Lee Berthiaume, The Canadian Press
Posted on Sunday, September 25, 2022 at 8:29 AM m. WBS
The Canadian Armed Forces are sounding the alarm about a dire shortage of recruits to fill thousands of open positions, and the shortage is so great that senior officers are now calling it a crisis.
On a crisp Tuesday afternoon, Robert Romero walks out of the Canadian Armed Forces recruiting office in downtown Ottawa with an envelope full of papers in his hands.
Romero, originally from the Philippines, has no direct experience with the Canadian military; his interest stems largely from a sense of adventure and some of what he saw about soldiers in movies as a child.
“I idolized them,” he says. “I got hooked. So I started researching about it and became more interested.”
Romero is one of 11 people who have just written an aptitude test to identify which military occupations prospective recruits are qualified to fill. She pulls her results out of the envelope: intelligence officer, weather technician, and cook.
Now she will discuss it with her parents to decide what career interests her, if she wants to rewrite the exam or drop the whole exercise.
Canada’s armed forces are supposed to be in a period of growth as new demands increase the need for trained soldiers, sailors and airmen. The Liberal government in 2017 put forward a plan to add thousands of full and part-time positions.
While the plan emerged after years of troop shortages, there were signs the army was turning a corner as recruitment began to outpace outputs.
“We were starting to gain momentum when the pandemic hit,” says the brigadier general. Krista Brodie, responsible for overseeing military recruiting and training.
Recruitment collapsed during the first year of COVID-19 as the military closed recruiting and training centers. The result: just 2,000 people signed up in 2020-21, less than half of what was needed.
Nearly 4,800 recruits signed up the following fiscal year as lockdowns and restrictions were eased.
But Brodie says the military is getting about half the number of applicants it needs per month to reach the goal of adding 5,900 members this year.
The shortfall is expected to exacerbate the current staffing shortage, with about one in 10 of the 100,000 military positions unfilled.
“We’re definitely in an applicant crisis right now,” says Brodie.
Many industries are facing employment challenges, and Statistics Canada reported record job vacancies in June. But the pandemic and labor shortages coincided with what Brodie describes as a “cultural reckoning” for the military.
That has been marked by allegations of misconduct against senior officers and concerns about a growing disconnect between the makeup of the armed forces and Canadian society as a whole, leading to a push for greater diversity in the ranks.
Those efforts include targeted recruitment of underrepresented groups, including women and indigenous people, and broader moves to create a more inclusive workplace by loosening dress rules, which Brodie says is paying off.
Still, fewer Canadians are choosing a military career, and it’s not entirely clear why.
“I don’t think we have a good answer anywhere. I think there are many factors, components and dimensions to why,” says Brodie.
The Defense Department is trying to better understand the problem, he added. It is also looking at possible solutions, such as financial incentives, ways to improve work-life balance, and address public perceptions of the military.
Brodie couldn’t say whether the push for diversity is hurting more than helping, at least in terms of absolute numbers, by closing down the military’s traditional recruiting pool: young, white men.
“We can’t measure the impact of that right now. It’s too soon,” she said. “But to be very, very clear … we want the right candidates, and the right candidates are those who first and foremost reflect the values of the Canadian Armed Forces.”
The impact of not having enough new recruits is both short-term and long-term, putting additional pressure on current members and meaning there are fewer people who can rise through the ranks and fill leadership roles later on.
The deficit is not uniform throughout the army. Certain occupations have more than enough applicants. But some face such dire shortages that signing bonuses of up to $20,000 are being offered in 25 of the roughly 100 military trades, including cooks, weather technicians and many Navy jobs.
Petty Officer 2nd Class Andrew Clark is a senior recruiter in Ottawa. In recent weeks, his staff has been to different events, such as the Gatineau Air Show and a comic book convention, to introduce him.
“We are selling the benefits of being in the Canadian Armed Forces,” he says. “The pension, the medicine, the dentistry, the education, the continuing education, as well as a pretty interesting career where you can travel all over the world, potentially, and get paid to do it.”
Recruiters are assigned goals to meet, with spots divided by trade, as well as minimum goals for female recruits and maximum goals for males. There is also a high-level push for what the military still calls “visible minorities” and indigenous peoples.
“What we’re looking for is diversity,” says Clark.
Ottawa is unusual in that it is close to meeting its recruiting goals, which Clark attributes to the large number of military families in the capital. But many other places are not, including traditional military communities.
“We’re really seeing even places like Kingston that used to have a large population of applicants, we’re seeing the well running dry,” says Maj. Simon Rocheleau, who is responsible for managing recruitment efforts in northern and eastern Ontario.
Rocheleau has a number of theories to explain the situation, including the state of the economy, the lack of a major mission like Afghanistan to raise awareness, and concerns about sexual misconduct.
Outside the Ottawa recruiting center, Jeremy Langlois has just finished his aptitude test. The 21-year-old chef wants to fly jets, but he didn’t score high enough. He will retest in 30 days in hopes of qualifying.
“If that doesn’t work, then I’ll have to reevaluate and think about things,” he says.
This report from The Canadian Press was first published on September 25, 2022.