Introduction

“This is our time of consequence. What we do, the decisions we make, the actions we take, the Airmen we lead, and the way we do it will define that next seminal event.”—General David Allvin, Chief of Staff of the Air Force

We acknowledge that Airmen are the Air Force’s greatest asset, yet we have not fully implemented talent management strategies that prioritize their aspirations to ensure the right Airmen are in the right jobs at the right time—both to fulfill mission requirements and individual goals. In an era where our military’s strategic advantage hinges on human capital, effectively managing talent within the Air Force is critical to maintaining operational readiness and a competitive edge. The Department of Defense (DoD) has emphasized a strategic imperative to cultivate the workforce our nation needs: “To recruit and retain the most talented Americans, we must change our institutional culture and reform how we do business.”¹

Internal talent marketplaces (ITMs) have emerged as a game-changing approach for organizations to align business needs with employee preferences. A 2022 article published by Harvard Business Review identified that for organizations to compete in the new talent market, companies must “play both offense by creating a better employee value proposition to attract new talent and defense making it more attractive to stay.”² The Air Force needs to focus on strategies that challenge the status quo and improve its appeal as an employer of choice.

The DoD’s recruitment challenges were evident in Fiscal Year 2023 when the Air Force missed its recruitment targets for the first time in 24 years.³ In addition to this challenge, there is a trending reduction in the size of the Air Force, a declining propensity to serve among Americans, and an ongoing war for talent. These factors underscore the importance for the Air Force to not only attract talent but also to effectively utilize and develop the existing force, ensuring the Air Force’s operational readiness and ability to adapt to future organizational needs with agility.

The Air Force is not alone in these challenges. Large organizations in all sectors grapple with aligning their talent management strategies to attract, develop, and retain talent in today’s environment. To combat these trends, companies are investing in ITMs that have the potential to drive transformational change. ITMs have emerged as an invaluable business tool to optimize talent utilization, rapidly respond to changing organizational needs, and empower and retain employees. Gartner projects that 30 percent of large enterprises will adopt a talent marketplace by 2025.⁴

In line with this trend, the Air Force has introduced its Talent Marketplace as an innovative solution “designed to provide increased transparency and interaction that should lead to greater awareness and satisfaction with the assignment process.”⁵ Nevertheless, the Talent Marketplace’s present capabilities do not meet industry benchmarks, primarily due to its dependence on antiquated practices and processes that are insufficient in addressing the needs of today’s Airmen and evolving mission requirements.

To optimize and engage its all-volunteer force for great power competition, the Air Force must transition from traditional, industrial-age talent management strategies toward those required by the information age. To accelerate this transition, the Air Force should prioritize and advance Talent Marketplace’s development to leverage its human capital’s unique skills and experiences as a strategic resource. This paper will examine how the Air Force can modernize its Talent Marketplace to operate as a true matching market by strategically applying market design principles and integrating technology. This entails embracing iterative design processes that keep pace with market demands and cater to Airmen’s professional growth and ambitions.

Building upon research and assessments of existing ITMs, this paper will progress through a structured analysis. Chapter two will provide a brief background of the Air Force Officer Assignment System to lay the groundwork for understanding the evolution of the Air Force’s current methodologies. Chapter three examines the current challenges of the Talent Marketplace. Chapter four describes key elements of an optimized ITM. Chapter five presents actionable recommendations for the Air Force to enhance the Talent Marketplace.

In the Air Force’s time of consequence, the strategies leveraged to retain and harness the unique capabilities of our all-volunteer force today will decisively shape our ability to meet the defense challenges of tomorrow.