Research Summary

Military Recruiting Outlook: Is the Supply Adequate?

In 1994, based on some worrisome trends in recruiting and reports about changes in the environment, senior officials expressed concern about DoD's ability to recruit the number of high-quality young people needed to meet accession requirements. Recruiting resources were cut after the Gulf War, and reports circulated that youth were less interested in joining the military. Recruiter accounts of difficulty in meeting goals seemed to confirm this reported decline. RAND was asked to perform a quick assessment and to carry out a longer-term analysis to examine recruiting trends, identify potential problems, and recommend ways to counter them.

RAND examined the supply of potential recruits in spring 1994 and concluded that the pool of high-quality young men was adequate to meet DoD's needs. If anything, more potential recruits were available relative to accession needs than before the drawdown.

However, the picture for fiscal year 1997 was less bright. Specifically, the significant increase in that yearís accessions required to sustain the postdrawdown force, coupled with a small decline in youthís interest in military service, translated into a possible supply shortage.

A more troublesome issue is that recruiters were reporting problems meeting goals when the supply should have been adequate. This implies that the recruiting system is less effective than it was before the drawdown. Consistent with this implication, we found that the marginal productivity of recruiters in producing high-quality enlistments--the number of additional recruits produced by increasing the number of recruiters--has declined for the Army and Air Force. What is causing these problems? Two explanations seem plausible. The downturn could result from changes in:

• Society's attitude toward the military
• Resource management and recruiting practices

Our analysis does not suggest that society's attitude toward the military has become more negative. For example, the key influencers of youth (parents and friends) have not become more negative toward military service, and recruiters have the same access to high schools that they had in the past. Simultaneously, the data do reveal a significant decline in recruiter contacts with high school students and in high school Armed Services Vocational Aptitude Battery (ASVAB) testing rates. These trends are likely interrelated and in part reflect changes in recruiting priorities in response to a more difficult environment, characterized by lower levels of recruiting resources and reduced youth interest in military service. Whatever its exact causes, the reduced effectiveness of recruiting implies that a given accession mission will require more recruiting resources or different management than it would have in the past.

We recommended a number of actions. One was to increase recruiting resources. Specifically, we recommended increases in advertising, educational benefits, and recruiters; past research has shown them to be the most cost-effective ways to expand the high-quality market. A second action was to reduce the requirement for high-quality non-prior-service male accessions by accepting more prior-service accessions, recruiting more women, or lowering the quality goals. However, the degree of substitution feasible is likely to be limited. These factors need to be weighed against the cost of increasing recruiting resources to meet accession requirements. In March 1997, the Army made a number of important changes in recruiting resources and goals; these changes were generally consistent with our recommendations.

In the longer term, we recommend that the Office of the Secretary of Defense and the services try to enhance the effectiveness and efficiency of recruiting in the postdrawdown environment. This could include: rethinking recruiting management and the cost-benefit of alternative recruit quality levels; considering additional marketing strategies and enlistment options, particularly those that would improve the militaryís ability to recruit persons interested in attending college; and optimizing the match between monthly accession goals and training infrastructure costs.

For more information: Military Recruiting Outlook: Recent Trends in Enlistment Propensity and Conversion of Potential Enlisted Supply, Bruce R. Orvis, Narayan Sastry, Laurie L. McDonald, MR-677-A/OSD, 1996.