{"id":25789,"date":"2023-06-09T18:31:09","date_gmt":"2023-06-09T18:31:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/federaltimes\/uncategorized\/2023\/06\/09\/qa-ex-army-cio-iyer-says-digital-democratization-aids-recruitment\/"},"modified":"2026-08-08T05:09:51","modified_gmt":"2026-08-08T05:09:51","slug":"qa-ex-army-cio-iyer-says-digital-democratization-aids-recruitment","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/federaltimes\/management\/career-management\/2023\/06\/09\/qa-ex-army-cio-iyer-says-digital-democratization-aids-recruitment\/","title":{"rendered":"Q&A: Ex-Army CIO Iyer says digital \u2018democratization\u2019 aids recruitment"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

To recruit and retain the tech workforce of the future, federal agencies and the military should embrace digital \u201cdemocratization\u201d and help existing civilian employees and service members learn IT skills, according to the former chief information officer of the U.S. Army.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Often, potential candidates and recruits complain about the federal hiring process being unattractive and bureaucratic, said Raj Iyer, <\/a>who left his civilian post overseeing technology for the Army this year and joined software company ServiceNow.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Army, Navy and Air Force are all projected to fall thousands short of their recruitment goals, Military Times reported.<\/a> The Army is expected to be the most behind. At the same time, the federal government is facing a major talent shortage of cyber and IT professionals who are being lured by the private sector\u2019s high paying salaries and work-life balance. Average time-to-hire was 106 days in government in 2017, compared with 23 days in other sectors, according to the federal CIO council. <\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Innovative modernization policies, IT goals and partnerships with industry can help, he said, but the right tools mean little when the government lacks the people in place to use them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThat\u2019s step one,\u201d he said in an interview with Federal Times.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Iyer spoke on how the government needs to meet candidates where they are, build their skills, and rebrand what it means to be a public servant.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Federal Times: What do you identify as some of the biggest challenges in terms of recruiting?<\/b><\/i><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Raj Iyer: <\/b>\u201cGovernment is not doing a good job telling the story of what [it] does. Most people who have not worked in the federal government, who have actually never been there, really see government as this big bureaucracy. That it\u2019s just a bunch of people sitting around, doing nothing and eating up taxpayer dollars. That\u2019s just how people have started to view government.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And yet, a day in the life of a citizen in this nation, every minute of it that you live and you survive, you are doing great things because of government. Not despite government, but because of government. And we\u2019re not able to tell that story. If we can actually tell that story, the number of people that want to come serve and be a public servant is huge. But if we just come across as bureaucratic all the way through \u2014 starting with the recruitment process of how we recruit, where we recruit and the process itself being so cumbersome \u2014 that\u2019s when you start to lose people.<\/p>\n\n\n\t