Chapter Ten
Going Beyond Race/Ethnicity and Gender
Although the majority of Chapters Four through Nine has focused on increasing racial/ ethnic and female representation within senior military leadership, the Commission also recommends tracking and improving other aspects of diversity within the military.
DoD and the Services Must Better Manage Personnel with MissionCritical Skill Sets Recommendation 13— DoD and the Services must track regional and cultural expertise and relevant Reserve Component civilian expertise and continue to track language expertise upon military accession and throughout servicemembers’ careers in order to better manage personnel with missioncritical skill sets.
As noted in the recent Quadrennial Defense Review Report, DoD needs to build regional, cultural, and foreign-language expertise in order to prepare for future security needs (U.S. Department of Defense, 2010). Given that no one can predict where the next conflict might be and what future regional expertise would be needed, it is prudent to track all language and cultural expertise, not just that specified by the current Quadrennial Defense Review Report, throughout servicemembers’ careers. In addition, certain RC civilian expertise can be a critical aid to missions. RC personnel may, via their civilian careers and other experiences, possess skills that are in high demand in the military. Some of these skills, such as regional, cultural, and language expertise, are linked with demographic diversity. Others, such as those related to science and technology, go beyond demographics. Therefore, the Commission recommends that DoD and the Services codify and track civilian expertise that is deemed mission critical. A mechanism that could be used to track relevant RC civilian expertise is the Civilian Employment Information program, which requires each member of the Ready Reserve to report employment status, employer’s name and address, civilian job title, and years of experience in current civilian occupation. This information is stored in the Reserve Component Common Personnel Data System. This program could be expanded to collect information on servicemember skills, including regional, cultural,
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