How would you solve the military recruiting challenges currently facing DOD?

bring back the draft!

Mandatory draft. Each should contribute as they can.

Once and when the collective consciousness of the USA shifts into a consensual perception of wielding promise and hope in terms of having access to provision, only then will such trends as the recruitment rate will climb.

The USA is way out of balance in terms of where and how, for example, (1) the US Senate administers the federal budget -- it's terribly mishandled: money proves ill-distributed and wasted; (2) military recruitment ploys as were administered and marketed 40, 30, and 20 years ago cannot presume to yield the same successful result today... indeed, a prospective recruit of today wants style, panache, swag, and insight on his or her future; (3) such manifestations as the 2008 Wall Street financial debacle truly affected America's assumptions on daily living and its sense of recourse; (4) the ill, mistaken planning to undertake war and unrest in the middle east was a grave error, and (5) the COVID pandemic woke everyone up --- all of these and more affect military recruitment.

Congress and the Market need to listen to the very phalanx of people to whom It makes the appeal for enlisting -- ay find out what 'they' need and want in terms of futurity... Congress, the Market, the Institute needs to obtain suggestions and a consensus from the very men and women whom the military asks to serve. People are sharper, ay more cynical, than the people were during the earlier wars, and they have rocketed past even the veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan. Americans are not the naive lot that they were just 20 years ago, oh, no. The USA needs to be a lot more inventive, less restrictive.

That $886,000,000,000 billion DOD budget had better be used to dedicate a substantial portion to military members' salaries, housing, and family support, -- ay offer better pension structures.

I hate to say it but the idea of "serving" is outdated, we've become a country of "everyone for themselves".

That said, The military has to answer "What do you have to offer?" with something competitive.
* "Fight the war on terror" is over... "Defend Europe from Russia." isn't going to fly.
* The Federal government doesn't have the best reputation for taking care of Veterans.
* "Pay for college" isn't going to cut it as long as there's talk of forgiving student loan debt.
* An E4 makes $2,400 a month, that figures out to be $13 an hour IF it's a 40 hour work week (which is unlikely) McDonald's is paying $17/hr here locally. No McDonald's doesn't pay for a room in the barracks, but sleeping in a tent has always been a possibility in the military.

You asked for how I would fix it... it's time for a reduction in force. Probably down to pre 9/11 levels. It would be nice to convert a lot of the force to reserves in case Putin decides to take a stab at conquering Europe like Kahn, Napoleon, or Hitler, but I don't think leadership is smart enough to "scale back"... they'll go "all or nothing".

Because of the current recruiting dilemma and the multiple date rapes in the military we have a problem with sexual behavior. If sexual relations are occurring between workers it can create a hostile relationship within the ranks.
Especially between senior ranking members and vet junior. There are predatory homosexuals that can openly express their sexuality. This has always been the case with females and is the case with vulnerable males. This can only be addressed by seperation and military law. If ignored the problem will persist.

1. Reevaluate enlistment minimum standards and what needs waivers (and how difficult GETTING those waivers are). Some 'issues' that were/are automatic DQ or require a waiver are becoming more common and should not be something that creates a mountain to overcome in order to join. Some of those issues probably should not have been a mountain even 25 years ago.
2. Stop dicking around with benefits. People are seeing our Veterans fighting for V.A. benefits and don't want that for themselves, and how many times have they changed our retirement plans in the last 20 years in general, and for people that joined expecting one plan, then being told they are not going to be grandfathered in for the retirement plan they enlisted for, they must change it to something else?
3. Look at who we've been turning away and consider if we can turn them into a recruit with some investment - one of my classmates couldn't make tape back in 98, so our recruiter worked with her to lose weight/body fat until she could pass, and she was able to ship for basic just a few weeks after me.
4. Check on what recruiters might be doing that is costing us recruits. My daughter was trying to enlist in the Air Force a few years ago, and every time she would do what the recruiter told her she needed to do (take this test, fill out this form, get this documentation), there was another thing she had to do. She gave up after a YEAR of trying to enlist because she kept getting jerked around by her recruiter.
5. STOP THE MENTAL HEALTH STIGMA!!!! Normalize seeing a psychologist/counselor/therapist, even when someone isn't suffering from severe PTSD. Make it EASY to get the help so that people know that they can get it without justifying themselves to 20 people with no qualifications to determine if it is justified (yes, I've seen Soldiers get told they needed to cancel their appointment at mental health because it was interfering with their unit schedule to prep for a 3-day field exercise, and they didn't really need that mental health appointment. I've also seen a Soldier given a command referral for a Psych eval so that his CoC couldn't make him cancel it, but then every appointment for anger management counseling was canceled because he was sent TDY on back-to-back missions.)

Interesting question. The military, and the overall society that it protects, has a couple of challenges that they are facing with young people.
- There isn't a unifying enemy. During the cold war we had the Soviet Union. For years we've had the Global War on Terror. It makes me feel old to say this but today's eighteen year-olds were born after 9-11 and it doesn't have the same impact on them. In media narratives, today's "enemy" are other Americans and that doesn't help with recruiting, in fact it hurts it. Speaking of which...
- There is extreme partisanship. The right has been using deep state and woke military narratives that will lead to young people on the right being distrustful of the military and the government in general. The left has been using income inequality and lack of upward mobility narratives that will lead to young people on the left thinking that the military is supporting a system of plutocracy. Neither of these are helping attract people to the military either.

So the military is less likely to attract people based on feelings of duty, service or patriotism. Historically in periods of social unrest recruiting has always been hard. What's left? Well quite frankly it is one of the few ways to climb the social ladder and have a secure future currently and the price of admission is more or less free (monetarily at least). Money for college, VA loans for houses (that young people struggle to get) and pensions / lifetime healthcare for retirees are benefits the military offers that exist in a very few other places in our society. We are in a society that has made it very difficult for young people to get ahead and the military is a place that can help with these modern challenges.

First Dre the issues for us still surviving on Active Duty, listen to our voice, concerns and recommendations. Thisway we don’t continue to lose great Soldiers thus adding to the already struggling numbers. Next a significant pay increase will speak for itself in terms of both initial enlistment and reenlistment. There’s more I could write but as with many I’d be here all day lol

Hello my fellow Vets and Friends! As a bunch of us NCO'S and Officers went to Elementary and Middle Schools, in uniform with the "Be All That You Can Be! Something has to change!?

Current active duty, prior recruiter, and going back to recruiting duty again. There are many, many issues regarding this. First, while confidence in the nation and government are at an all time low, there are many patriot hearted individuals that can and will say yes to the call. They see their service to the country as an honor still, even if they're all almost unanimously fed up with the current government. However, I can tell you from personal experience, the new medical system, which can and does find ANYTHING out on you medically, even stuff you forgot about or happened when you were an infant, (and mom and dad forgot to tell you about), is drug up. Its turned what would normally be a 2 week application process into an 8 week ordeal. In the mean time, people often have to have a plan for survival, and in that period of uncertainty, they will often go out and seek something outside the military and decide to go with what is paying them now versus what they could make. Another major issue is social media; its given a voice to the younger generations to vocalize their dissent at some of the normal hardships of military life. It spreads a negative message on what is often perceived to be a personal level. As is often the case, the 1% of non-hackers cause 99% of the problems. And third, its a much more incumbent problem, the truly toxic leadership exhibited in many, many cases. What would normally be grounds for the future leaders of the military has turned into a politically charged race-to-backstab, or to pump up the egos of those calling the shots. It turns many people off, and they don't re-enlist. End result of all these issues causes and completes a self fulfilling prophecy; less people in the military equates to a tougher life for those within it, which drives down retention, which creates more problems, which creates more social media posts, which further dissuades many from joining. To solve the problem is a simple solution, yet dauntingly challenging in its execution.

1) The new medical system is here to stay. Some will say its good, some will say its bad. Good for finding the truly qualified, bad for turning away people that have historically been able to join in fair time allowances, with issues that are amongst the usual problems that people whom are in now may have had and completely unhampered their contribution to the military as a whole. I am unable to provide a solution for this, as saying "lets go back to the proven way prior" will be met by people reminding me that the new system was implemented to streamline the application process and to find out whats truly in someone's medical record, and probably some words of 'the military only wants the best of the best', while not realizing that people can, and have, been incredibly delayed or turned away for not disclosing something as benign as having their tonsils taken out at such a young age that they don't remember it having happened.

2) Social media posting. You can't stop a person from saying whats on their mind, even if its a totally exaggerated, emotionally charged script used to gain attention. "I was in for four years, never join, life sucks, etc, etc." Before what was word of mouth to a few people close to the individual, is spouted without care to an audience a thousand times the size. And since people in masses are cynical as a whole by nature, they will err on the side of negativity and write off the military as a viable option. The best you can do here is to fix the underlying issues of the military and encourage those that hear the trumpet of the bereaved to step up and voice back the truth and positive reality of what the military is, does, and what it represents.

3) Toxic leadership. This is the largest angle of attack, in my opinion. Without a biblical tirade of examples of such leadership, I'll throw a few blanket statements out there. Making mid level rank is a very quick endeavor, and with retention as low as it is, it shortens the gap of time that would allow a normal person the time to learn true leadership skills, and side with continual band-aid patches of blunt, brute force over compassion and finesse. Rank and evaluation go hand in hand, and instead of being the best at what you do, competition turns many people into Yes Men, scrambling for padding and numbers for their performance reviews, often collecting said titles and prioritizing themselves over unit cohesion. Lastly, many view their fellow servicemember as replaceable. "Oh, he's unhappy? Tough it up, this is the military, get out if its too hard for you. Hey, we're gonna need a new guy." Tough love, while still used, is fading into obscurity as young leaders choose to not invest their time in building someone up and instead demanding a replacement that falls into line with their own thinking, without question. Easier to roll the dice and replace instead of pause, evaluate, plan, and implement.

I can state, and to much objection by most all, that its not the way of thinking of the newer generation; the most basic question has always remained the same: Do you want to do good for your country or not? Broken down to such a base form, the reasoning itself changes from generation to generation, but the end result does not. The X amount of people in the country to Y amount of people whom join scales approximately the same. But in that same breath, if you become convinced for any of the new reasons to not join, its not that you don't hold that patriotic flare in your heart. Its because you have become convinced that the military is not what its been sold as, and instead, a festering pit of toxicity, hard life styles, little to gain, for a flag that increasingly feels less and less proud to represent. Objectivity kicks in, and while they may choose to remain an America loving patriot, how they express that will not be by raising their hand and taking the oath. This change requires a combined effort of the branches senior most leadership to take a hard look at themselves, at the state of the active duty military, and make the hard decisions to move back from the current political / social fads and return to traditional military values. I will be branded a foolish optimist, and I accept that mantle with pride as I say this: Promote cohesion, comraderies, install better leadership mentoring, and -mean- it, instead of going through rough motions to mark a wicket on a check list and say "Yes, we do do that", and the problem will begin to solve itself. Retention goes up, day to day life becomes better, the military is something to be proud of joining again, and more people will decide they want to join up. Next year is my 20th year active duty, and I have a few more in me after that. I've seen the rise and fall of trends, and the current one is unprecedented. But I truly believe that fixing, (or at least, planning for and around), these few core issues creates the domino effect that leads back up to a properly manned and prepared military.