Recruitment Rises 12.5% Despite Ongoing Challenges

The Defense Department’s armed services branches recruited 12.5% more individuals in fiscal year 2024 than in the year prior employment despite a tough and employment indifferent recruiting market.

Katie Helland Director of Military Accessions Policy Katie Helland speaks to members of the media during a panel on financial year 2025 recruiting goals at the Pentagon, Oct. 30, 2024.
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Credit: Air Force Tech. Sgt. Jackie Sanders, employment DOD.
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While speaking at a multiservice panel on 2025 hiring issues at the Pentagon previously today, Director of Military Accession Policy Katie Helland said that the services increased the number of employees from 200,000 in FY 2023 to 225,000 in FY 2024, which ended September 30.

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

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

” Nevertheless,” she continued, “we need to stay meticulously optimistic about the future recruiting operations as we continue to hire in a market that has low youth tendency to serve, minimal familiarity with military opportunities, a competitive labor market and a decreasing eligibility among young grownups.”

Helland elaborated on those difficulties by describing that, for the very first time considering that the metric has been tracked, many youths have actually never considered the option of serving in the military.

The factors behind that are multifold, Helland said. Young Americans have less ties to buddies or member of the family who have actually served in the armed force. There is a declining existence of veterans in our society. Approximately 77% of individuals in between the ages of 17 and 24 require some kind of waiver to serve due to any variety of disqualifications.

To counter such difficulties, Helland stated the military has executed a medical pilot program that permits employees to join the military without a waiver for various – provided they satisfy particular requirements. Additionally, there are service member prep courses that prepare employees to satisfy the exhausting requirements of military service. Moreover, DOD is looking for to reconnect with youth and their influencers by revealing them the value of serving.

” The next generation of Americans to serve ought to know that there has never been a better time for them to pick military service,” Helland said.

Panel Pentagon Press Secretary Flying Force Maj. Gen. Pat Ryder facilitates a panel on 2025 recruiting goals at the Pentagon, Oct. 30, 2024.
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” Youth today look for a larger function in their lives and desire jobs where they have greater participation in decision-making and can create a direct tangible effect,” she continued. “Military service provides all of this.”

Explaining that U.S. military service uses more than 250 professions which it represents one of the most highly informed companies throughout the world and throughout all pay grades, Helland stated the Defense Department is working hard to counter the narrative that joining the military is an alternative to attending college or “an option of last hope.”

” We are working to reframe this narrative so that Americans comprehend that military service is a pathway to greater education and profession chances while safeguarding democracy and the flexibilities we love,” Helland stated.

She added that DOD is reframing this story. For instance, the department’s Joint Advertising Marketing research and Studies program will quickly release a project to build familiarity with the American public about the value of military service. Plans are also proceeding to have adult influencers promote for military service.