Recruitment and retention of qualified personnelINTRODUCTIONOne of the most critical challenges facing public administration is the recruitment and retention of qualified personnel. While the problem of attracting talent into public service is not new, with the introduction and rapid expansion of high technology and the Internet industry the problem has reached crisis proportions. Both the public and private sectors have embraced the information age with an increasing reliance on a skilled and versatile workforce. Private industry has responded by developing greater versatility in expanding and contracting its workforce to meet strategic requirements and organizational goals. Government has not adequately recognized the changes in private industry that have had such a significant impact on the workforce. Over the past twenty years, the workforce that previously expected to spend their careers with a single employer has adapted to the norm of changing employers multiple times (and in many cases changing career paths). This shift in workforce expectations requires not only policy changes in public administration, but also greater flexibility in hiring, rewarding and retention methods. The shift to broader training and advanced skills has changed workforce expectations. Workers are increasingly content to stay within a single professional discipline and have matched the flexibility and agility of their employers. Public administrators have increasingly recognized the need to modify reward and incentive programs with a much greater emphasis on performance than tenure. Private enterprise, with its ability to change and reorient strategic goals and objectives...... middle of paper ... ...U.S. Department of Defense, Acquisition Managers Recruiting, Hiring and Retention Handbook, “Hiring ,” April 15, 2001. Available at: http://gravity.lmi.org/acqbook/hiring/index.html. United States Department of Defense, Acquisition Managers Recruiting, Hiring and Retention Handbook, “Retention,” April 15, 2001 . Available at: http://gravity.lmi.org/acqbook/retention/index.html. United States Department of Defense, Acquisition Managers Recruiting, Hiring and Retention Handbook, “The Defense Acquisition Workforce Improvement Act (DAWIA),” April 15, 2001. Available at: http://gravity.lmi.org/acqbook/dawia/index.html. United States Department of Defense, Acquisition Managers Recruiting, Hiring and Retention Handbook, “The DoD Civilian Acquisition Workforce Personnel Demonstration Project (AcqDemo)”, 15 April 2001. Available at: http://gravity.lmi.org/acqbook/acqdemo/index.html.