Ellen Voie (Voy-a) is an internationally recognized speaker and authority on gender diversity and inclusion for women working in non-traditional careers in transportation. She has been invited to speak to audiences in Sweden, Australia, New Zealand, Vietnam, France, Mexico, and Canada, in addition to being a popular speaker at conferences throughout the United States. Voie founded the Women In Trucking Association in 2007, and currently serves as the nonprofit organization’s President & CEO. The Women In Trucking Association was formed to promote the employment of women in the trucking industry, to remove obstacles that might keep them from succeeding, and to celebrate the successes of its members. Voie also currently serves on the Motor Carrier Safety Advisory Committee (MCSAC) to provide recommendations and advice to the FMCSA on motor carrier safety programs and motor carrier safety regulations. Voie’s background in the trucking industry began as the assistant and later Traffic Manager for a steel fabricating plant in the upper Midwest. She then worked as a dispatcher for a grain hauling carrier before becoming co-owner of a small fleet. After starting a family, she used her background to become a freelance transportation consultant to carriers in Wisconsin, licensing and permitting trucks for more than 16 years. Voie also served as the Executive Director of Trucker Buddy International, Inc., a pen pal program between professional drivers and elementary students. Voie holds a Master’s in Communication degree from the University of Wisconsin, Stevens Point, where she completed her Thesis research on the complex identities of women married to professional drivers. She also hold a degree in Traffic and Transportation Management from LaSalle Extension University. Voie has earned the Certified Association Executive (CAE) credential from the American Society of Association Executives, the leading authority in association management.

Columnists,Ellen Voie |
May 4, 2022

Recently the Department of Labor held a “Day of Action” to promote safety and address these issues in the trucking industry. Since our inception in 2007, our mission has included the goal to address obstacles that might keep women from entering the trucking industry, or from succeeding in a transportation role.   For over fifteen years the Women In Trucking Association has already been addressing the subject of sexual harassment and sexual assault against professional drivers.

We feel the time is way overdue for the government to support our efforts to address sexual harassment and assault in the trucking industry.  In June of 2011 we met with Lynn Rosenthal, who was the White House Advisor on Violence Against Women and Judge Susan Carbon, who served as Director of the Office on Violence Against Women at the Department of Justice who both agreed more needs to be done to address harassment against our professional drivers.

In 2011 WIT partnered with J. J. Keller & Associates, Inc. and created an Anti-Harassment Employment Guide which we offer as a resource to our corporate members.

In 2017 the FMCSA initiated a project to research harassment against female and minority drivers (renewed in 2020) called Crime Prevention for Truckers.  This was a result of our request to the agency to help us identify and address safety and harassment issues against female drivers.  We are awaiting the results of this campaign to be released soon.

To better understand the prevalence of harassment against our female driver population we initiated a survey late in 2021 which collected the responses of 437 professional drivers.  When asked if the respondent felt that trucking was a safe industry for women, 54 percent agreed, and 18 percent disagreed.

One of the concerns expressed by drivers was the training situation when it involves opposite gender trainers. More than half (52%) felt that a same gender training policy would encourage more women to pursue a career as a driver (only nine % disagreed).

The Women In Trucking association advocates for a same gender training policy OPTION for motor carriers.  Currently trucking companies who do not have sufficient female trainers are unable to provide this option due to an EEOC ruling against a carrier that provided male trainees more opportunities to work for them due to a delay in securing female trainers.

The trucking industry is the only mode of transportation that does not allow separate sleeping and living quarters for opposite genders.  Unfortunately, this has led to an environment that could lead to harassment or assault, as reported by the survey respondents. More than 67 percent of the drivers reported being subjected to verbal offenses, with 52 percent reporting the comment as threatening.  Over twenty percent of those in the survey reported being threatened with a weapon and 46 percent said they had experienced unwanted physical advances.

We have created a series of White Papers based on research conducted with our members which is available to the media, trucking companies and government entities.  Our White Papers are available on our website.

To educate our members on personal safety we offer sexual harassment training at our events by the Survive Institute.   Hundreds of our members have been trained in personal safety and how to avoid being a victim of assault through our programs.

As an industry, we need to protect the personal safety of our drivers, particularly our more vulnerable female drivers.  Our board of directors has agreed to invest in a partnership with RAINN (Rape, Abuse, and Incest National Network), the nation’s largest anti-sexual violence organization.  We have committed to supporting research to be conducted by RAINN to determine the extent of harassment against professional drivers.  Our goal is to create a toll-free hotline for transportation workers to call if they experience sexual harassment or violence.

In our survey of drivers, we asked them where they felt least safe, and the top response was in rest areas (85.5%) and truck stops (86.8%).  We approached the truck stop industry to help us create an awareness campaign called, Hear Something, Say Something,” to educate drivers in bystander awareness.  This project is still in the initial stages until support from the truck stop industry is secured.

The Sexual Assault and Prevention Month Day of Action is a project that we feel strongly about supporting, but more importantly, we feel it will benefit our efforts to provide a safer environment for all professional drivers.

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Ellen Voie (Voy-a) is an internationally recognized speaker and authority on gender diversity and inclusion for women working in non-traditional careers in transportation. She has been invited to speak to audiences in Sweden, Australia, New Zealand, Vietnam, France, Mexico, and Canada, in addition to being a popular speaker at conferences throughout the United States. Voie founded the Women In Trucking Association in 2007, and currently serves as the nonprofit organization’s President & CEO. The Women In Trucking Association was formed to promote the employment of women in the trucking industry, to remove obstacles that might keep them from succeeding, and to celebrate the successes of its members. Voie also currently serves on the Motor Carrier Safety Advisory Committee (MCSAC) to provide recommendations and advice to the FMCSA on motor carrier safety programs and motor carrier safety regulations. Voie’s background in the trucking industry began as the assistant and later Traffic Manager for a steel fabricating plant in the upper Midwest. She then worked as a dispatcher for a grain hauling carrier before becoming co-owner of a small fleet. After starting a family, she used her background to become a freelance transportation consultant to carriers in Wisconsin, licensing and permitting trucks for more than 16 years. Voie also served as the Executive Director of Trucker Buddy International, Inc., a pen pal program between professional drivers and elementary students. Voie holds a Master’s in Communication degree from the University of Wisconsin, Stevens Point, where she completed her Thesis research on the complex identities of women married to professional drivers. She also hold a degree in Traffic and Transportation Management from LaSalle Extension University. Voie has earned the Certified Association Executive (CAE) credential from the American Society of Association Executives, the leading authority in association management.