Chief of Naval Personnel Vice Adm. Bill Moran testified before the Senate Armed Services Military Personnel Subcommittee to provide an overview of the Navy's personnel programs and policies, March 8.

Moran appeared on Capitol Hill alongside other service personnel chiefs from the Army, Air Force and Marine Corps, and highlighted that the Navy's policies, analytic tools, and supporting infrastructure will hold us back unless we upgrade them.

"We need to consider every dimension of our operating environment to reduce the risk and continue replenishing our workforce with high quality people," Moran told the subcommittee. "Fortunately our current healthy manning in the fleet has given us an opportunity to boldly look at transforming our personnel system and set the table for the next 30 years."

Moran said there are many reasons to pay close attention to potential challenges that could affect the service's ability to recruit and retain the best, including an unpredictable economy, a declining veteran population, a legacy personnel system, and growing competition for high-tech skills.

He said the Navy is working to put personnel policies in place that will allow the service to be prepared for economic changes or a lagging recruiting and retention market that might affect them.

"We are on the path to modernize," Moran said. "Our workforce is anxious for change; they expect greater transparency and responsiveness, and they expect a system that speaks to them. We want Sailors who are driven by tenacity, consumed with a passion for excellence and the will-to-win who understand and appreciate that there is no better place to be, no more rewarding life to live than to serve. That is the Navy we have, and the Navy we want to keep."