WASHINGTON \u2014 The Pentagon is evaluating how its 225,000-member cyber workforce can more easily transition to and from private industry, picking up new skills and fresh perspectives and spurring defense innovation in the process.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Defense Department\u2019s 2023-2027 cyber workforce strategy<\/a>, released this week, includes four \u201chuman capital pillars\u201d: identification of talent, recruitment, development of skills and personnel retention. Implementing it will require close interaction and unprecedented levels of cross-pollination with the tech industry, officials said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The strategy, which supports the Biden administration\u2019s national cybersecurity blueprint, calls for collaboration inside and outside government, academia and allied nations, and includes a talent-exchange pilot project. The department must prioritize these \u201cengagements\u201d and allocate resources to ensure there is mutual benefit, it said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cPermeability, the ability to move between the different sectors, there has to be a change,\u201d Patrick Johnson, director of the workforce innovation directorate for the department\u2019s chief information officer<\/a>, told reporters ahead of the release.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The approach is a departure from the traditional government job, which locks in employees on set career paths at gradually increasing pay scales over decades.<\/p>\n\n\n\t