Chapter 5: Assisting Frontline Recruiters In the Struggle

Z has a tough balancing act between listening to elder’s wisdom and having more knowledge than them. The recruiting job needs to work to with this trend.

Solution: Recruiters should adopt a “keeping it real” approach in concert with improving recruiter training and treatment though centralization, and applying a business-minded approach.

Throughout American history, there has always been some healthy tension between the young and the old. The debate about experience vs. fresh new perspectives rings more true now than in the past, because today's youth may be the first generation that is better informed than their elders. An idle young person can absorb more about the world through endless streams of podcasts, videos, and audiobooks, creating the effect of them quite literally knowing 10x more than adults at a very young age. Z, in particular, has a tougher balancing act between respect for authority and knowing simply more skills/information than Millennials or Gen X. Deciding when to listen to older people's wisdom and when to choose their own paths is a current sticking point. This paradigm hits hardest at the recruiter-recruit level.

The recruiter is the individual at the tip of the spear in the effort to bring new citizens into the military. Many describe this role as one of the hardest in the entire armed forces. To speak here as a naïve Gen-Zer who has never sat in the recruiter chair, and make direct recommendations to them specifically about the nitty gritty of their challenging job would be disingenuous. However, the fresh perspective of tying these Z trends together to reform the recruiting structure may successfully spark the proper debate. With some Zers knowing more than their older recruiters, the job has to carefully balance this trend by "keeping it real," improving recruiter training and treatment through centralization, and applying a business-minded approach…

Matthew Weiss is currently an Intelligence Officer in the United States Marine Corps. His book, “We Don’t Want You, Uncle Sam: Examining the Military Recruiting Crisis with Generation Z” is available on amazon in paperback, e-book, and audiobook format.