In response to world events there’s been increasing discussion about putting ‘boots on the ground’ in Ukraine. Reaction from the military community will likely be varied: trying to anticipate who will be going; wondering when and what will be the impact on your own family; anxiously watching the debate develop in the media.
In the process, difficulties in both recruitment and retention into the UK’s Armed Forces are being highlighted, and questions asked about how big our military needs to be. A recent Radio 4 investigation muddled the two and missed an opportunity to consider issues of which those within the military community are only too aware.
Recruitment is perhaps easiest to deal with. Today’s youth tend not to look for a single employer and are trained to expect a varied career. So, if there is no military tradition in your family, and you do not come across easy to access information on the Forces as an attractive and highly developmental career, joining up may not occur to you.
Retention however generally occurs at a later stage, when family commitments significantly weigh into the decision. Indeed, the Haythornthwaite Review (2023) – a review of incentivisation within the Armed Forces in order to better retain Service personnel – revealed that the median length of service is around ten years, and 59% of those leaving give the main reason as ‘impact on family and personal life’ – issues that the rest of the report barely addressed.
At Reading Force, we argue that low retention also needs addressing through considering the needs of the military family, and in particular the partner, not just the individual serving. The higher than average divorce rate within the Armed Forces adds weight to the argument.
Firstly, military couples are short of money, generally relying on a single income – rather than the UK norm of two.
The government seems to agree. In March 2025, justifying cuts to the benefits system, Darren Jones, Chief Secretary to the Treasury commented on both Newsnight and The News Agents that ‘the main driver of poverty is larger families where one parent is not able to work’. In the context of military families this is particularly relevant. Regular deployments, exercises and the sheer unpredictability of military life make it very difficult to have both partners in full time jobs out of the home.
While working practices that evolved during Covid could however make things significantly easier, the military has not fully engaged with how best to help partners work from home. For example, work hubs available to partners on the base, and information on the local economy, could be a standard part of the information given on postings. In the case of an overseas posting, information on your tax status if you carry on working for a UK employer would be particularly useful. The acronym-rich language of briefings could be made friendlier. A recent communication that all work-from-home permits would henceforth be paused, pending process review, has been met with uproar in the military community.
The recent Forces Employment Charity conference (March 2025) highlighted employers who have benefitted from the highly skilled ex-military community staff who have come to them, and through their competencies, positive attitudes and values, enriched the organisations they joined. But there are still too many organisations who effectively exclude military applicants because incoming applications are read by AI, which has been programmed to spot those with Non-Linear CVs. Ironically the presentation of lots of locations and of roles with differing status, rather than displaying someone with a dilettante approach to work, records their sheer determination to remain useful, adapt to circumstance – and continue to contribute to family finances.
All this is ironic considering that current debate around ‘the workforce of the future’ (very important to the funding of higher education), focuses on how to nurture the very competences that military families develop: an ability to manage change; excellent project management skills; flexibility and resilience; resourcefulness and diplomacy.
We know all this because at Reading Force we hear from the military community all the time. As we are ‘from’ the Forces but not ‘of’ them (we never ask for the ‘last three’ of the Service person’s number, or a rank), we hear about the pressures they face and their reluctance to complain. And, as largely military partners ourselves, we remain convinced that the value of a career within the military, and the lifestyle that accompanies it, is one of challenge and enjoyment, that equips you handsomely for the future – whenever you decide that will be.
Professor Alison Baverstock MBE
