Youth and Vigor: Modernizing Reserve Component Retirement
Abstract
Joint Vision 2020 calls for increasingly agile and responsive organizations made up of people who encompass specific behaviors such as judgment, adaptability, initiative, teamwork, and creativity. Accordingly, the Department of Defense (DoD), in order to acquire the people to transform the military, must transform its military human resources management strategy from a Cold War-era one-size-fits-all strategy to a modem capabilities-based strategy. Critical to the success of this transformation for the reserve component will be modernization of the personnel management system which includes competitive retirement incentives that will achieve two objectives: 1) Sustain and improve the quality of the reserve forces and 2) Provide a good value to the taxpayer. This paper will examine the current reserve retirement system in terms of its ability to serve as a force management tool to balance retention and manage turnover in accordance with DoD manpower requirements. Analysis will focus on answering two questions. First, is the current system capable of achieving reserve force manpower management objectives? Second, what changes might be needed to the current system to support future needs of the military and still be a good value to the taxpayer? The current system origins are reviewed, followed by an evaluation of the need to have a retirement system for part time service and an evaluation of whether age really matters in the reserves. After this, an evaluation is made of retirement systems in terms of their ability to influence retention and turnover. Finally, alternatives to the current system are proposed and compared to the existing system with an eye on recommending a more modern design.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Jan 01, 2001
- Accession Number
- ADA389926
Entities
People
- Robert A. Harris
Organizations
- United States Army War College