Job Responsibilities
I supervise a staff of two and the work of a company who manages
our vehicle maintenance and titling functions. I develop the
capital budget for replacement of the company owned vehicles,
which range from sedans to school buses to tractors and work
equipment. The majority of my time is spent developing the
replacement budgets and purchasing the vehicles. My group is
also responsible for delivery of new vehicles and sale of the
old vehicles. We spend a lot of time interacting with our
internal customers - we have very few external customers. We
work in excel and our vehicle database all day long.
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Job Requirements
Although individual companies may require a degree before hiring
you, there is nothing in fleet management that requires a
degree - no rocket science involved. You definitely need common
sense and good reasoning skills. And if you don't have prior
experience, don't expect to step into the manager's position.
If you do have prior experience, you can do the job at any
company anywhere.
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Uppers
The best part of this job is interacting with our customers and getting to know
the suppliers in the field.
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Downers
The worst part is watching your budget requests get cut when you
know how badly the field needs the equipment. You stay slammed
all the time, and there's always some exception to some rule to
work around. This is true of every fleet manager I ever talk to.
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Lifestyle
You really need to be a people person to work in Fleet. And you
need to be able to multi-task and have an eye for detail. It
helps to be a motor head, but it's not necessary. Because of
the involvement with upper management it is also important to
present yourself well, be well spoken, and be able to write a
proper letter (because most of us have to write our own
nowdays)
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Compensation
Most fleet managers make 60 - 80K per year. Other benefits are
going to depend on who you're working for. The periodical
Automotive Fleet has a lot of good information on this if you're
interested. It can be found on line.
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Advice to Jobseekers
You really need to be a people person to work in Fleet. And you
need to be able to multi-task and have an eye for detail. It
helps to be a motor head, but it's not necessary. Because of
the involvement with upper management it is also important to
present yourself well, be well spoken, and be able to write a
proper letter (because most of us have to write our own
nowdays)
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