Marine Corps Commandant Gen. Robert Neller has found a simple way to get good Marines to stay in the service: just ask them to. that one of the most an effective ways to get Marines to stay in the services is tincrease retention is to personally ask Marines to stay in the service.
"I am always talking to Marines about staying — from colonels and generals to lance corporals," Neller told Marine Corps Times in a recent interview. "I was talking to a [sergeant] in the gym this morning at five o’clock who says he is getting out. : sergeant over marine barracks. I said, ‘What would it take to get you to stay?’"
That, Neller said, made the noncommissioned officer him pause for a second.
"So I am going to re-attack on that later," the commandant said.
In his recent guidance for the next four years, Neller stressed that the need for the Marine Corps to "recognize, promote and retain those who are the most competent, mature and capable leaders." Although it has always been a priority, Neller felt the need to say that the Marine Corps is focused on retaining and promoting Marines who have the qualities that the service needs now and in the future, he said.
"We are going to put a little bit more pressure on commanders to be involved with the retention process, and all of us," Neller said. "I mean, we are all recruiters. We are all career planners."
A Marine Corps retention survey for fiscal 2015 found that 38 percent of 4,200 re-enlistment eligible Marines polled said they were unlikely to re-enlist, compared with 33 percent in fiscal 2014 and 31 percent in fiscal 2013. Respondents cited stagnating pay and benefits, low job satisfaction and a desire to attend college as reasons for wanting to leave the service.
Fiscal 2016 got off to a slow start retention-wise. By early October Oct. 5, only 33 percent of targeted first-term boat spaces were filled, compared with 53 percent during the same time period the year before, according to Marine administrative message 490/15.
"We have got a very talented force out there and we just want to make sure commanders understand that we, as commanders, have an obligation to talk to our Marines and those we lead and encourage those that we think are most effective ... , have the most ‘game.’ if you will, to stick around," Neller said. "Everybody has options."
Good leadership is paramount for keeping good Marines, and Neller said he will hold himself to the same standards that he expects of officers and enlisted Marines.
"I'll listen," he said. "I want to hear what they have to say, I really do: good, bad or otherwise. I will do my very best to represent them and ensure they have what they require — maybe not what they want all the time — but what they require to not just do their mission but to live their lives in a successful way and that their family needs are met."
Neller said he will be compassionate, understanding that everyone makes mistakes, but also emphasizing that Marines have to meet their obligations to get the mission done.
"Marines, we like to talk about stuff and we might argue in the family but at the end of the day, we do what we are told, as long as it is moral, legal and ethical," he said. "I am confident they will hold up their end of the deal. I've got to prove to them that I'm going to hold up my end.
"I trust them and I have to earn their trust every day in everything I do."
