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ExpectMore.govExpectMore.gov home pageEXPECT FEDERAL PROGRAMS TO PERFORM WELL, AND BETTER EVERY YEAR.
Program Assessment

Program

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Military Force Management

The Department of Defense (DOD) employs nearly 1.4 million active duty and 900,000 reserve and Guard service members. Ensuring DoD has the personnel it needs in the right place at the right time requires managing a combination of compensation and other tools to assure recruiting and retention success.

Rating

What This Rating Means

PERFORMING
Effective

This is the highest rating a program can achieve. Programs rated Effective set ambitious goals, achieve results, are well-managed and improve efficiency.
  • DoD has been able to meet its personnel needs for the Global War on Terror while maintaining operations in hundreds of other countries by offering challenging work, excellent training, and a competitive compensation package.
  • Overall retention of Active Component experienced personnel remains above goal; and overall Reserve Component attrition has generally been below its annual ceiling.
  • The dynamic environment and market forces impact recruiting - making it difficult to quickly increase mission. Although Services have the tools to address the problem, an increase in resources, recruiters and incentives have a 6-12 month lag in the impact to mission. A constant and consistent program of resources as a baseline is important for short term success when missions are increased.

Improvement Plan

About Improvement Plans

We are taking the following actions to improve the performance of the program:

  • Developing additional efficiency measures to determine the impacts of each individual recruiting and retention tool in the Department's "toolkit".
  • Examining the entire system of compensation initiatives. The Defense Advisory Commission on Military Compensation (DACMC) issued a report with ideas on compensation reform.
  • The Quadrennial Review of Military Copmensation is now preparing an implementation plan for some of the inititives in the DACMC report and is studying other possible reforms.

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