Recruitment Rises 12.5% Despite Ongoing Challenges

The Defense Department’s armed hired 12.5% more people in 2024 than in the year prior in spite of a tough and indifferent recruiting market.

Katie Helland Director of Military Accessions Policy Katie Helland talks to members of the media during a panel on fiscal year 2025 recruiting objectives at the Pentagon, somalibidders.com Oct. 30, 2024.
Share:
×
Share
Copy Link
Email
Facebook
X.
LinkedIn.
WhatsApp

Download: Full Size (235.52 KB).
Credit: Air Force Tech. Sgt. Jackie Sanders, DOD.
VIRIN: 241030-D-XI929-1004

While speaking at a multiservice panel on 2025 recruiting problems at the Pentagon earlier today, Director of Military Accession Policy Katie Helland referall.us stated that the services increased the number of recruits from 200,000 in FY 2023 to 225,000 in FY 2024, which ended September 30.

Additionally, she stated, the services had a 35% increase in written agreements, and the active elements’ postponed entry program started FY 2025 with a 10% bigger pool.

” [The Office of the Secretary of Defense] and the services will continue to develop off the momentum that we’ve gotten in 2024,” Helland said.

” Nevertheless,” she continued, “we need to remain meticulously optimistic about the future recruiting operations as we continue to recruit in a market that has low youth tendency to serve, limited familiarity with military opportunities, a competitive labor market and a declining eligibility among young people.”

Helland elaborated on those difficulties by describing that, for the very first time because the metric has actually been tracked, many young people have actually never ever thought about the choice of serving in the military.

The factors behind that are multifold, Helland stated. Young Americans have fewer ties to pals or relative who have served in the armed force. There is a decreasing existence of veterans in our society. Approximately 77% of individuals in between the ages of 17 and 24 need some type of waiver to serve due to any variety of disqualifications.

To counter such obstacles, Helland said the armed force has carried out a medical pilot program that enables employees to sign up with the armed force without a waiver for various health conditions – offered they satisfy particular requirements. Additionally, there are service member prep courses that prepare employees to fulfill the laborious requirements of military service. Moreover, DOD is looking for to reconnect with youth and their influencers by showing them the value of serving.

” The next generation of Americans to serve should understand that there has never ever been a better time for them to pick military service,” Helland stated.

Panel Pentagon Press Secretary Air Force Maj. Gen. Pat Ryder helps with a panel on 2025 recruiting goals at the Pentagon, Oct. 30, 2024.
Share:.
×.
Share.
Copy Link.
Email.
Facebook.
X.
LinkedIn.
WhatsApp

Download: Full Size (266.24 KB).
Credit: Air Force Tech. Sgt. Jackie Sanders, DOD.
VIRIN: 241030-D-XI929-1016

” Youth today look for a bigger purpose in their lives and desire jobs where they have higher involvement in decision-making and can create a direct concrete effect,” she continued. “Military service uses all of this.”

Explaining that U.S. military service offers more than 250 occupations which it represents one of the most highly educated companies throughout the world and across all pay grades, Helland stated the Defense Department is working hard to counter the story that joining the military is an alternative to participating in college or “an alternative of last option.”

” We are working to reframe this narrative so that Americans comprehend that military service is a path to greater education and career opportunities while safeguarding democracy and the freedoms we hold dear,” Helland said.

She included that DOD is reframing this narrative. For instance, the department’s Joint Advertising Market Research and Studies program will quickly launch a campaign to build familiarity with the American public about the worth of military service. Plans are likewise proceeding to have adult influencers advocate for military service.