Recruiting the best personnel is the first step on the path towards training excellence, and our recruitment policy, despite overall down-scaling, is wide-ranging and progressive in order to give us the best selection of candidates possible.

Our HQ, based at RAF Cranwell, translates strategic policy and recruitment goals into targets and procedures which enable us to achieve the desired intake.

Our Recruiting Aims

Our primary objective is to fill the annual Manpower Plan (MP) as promulgated by the Strategic Manpower Planners at Air Command. In pursuit of this objective, we recognise the benefits which diversity brings to organisational effectiveness and therefore seek to recruit individuals from diverse backgrounds thereby properly representing the society we serve.

Our secondary objective is to raise awareness of the RAF amongst younger people and place the Service firmly on their radar as a career of first choice. The challenge is to engage with both youngsters and their key influencers such as parents, teachers, community leaders and youth/community workers. To this end, we have worked toward raising the profile of the RAF amongst pre-eligible (11-15 year olds) youngsters. In support of this objective, most RAF stations now have a Youth Activities Liaison Officers (YALOs) whose role it is to co-ordinate and promote youth activities.

Key Areas of Involvement

Some of the areas in which we are actively involved are as follows:

• Providing expert RAF careers advice to the target audience from the 42 Armed Forces Careers Offices (AFCOs) across the UK.
• Building strong relationships with schools and colleges.
• Providing support to, and promotion of, the Air Cadets.
• Providing support to the University Air Squadrons (UAS).
• Promoting RAF careers through active involvement in Air Shows, Town Shows and local careers events.
• Sponsorship (of educational packages, significant events or sports such as basketball, rugby, hockey).
• Posting of Community Careers Liaison Officers (CCLOs) to increase community contact.

Smart marketing has resulted in a number of public campaigns which include:

• You don't need to be a pilot to fly in the RAF television and print recruitment campaign (featuring Typhoon, a pop song by new band C-Jags and focus placed on the diversity of career opportunities in the RAF).
• A new RAF Careers website carefully tuned to a modern audience.
• A new Customer Relationship Management Programme, known as Altitude aimed at 14 and 15 year olds with an interest in joining the RAF.
• RAF4U website aimed at young people and designed to encourage them to take part in activities hosted by RAF stations (via a comprehensive events finder of country-wide RAF events). This will soon be subsumed into the Altitude website.

Sponsorship of the Maths Challenge and Maths Workshops. Two thousand secondary schools now participate in this venture.