Maxim Crane Works adopts Samsara to improve safety and operational efficiencies
With massive safety and efficiency gains, Maxim’s long-term growth strategy is fueled by their partnership with Samsara.
Meet Maxim Crane
How to continue improving upon Maxim Crane Works’ top-tier safety program
Maxim Crane Works (or “Maxim Crane”) is North America’s largest crane rental company and lifting solutions provider serving thousands of customers across 60 locations.
Before Samsara, Maxim Crane had limited visibility into what their employees were experiencing on the road—when accidents occurred, they faced many challenges in verifying what actually happened. This meant Maxim Crane had limited control over proving their employees’ innocence. And, with the largest crane and support fleet in the continental United States, logging tens of millions of on-road miles annually, there was no shortage of on-road incidents. Additionally, the company’s previous telematics system provided very limited insights into several fleet metrics, which impacted training opportunities for their team.
Finally, Maxim Crane was lacking a platform built with Privacy-by-Design principles which could be customized for increased visibility to help exonerate innocent employees involved in on-road incidents.
A single platform to inform coaching with on-the-road visibility.
Maxim Crane chose the Samsara Connected Operations Cloud™ to gain complete visibility across their fleet on one consolidated, customizable platform. Together, Video-Based Safety, Vehicle Telematics and more provide Maxim Crane with a holistic view into the health of their fleet, how safe their employees are performing, and what’s happening on the road. Troy Wagner, Vice President of Safety, said, “Samsara brought a level of detail which expanded our fleet safety program into several different areas that we couldn't measure with our previous system.”
To ease concerns about the inward-facing cameras, a pilot program was initiated featuring a sample pool of 100 vehicles equipped with dash cams that focused on how to best use the technology. Equally important, Maxim Crane partnered with Samsara Implementation Consultants to educate their team on what the dash cams do and do not do, as well as how employees’ privacy is valued and protected in the cab using Samsara. Today, employee buy-in continues to improve thanks to employee advocates from the pilot program and a growing library of exoneration success stories. As a result of this effective change management, Maxim Crane experienced smooth implementation of over 6,000 Samsara devices throughout their fleet in less than six months.
Using Samsara for all of their safety reporting—including alleged harsh driving, speeding, and tailgating—Maxim Crane has created a more robust safety program by customizing employee coaching with HD video and in-cab alerts as well as updating their HOS, speeding, and other safety policies. Maxim Crane has built their safety program around positive reinforcement and timely coaching. Now, they leverage individualized Driver Safety Scores to celebrate exemplary employees and coach 92% of all alleged harsh driving events within 48 hours. “The coaching aspect has not only been key to increasing our employees’ on-road performance, but also for our employee recognition program,” Wagner said.
Additionally, Maxim Crane uses Samsara Vehicle Telematics alerts and diagnostics which, in certain cases, can help with preventative repairs and maintenance.
Improved safety coaching leads to reduced accident rates and increased public safety
Today, Maxim Crane has a better understanding of their operations and has enhanced their safety program with Samsara. By collecting and consolidating data from across their fleet, they have improved training and on-the-road visibility.
Using Dash Cams, they have reduced on-road vehicular accidents significantly. Wagner credits this result to preventative In-Cab Alerts. “I fully believe the reason we have fewer accidents today is the integration of the camera system and technology that notifies our employees when the vehicle becomes exposed to various on-road hazards,” he said.
This reduction in accidents has also preventatively reduced injuries to Maxim Crane’s employees, the public at large and damage to third-party property. When incidents do occur, Maxim Crane uses dash cam footage to prove their employees acted safely. To date, they have used 40 dash cam videos to exonerate employees operating on-road vehicles, saving many jobs and livelihoods in the process. In one example, an employee was sideswiped and run into a bridge, causing significant damage to the equipment. Using dash cam footage, Maxim Crane was able to exonerate the employee and receive payment for the incurred damage from the responsible party. The ability to protect company employees in multiple ways has reinforced the culture of safety and boosted Maxim Crane’s positive recognition program.
With Vehicle Telematics, Maxim Crane saves time and money on repairs and lost work with preventative maintenance to keep its fleet operating optimally. The Company has also improved billing accuracy for rental equipment—with greater insight into where and when the equipment is being used, it can be ensured customers are billed properly.
In the near future, Maxim Crane is looking forward to expanding its partnership with Samsara to continue to drive digitization throughout operations as well as to further leverage diagnostic data to increase the volume of used equipment sales.
