Marine Corps Recruiting Practices Necessary for a Viable All-Volunteer Force in the 21st Century

Abstract

Because of the current and future global threats, a force structure of at least 202,000 for the Marine Corps through the middle of the 21st Century will be vital. In addition, significant increases in annual enlistments of at least the quality standards of today will be necessary. Thus far, the Marine Corps has responded by significantly increasing its recruiting budget and the number of recruiters to meet its annual mission. This business practice is unsustainable. The Marine Corps will have to change its current recruiting practices, methodologies, and organization to sustain the force structure necessary to fight the future threats of the 21st Century. Outside of attempting to automate Systematic Recruiting, no substantive changes have been made since its inception in the 1970's. A Marine recruiter must still be actively involved in every step of the Contact-to-Contract chain, which demands that he spend the preponderance of his time and effort obtaining names and prospecting?lead generation? vice selling the Marine Corps, an activity he is better trained and suited. Ironically, a recruiter receives the vast majority of his good leads from referrals?activities outside of the Contact-to- Contract chain. Ultimately, a recruiter is left with only one viable means of prospecting?Area Canvassing. The other forms (Telephone Canvassing, Office Traffic, and Home visits) are either passive in nature or a waste of time compared to the results obtained. Through the use of data mining the Marine Corps could begin to predicts future enlistment behavior based on relative past and present behavior. The Marine Corps could determine with a reasonable degree of accuracy who (by name) has a higher propensity to enlist within a specific geographic region. By scoring this propensity, a recruiter is able to manage his time and prospecting efforts thereby being more productive.

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Document Details

Document Type
Technical Report
Publication Date
Jan 01, 2008
Accession Number
ADA504720

Entities

People

  • David F. Bradney

Organizations

  • Marine Corps University

Tags

Communities of Interest

  • Ground and Sea Platforms
  • Materials and Manufacturing Processes

DTIC Thesaurus Topics

  • Business Administration
  • Commerce
  • Computer Programs
  • Contracts
  • Data Mining
  • Force Structure
  • Geographic Regions
  • Management Personnel
  • Manpower
  • Marine Corps
  • Market Research
  • National Security
  • Recruiting
  • Students
  • Training
  • United States
  • Volunteers

Readers

  • Government and Public Administration Law.
  • Military Leadership and Professional Education.
  • Strategic Security Studies

Technology Areas

  • AI & ML
  • AI & ML - DoD AI Strategy