Recruitment Potential: "Sailors" Who have Never Seen the Ocean

Abstract

In 2017, the Navy began a transformation in recruiting, moving away from the generalist recruiter model to specialization in different areas of the recruiting process. In this thesis, the author uses recruit-level accession data from all U.S. military services, from 2010 to 2019, to document any changes in the Navy recruiting share relative to the other services, on the coasts and in the Midwest. Over the past decade, Navy recruiting has suffered in the Midwest relative to the other services, likely due to fewer resources used in that region. Using an event-study quantitative analysis approach, the author evaluates the effects of the transformation on the quality of Navy recruits in the five recruiting districts that have transitioned to the new model of recruiting during the time frame studied in the thesis. The findings indicate that the initial phases of the transformation faced difficulties in meeting the same percentage of quality recruits generated under the legacy model. To fully evaluate the impact of the policy shift, further analysis is needed to evaluate the other recruiting districts as they transition to the new model of recruiting.