Army Recruitment

Army Recruitment

Table of Contents

1. Introduction 3

2. Problem Statement 3

3. Review of Current Practices 3

4. Strategic Plan for Change 6

5. Strategic Approach for Implementation of Changes 8

6. Final Recommendations 10

7. Summary/Conclusions 11

Introduction

Recruitment of the United States military is a vital part of maintaining an all volunteer military force. Because of recent world events and the high operations tempo of the military, Army has had some problems with its recruitment. Convincing civilians to sign up to be a solider can be a tough job when it requires being sent 7,000 miles from home to go fight in a war zone. What can recruiters do to keep recruitment levels where they need to be to maintain an all volunteer United States military force and how is technology changing their tactics?

Problem Statement

In the last few years the Army has been experiencing problems with recruitment. With the national unemployment rate around 4.8% and the fact that shortly after joining the Army the reality of deploying to a war zone is imminent, recruiters are having a tougher time meeting their recruitment goals. The Army marketing campaign totaled over $850 million in FY2006 and still managed to come out short with recruitment. Since the country is doing its best to provide an all voluntary military force during a time of war recruiters for the Army have employed drastic means in order to sign up recruits. Some recruiters are even being accused of less than honorable methods of recruitment. Leading a potential recruit to believe that they will be able to do certain things in the Army which are extremely competitive and unlikely is not honorable. What kind of tactics can recruiters use to bring up the Army's numbers and how much is the Army and the tax payers willing to spend to get these recruits?

Review of Current Practices

The Army's techniques for recruiting go after recruits self interests when serving your country or possibly dying for your country is one of the most selfless acts an individual can make. These kinds of acts are exactly what the United States Army is going to be expecting from their recruits. However, in contrast with the selfless type of person the Army is looking to recruit, they attempt to tailor their recruiting to sound desirable to an individual's self interests. Various methods are used to recruit to potential soldiers' interests, some of which include: paying for your college with a GI bill, seeing the world, and teaching you skills that you can use in the future to get good jobs. These methods are attracting the wrong type of person to join the Army. Somebody that is inspired by these recruiting method might have a huge problem with leaving their family for over a year to go to war in very undesirable parts of the world. The type of person who is attracted to the military because of education benefits is not necessarily the same type of person who willingly is away from their family for over a year, or is prepared to possibly watch their friends die from a road side bomb.

There are many things that are currently hurting recruitment in today's military. First of all the negative press that comes in about the Middle East daily gives people a bad attitude about what is happening in Iraq and Afghanistan. The bad press includes concentrating on horrific events involving soldiers in Iraq and uncertainty with the insurgency there. Also the current commitment of three years is a long commitment to ask for. This can seem especially lengthy for an individual who is only 18 years old.

Anther major factor which affects military recruiting is the national unemployment rate. Currently the national unemployment rate has gone down to 4.8%. Therefore, obtaining a job in the United States right now is not that difficult compared to other times in our country's history. This hurts military recruitment because if it is easy to get a civilian job, not as many people will need to join the military to make money. When people have other options some of them will inevitably take them. This causes a direct correlation between military recruitment and the national unemployment rate. When young healthy people that would be eligible to join the military can't find a civilian job, the military becomes much more appealing. Having a good awareness of the national unemployment rate is critical for military recruitment. During times of low national unemployment, the military may have to consider offering adding incentives and bonuses to attract quality personnel.

Other problems that recruiter's face, when trying to attract military personnel, is advanced education, youth trends of popularity and society views. The principal activities that "compete" with military service for recent high school graduates are further schooling and civilian employment. The trade-offs among these alternatives shift substantially over time because of both fluctuations in the civilian economy and secular trends in the aspirations of youth (Sackett, 2003, p.43). With the current events in the world today and in the United States the trade-offs of not joining the military seem to have the edge causing recruiters to work harder and the government to spend more money on meeting their goals. Due to recent problems with recruitment, the Army has increased the maximum age of recruits from 34 to 39. This five year increase shows that the Army is becoming desperate to find recruits to fill their ranks. An Army spokesman states "maturity, motivation, loyalty and patriotism" (Liss 2006) are what older recruits will bring to the table. This may be true, but the Army is becoming a service based more off of technology and less dependent on physical capabilities. This change in policy would not have occurred if the Army wasn't having problems recruiting, however it would have been a much harder choice to make if the Army was still requiring almost all soldiers to be able to meet tough physical standards. Having soldiers that are older and more experienced with computers and other forms of technology are extremely beneficial to the Army. The latest attempt to attract recruits is one of several initiatives taken