Military has to broaden appeal and change how it recruits, says defence chief
at 14:43 on July 15, 2005, EST.
STEPHEN THORNE
OTTAWA (CP) - The military needs to broaden its appeal to attract quality people to meet hefty expansion targets in the next five years, says the chief of defence staff. Gen. Rick Hillier says the number of recruits is "somewhat down from where we want them" and it's time the brass looked at how the military sells itself.
"We're going to have to reach out to Canadians to recruit here . . . because it is not automatic that they're considering us as a career or even as a three-or four-year option right now," Hillier said.
"We're going to have to change our methodology."
Capt. Holly-Anne Brown said that half way into this year the Armed Forces had recruited about 42 per cent of the year's enlistment target and 46 per cent for officers.
Summer is traditionally the military's strongest recruiting period, said Brown of the Canadian Forces Recruiting Group in Borden, Ont.
The Forces are attracting between 2.5 and three candidates for every recruit, said Brown.
Hillier wants that closer to 10 to one, and he wants the army, navy and air force to better reflect Canada's ethnic makeup.
He says National Defence needs more savvy marketing aimed at narrower audiences and to capitalize on opportunities to enhance its image.
He's to meet senior recruiters next week to discuss logjams in processing new soldiers, sailors and aircrew.
The federal government has promised money to expand the military by 5,000 regular personnel and 3,000 reservists over five years. Eighty per cent will go to front-line army units.
A recent internal army study found that some young people interested in the military tended to lack life goals, felt alienated and accepted violence to achieve ends.
The study, "Canada's Soldiers: Military Ethos and Canadian Values in the 21st Century Army," found candidates who were spoiled, petulant and, while deferring to authority, tended to look after their own interests.
"We're not going to take anybody who doesn't meet the standard," Hillier said at a luncheon this week. "Clearly, if we have a greater number, you get to pick that man or woman who's obviously slightly better, etc.
"We are above (the standard) and we're going to remain above it."
He said the military has to boost its representation of women, minorities and aboriginals by focusing on specific communities and groups.
"I am looking at trying to change the demographic of the Canadian Forces so that we are seen as employer of choice for every ethnic group in every part of our great country," he said.
"Right now, we are not because many folks, perhaps, look at us and don't see themselves in us."
Making the military better reflect the country's makeup is "fundamental to success 10, 15, 20 years down the road," he added.
"We just need to aggressively pursue it here. It's a command-leadership issue that we need to get at."
Hillier said he's satisfied with current incentives to join the military, which include educational opportunities and signing bonuses of up to $225,000 for doctors.
But he said incentives and TV advertising alone just aren't cutting it. Marketing the Armed Forces requires a more complex approach.
Hillier says the military recently did not fully exploit an opportunity to sell itself at the Calgary Stampede, where organizers gave it prime space free to set up a booth worth up to $90,000 in rent.
He said their hosts expressed "an incredible desire to profile and highlight the Canadian Forces."
Between 1.2 million and 1.5 million people pass through the Stampede over 10 days, creating what Hillier called an "awesome opportunity" for recruiters.
"Three hundred thousand people, minimum, will visit our display," Hillier said. "We came at it incoherently."
The army brought a gunnery team and Afghan vets, the navy sent crew from HMCS Calgary, the air force flew a helicopter over the grandstand with the national flag suspended beneath it - admirable but not enough, said Hillier.
"I looked at this and thought: 'My goodness, we're missing an opportunity,' " he said.
The Skyhawks parachute team was jumping elsewhere, and the Snowbirds were flying somewhere else, he noted.
"It seemed to me that we, as the Canadian Forces, had missed an opportunity to converge our assets and hit this massive population of folks with everything that we had to raise our profile."
The Forces should have had a recruiting centre "stuck right in there at the same time so that, as you fire people up and get them emotional and get the thrill down their spine and get a little trickle in their eye, you have somebody right there ready to sign them," he said.
"It's something like press-ganging, but without the violence."
He says recruiters need to be at six major events across Canada each year - Carnivale in Quebec, the Tattoo in Nova Scotia, Canada Day in Ottawa, the Canadian National Exhibition in Toronto, the Pacific Exhibition in Vancouver, and the Stampede.
