Facing the human capital crisis: successful recruitment program pilot at Edwards AFB - Best Practices

Defense AT&L, Jan-Feb, 2004 by Rachel Schwarz

Human capital crisis. Over the past few years, it's become a common catchphrase within the Department of Defense (DoD). What exactly does it mean? Whom does it affect? And what is DoD doing to keep at bay the reality behind the buzzword?

According to a report (Feb. 2003) of the Performance Institute, a private think tank and leading authority on performance-based management practices for government agencies, over half the federal workforce is between the ages of 49 and 69. Over the next few years, 50 percent of the current acquisition, technology, and logistics (AT & L) workforce will be eligible for early or regular retirement. The percentage will continue growing until the number of people eligible to retire from the AT & L workforce reaches a predicted 70 percent in the year 2010. A loss of this magnitude is potentially debilitating for the federal government. As more senior personnel retire, the AT & L workforce will lose far more than just numbers: there will be a precipitous loss of workforce knowledge and experience. Without creating a strategic plan to reduce the impact of this enormous loss of human capital, DoD won't have the resources necessary to successfully carry out the organization's mission.

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The human capital crisis is complex and involves numerous agencies within the DoD. The solution is no single quick-fix program, so the government is approaching the problem from several different angles. One specific approach involves the DoD's working with specific agencies to develop general methodologies that will be useful in future resolution of the human capital crisis.

DoD Initiates Pilot Program

Realizing the seriousness of the human capital situation facing DoD, the acquisition workforce and career management (AW & CM) office is taking action to implement processes and procedures to build up the workforce now so it will continue to be strong in the future. To this end, in the summer of 2002, the AW & CM office contracted with Knowledge Workers, Inc., a Colorado-based firm specializing in human capital solutions, for assistance in meeting the challenge ahead.

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As a first step, Knowledge Workers researched human capital problems within the AT & L workforce and drafted a proposal to prepare DoD for the future: implement a pilot program where Knowledge Workers could "demonstrate a standardized, metric-driven, and measurable recruitment action program paying particular attention to external, mid-level hires."

Site Selected

In the fall of 2002, AW & CM focused on finding an appropriate site to implement a recruitment pilot. "We wanted a location that was having problems," says Steve Tkac, program sponsor, AW & CM office. "Since strategic planners told us the AT & L workforce's greatest need was in engineering, we especially wanted a pilot location with vacancies in engineering career fields. And we really wanted to challenge the system with difficult circumstances."

Edwards Air Force Base (AFB), located in the heart of the Mojave Desert, met the requirements for the recruitment pilot site, and on Jan. 1, 2003, the Edwards Air Force Base Pilot was born. "Having the opportunity to go to Edwards and work with people with similar vision, people who were willing to challenge the system, was a blessing," says Tkac.

Existing Processes Researched and Re-engineered

When Knowledge Workers began their work at Edwards AFB, they found a human resources staff that was overwhelmed with paper and unable to give applicants as efficient and responsive support as they would have liked. Knowledge Workers also discovered a passive recruiting approach (attending job fairs and posting jobs on government Web sites), bland marketing materials, and no formal relationships with universities.

To fully understand the hiring process and practices used at Edwards AFB, Knowledge Workers conducted in-depth interviews with key hiring authorities within the Edwards human resources and hiring directorates. From the information gathered in the interviews, Knowledge Workers created the existing, "as-is" process map. The validated map was then used to determine key points, meaningful to Edwards, to measure recruiting results within the Edwards process. Once the combined Edwards and Knowledge Workers team had selected measurement points, the workflow was embedded in Knowledge Workers' applicant tracking system. This allowed for the automatic capture and reporting of hiring productivity measures in a fully Web-enabled dashboard-style reporting tool that gave key Edwards and DoD decision makers real-time access to applicant data and hiring metrics. Once the basic redesign of the application and hiring system for engineering jobs at Edwards was established, Joe Weiner, Knowledge Workers' managing director, led the pilot team through the creation of a new, more user-friendly Web-based applicant sourcing system that would challenge the conventional recruiting model and bring 21st century technology to Edwards. Now potential employees can search for available engineering jobs in their specific fields and apply online, and recruiting coordinators can respond quickly to qualified candidates. This quick response encourages more candidates to stick around longer in the application process and has resulted in a much larger candidate pool for base engineering jobs. In addition, moving the application process online allows Edwards to track steps in the hiring process more effectively.