at the EcoBoost engines from Ford, and we’re offering that. So we are looking at any way we can to make the employees happy but keep us cost conscious and CO2 reduction conscious.
What about safety?
Safety is still an issue with my fleet. We had our first fatality this year. It was actually the first fatality that I have managed a fleet with. It really shook us. When we investigated, a witness said that it looked like the driver had spilled a drink, reached over to grab it and drifted into the other lane. She was driving a Volvo S40. She hit a Chevy Suburban head on. She was killed instantly. When I look at the pictures of her vehicle, it looks like the Volvo safety features did their job because it looks like the passenger cabin was intact. I really don’t know what she died from, and of course there is a limited amount of information I can get. There was an elderly couple driving the vehicle that she hit, and they both were very severely hurt.
That has put safety in the forefront of everybody’s minds. We don’t want this to happen again. And as our drivers drive many more miles and we keep putting more drivers behind the wheel, how can we get them to understand that driving is a full time job and that is what they need to be paying attention to when they are in their cars?
I am currently working on getting an executive safety champion so that I can make the drivers understand that this is an initiative that is coming from the top down, and they will take it seriously. In this area I am probably going to look at gamification to make it more fun. Because if I can take something serious and make it fun for them, make it competitive for them, they will buy into it; and I will be reading less accident reports that say, “My foot slipped off the break at the red light, and I just ran into the car in front of me.” Or, “I didn’t notice there was a pole behind me, and I backed up into it.” We are trying to curb those silly kinds of accidents. We know that if we get into the good driver habits, we won’t have any more serious accidents.
What is the secret to your own personal success?
I think the secret to my success is being passionate about what I do. We all spend an awful lot of time at work every day. I tell this to my kids all the time, you need to find something that you really love to do; that you can be involved in and you can be behind and you believe in what you are doing. I believe in education so I look at all of the opportunities I have to gain knowledge. I never think that I know all there is to know about anything. I am always looking to learn more.
I also think it is also important to give back to the industry that has been so good to me, which is why I think it is important to be involved with NAFA and AFLA on the national level and on the local level.
BIO
Donna Bibbo is Manager of Fleet and Travel for Novo Nordisk Inc. She has been involved in fleet since 1990, first managing the fleet of Pharmacia and its life sciences spinoff, Pharmacia Biotech, which merged with Amersham Life Sciences. After Amersham was bought by General Electric, she left to become the Fleet and Employee Services Manager for Novo Nordisk Inc., a Danish pharmaceutical company located in Princeton, New Jersey in August, 2006. There she manages a fleet of 3100 (soon to be 4000) vehicles in the U.S. and Canada. Those vehicles include sedans, wagons, minivans and SUVs. She also recently took over the Travel Management function at Novo Nordisk.
Donna has served as the Treasurer, Vice Chair, and Chair of the New Jersey Chapter of NAFA. She has also chaired the Audit Committee, the FleetEd Advisory Board and is currently the chair of the Safety Advisory Council of NAFA. She is also active in AFLA, currently serving as Secretary.
Donna is married to husband, Ken, and has sons, Nicholas, 24, and KC, 20. In her spare time, she enjoys reading, following her favorite NASCAR drivers, and rooting for the J-E-T-S, Jets, Jets, Jets.
