National Recruiting and Retention Manager - Volunteer Opening

[NIN]

I love the idea, and when I renew I'd love to try 'er out.

But I have a question. Does this work for "flyover squadron A" with 4 cadets attending and 2 or 3 seniors? Can you really afford to wait (even quarterly) to bring in fresh meat? I'm not sure...

Here's the thing:

The unit I took over in 1999 had about 12 cadets showing up and 3 seniors showing up.  And the leadership was in sad shape.

That is a FAR more structural problem than almost ANY recruiting is going to solve. You need a quick infusion of bodies, and REALLY strong knowledgeable leadership at the top, IMMEDIATELY, to right the boat.   This is not the place for the guy with 6 months in CAP who was the last man standing when the group commander showed up.  Not if you want the unit to be a viable, functional unit someday soon.

NIN's quick fix: Standards, Schedule, Communication

Do some trickle-in recruiting to get some immediate bodies. Borrow bodies from an adjacent squadron (at least for the open house recruiting night). Maximum push for an immediate Open House with follow-on Great Start for cadets. Plan for a Max Push for seniors (Level I stuff. CPP, etc)

Don't turn down someone who shows up 2 weeks after the open house, but don't actively pursue them, either.  You don't HAVE to pipeline right away.  Trickle in will work, but its long term disadvantages outweigh the advantages of pipelining.

But if you think about it: What are 4 cadets going to do anyway, either with trickle in or pipeline?  Not diddly squat, really.  You're way, way below any kind of a critical mass, so you need to get to some critical mass. Borrow some cadets & seniors if you have to. Ask for help.

"hey, group HQ, can you help?"

If you meet on a Tuesday night and so does every other unit within 30-60 minutes, consider switching to Wednesday or Thursday so you can borrow experienced people from other units for 6 months of meetings. (really 8-10 months)

A unit that is down to 4 cadets & 2-3 seniors is asking for a CAPF 27 deactivation. Really.  And that might be an option, I hate to say.

[RiverAux]

Recruiting at the squadron level isn't any great mystery and for the most part neither is retention. 

What should someone working at the national level in this position be doing specifically? 

[Storm Chaser]

Recruiting at the squadron level isn't any great mystery and for the most part neither is retention.

Maybe so, but CAP numbers say otherwise.

What should someone working at the national level in this position be doing specifically?

Of the top of my head, developing strategies, training and materials.

[FW]

"Pipelining" cadets on regular cycles was the norm in the 50's and 60's.  We would begin new "basic training classes" every 8 weeks.  Each basic class was their own flight, trained as a flight, and was segregated from the rest of the cadets until graduation and the passage of their Curry achievement.  At the time, the squadrons in our group averaged 80 to 100 members.  There never seemed a problem in getting new cadets.  The hard part was keeping them interested past the 1st  year.  That was dealt with, in part,  by the cadet's joining  "specialty teams" which competed with other squadrons. 
Why we got away from this practice is beyond me, however you guys seem to be on to something...   

[Capt Thompson]

A lot of other activities recruit in cycles, especially youth activities. For instance, when I was a kid I signed up for karate. I came 2 weeks after my friend signed up, but had to wait until the start of the next cycle to join. I was allowed to sit and watch the class as a visitor, and the instructors sat down and talked to me, and gave me material to read to keep me interested. The basic class ran 8 weeks before being promoted to white belt and being integrated into the regular class. Similar with basic cadets, it's hard to bring on a new cadet basic 2 weeks after another, and decide whether to backtrack for the new guy, or have him wait. It would be a lot easier to just tell the new cadet that he can be an observer, and we'll talk to him and give him a bunch of materials, but the next cycle starts on this date.

Another thing to consider is coordinating recruiting with our other training cycles. I came from a Squadron that had no qualified ES personnel, so GTM training was on the member to seek out on their own outside of meetings. Likewise we had no pilots or plane, so aircrew training had to be done elsewhere, and cadets were on their own to find it. We had maybe 6 cadets and 3 seniors, and were downgraded to a Cadet Flight for a long time. From experience most Squadrons that aren't active in all 3 missions tend to struggle with retention.

The Squadron that I am with now is very active in ES, and has several pilots and a plane. They do GTM training in the spring in house, and Scanner training in the fall.

It would be great to coordinate the Great Start flight with this training, so that we do 2 focused recruiting efforts per year, and time them so that when the cadets are promoted out of the GS flight, and Seniors pass Level I, they can immediately go into GTM or Scanner training if that's something that interests them. If we make training and practice missions a part of the regular calendar, it will be hard for members to get bored after a year and wash out, as there will always be something interesting going on.

[LSThiker]

"Pipelining" cadets on regular cycles was the norm in the 50's and 60's. 

It was actually the standard during the 1940s (at least for my wing).  Cadets were recruited at certain intervals in order to align their classes with the others new cadets.  Senior members were allowed as walk-ins at times, but mostly relied on pipeline recruiting.  Local squadrons would push newspaper articles on when the next enrollment period began. 

[Garibaldi]

Why not do it that way? Maybe I didn't read far enough into this, but the state defense force does their indoctrination over a series of weekends and graduates a platoon at once. I dunno, only been to a couple MEPS days and it seems to work.

[JC004]

Why not do it that way? Maybe I didn't read far enough into this, but the state defense force does their indoctrination over a series of weekends and graduates a platoon at once. I dunno, only been to a couple MEPS days and it seems to work.

If your unit isn't large enough (and many aren't), or if you don't recruit a bunch of new members at once, it is difficult to accomplish. 

Another consideration for Recruiting and Retention officers at any level is that many issues (in retention especially) are outside the control of the Recruiting/Retention person.  For instance, many people join CAP for its operations.  It's one thing CAP has over youth programs like JROTC.  Operational tempo is outside the control of the Recruiting/Retention person, but a key to retention is having wings and such making operational missions as available as possible. 

[coudano]

Recruiting cadets is easy.  Quite frankly it's down to a proven formula that you can almost just plug and play basically anywhere.

Figure out how unit X can recruit, retain, train to a reasonable proficiency, and actively employ a senior member <fill in the blank> officer.

One solid CP officer (difficult or impossible to do, intentionally) that will input the local cadet program for 4+ years is  more valuable than four cycles of pipeline cadets.

Figure out how to do that as efficiently/effectively as the pipelining system.
Make it a TTP.
To the first dude who can do that, Ultimate honor to you.


I'd just about leave pilots out of that challenge too, they are mildly easier, if the unit has a plane or a plane nearby; and if the unit DOESNT have a plane or a plane nearby, we are probably wasting their time (in terms of interest in flying).

[James Shaw]

CAP seems to have an effective program for recruiting Cadets. For SM's it is a bit harder. In my humble opinion the National Recruiting & Retention Officer needs to be more PAO than R&R and have experiences in all three missions. The NR&R Officer needs to be able to tell the story of CAP and how it can benefit the person as well as the organization. They need to be able to show "success" stories if you will of all kinds of members, as well as the benefits of participation. I am not rated in R&R and have no intention of applying, just sharing.

The R&R MUST HAVE real support from NHQ at that level. If you try to make a phone call to speak to someone, it shouldn't take a week to get a response. If you don't have that open communication and dialogue.....you have nothing. The National R&R is reporting to someone at NHQ...that individual must be able to operate at the same level or above when they are helping Direct the effort.  No Communication / No Direction / No Understanding, No Success! That will be the "linchpin" of success for the entire program.

[Private Investigator]

"Pipelining" cadets on regular cycles was the norm in the 50's and 60's. 

It was actually the standard during the 1940s (at least for my wing).  Cadets were recruited at certain intervals in order to align their classes with the others new cadets. Local squadrons would push newspaper articles on when the next enrollment period began.

That is a great plan if you have numbers. Now you get bodies as walk ins. When I was in the National Guard the 1SG was a Veteran of the Viet Nam era said at that time they would get a new Squad (or more) of people every month. Now in a good year they may get 12 soldiers or maybe one a month. Times change 

[PHall]

"Pipelining" cadets on regular cycles was the norm in the 50's and 60's. 

It was actually the standard during the 1940s (at least for my wing).  Cadets were recruited at certain intervals in order to align their classes with the others new cadets. Local squadrons would push newspaper articles on when the next enrollment period began.

That is a great plan if you have numbers. Now you get bodies as walk ins. When I was in the National Guard the 1SG was a Veteran of the Viet Nam era said at that time they would get a new Squad (or more) of people every month. Now in a good year they may get 12 soldiers or maybe one a month. Times change 

The draft was the best recruiting tool the Guard ever had!