By Kevin Dunleavy
Secretary of Defense Ash Carter Wednesday outlined his plans to revamp the military’s personnel system in hopes of attracting and retaining the top talent needed to address the nation’s increasingly complex security challenges.
Secretary Carter, speaking to students at the George Washington University’s Elliott School of International Affairs, mentioned measures large and small designed to make military service and working for the Defense Department more attractive and rewarding.
“We in the Pentagon must think, as I put it, outside of our five-sided box,” Secretary Carter said. “While the military cannot and should not replicate all aspects of the private sector, it can and should borrow the best practices, technologies and personnel management techniques.”
For example, he plans to establish a personnel management system—which he compared to the business-oriented social networking service LinkedIn—that would match troops with job openings.
He also plans to revamp the retirement system. Instead of requiring soldiers to serve for 20 years to receive pensions, the new proposal would allow soldiers to invest in 401(k) plans.
Secretary Carter talked of building introductory “on ramps” to military service. As it applies to students, he said internship opportunities would be upgraded and that the Department of Defense would advertise them more aggressively on college campuses.
“This is imperative for attracting civilian talent,” Secretary Carter said. “This is why we’re making our internship programs better managed and also more effective in transitioning promising and successful interns into permanent employees.”
That part of the plan got the attention of Kristen Cheriegate, a first-year graduate student in the Elliott School.
“It was interesting to hear what he called the on-ramps and off-ramps and the new recruitment strategies that the DoD is taking on,” she said. “I found that very reassuring.”
“I could tell there were a lot of underclassmen taking notes, nodding their heads. It seems to me that the new strategies they’re working on, will reach out to a broader geographic [pool] of candidates.”
Sec. Carter also announced the creation of the Defense Digital Services directorate, led by tech entrepreneur Chris Lynch, who Secretary Carter introduced as a new hire on Wednesday. He also plans to hire a “chief recruiting officer, who would serve as a headhunter to help bring in some of America’s best qualified executives.”
Other initiatives include expanding sabbaticals, which allow more soldiers to meet their education and family goals, and doubling fellowships, which allow soldiers to work in the private sector. They all add up to creating a force that can better meet the challenges in a changing world where technology, formerly driven in America and by the government, is now driven globally and commercially.
Before closing his remarks, Secretary Carter reflected on his experience as a physics and medieval history major at Yale. He had little interest in serving his country.
“I was focused on physics, history, sports,” he said. “That changed a few years later when I heard a speech about the future of technology in the military. It helped me realize that I could make a contribution to defending this country and being part of something bigger than myself.”
That speech was delivered by Bill Perry, then the Secretary of Defense.
“I wouldn’t be surprised if there’s a future Secretary of Defense sitting down there among you today,” Secretary Carter said. “I’m 100 percent confident that you all have something to contribute—the drive to be part of something bigger than yourselves. That’s when the call to service begins. And that’s the beginning of how together we can make a better and brighter world.”
Secretary Carter opened and closed his remarks with nods to the man for whom the university is named.
“George Washington launched what has arguably been the most successful start-up in history—namely the United States military,” he said.
As for words that will guide him in his job, Secretary Carter, who was confirmed in February, repeated a famous George Washington quote, etched into the walls of the Pentagon.
“To be prepared for war is one of the most effectual means of preserving peace,” he said.
