Transportation coordinator
- Median pay: $41,654
- % who say their job is stressful: 82.4%
From small municipal police departments to vast corporations, fleet managers coordinate and manage the transportation needs for all types of organizations.
Claude Masters manages 3,400 vehicles for Florida Power & Light and his job entails everything from running the maintenance shop to making sure the company's transportation policies comply with government regulations.
One of the biggest pressures comes from the need to keep the trucks in good repair. If too many vehicles are out of service and can't answer emergency calls or there's a brake failure that leads to a serious accident, that's a big problem.
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"Equipment has to be available and in tip-top condition," said Masters.
For corporate fleet managers, the pressure can be equally high. Too many trucks out of service can cost the company a lot of money.
Pay depends on the job's responsibilities, said Masters. Managers of smaller fleets or those who work for the government tend not to earn as much.
Methodology: Starting from a database of more than 9,000 jobs, PayScale used data from over 120,000 respondents who rated their jobs for quality of life factors. The 15 were selected based on the national median pay for workers with at least five or seven years' experience and the percent of workers surveyed who said their jobs were "fairly stressful" or "extremely stressful." Only one job per "job family" was included. PayScale conducted the survey between August 2011 and August 2013.
