The recruiting process is all about risk management. Open it up too wide, and you get a ton of irregular enrollments, which are costly. Close it off to eliminate irregular enrollments, and you get the process taking 8-12 months for all candidates. Either end of the spectrum is not acceptable.
Frankly, 30% in one week may be too much. I think that this objective is there to force the hard thinking and to break existing processes. Just looking at it, I don't think that most candidates would be ready for such a quick turnaround. 70% within a month may be doable though. Some of the questions that this raises
- clearly, simply having people get generic doctors notes won't work, but if the "doctors note" is a civ doctor sign-off on the part 1 medical, then I think that this is workable.
- fitness testing should continue to happen. Yes the standard is low, but this was introduced to avoid people dying on PT during recruit courses (in the mid-late 90s, 2 dropped one summer). the test becomes a barrier to entry of the severely unfit.
- would candidates need to show up with all of the documentation, ready to do the aptitude test, fitness test, and all that?
- would we really be willing to turf people who came back with issues (say, security screen catches something after the fact) who have already been enrolled, and are working out on course? Current experience would say no.
the biggest question is whether our training system is set up appropriately for the gusher that is going to be coming out of the recruiting system once this is done...
on another note- I do know of an infantry officer candidate who failed the grip test on training- needless to say, his nickname became "Gripless". He was in other ways too....
