Other forms: recruited, recruiting, recruits
To recruit is to find and take on new people. Recruit staff, hard to recruit, recruit volunteers.
It is the standard word in employment, the armed forces and campaigning. As a noun, a recruit is the new person, especially in the military: a raw recruit. Recruitment is the whole process, and a recruiter or recruitment consultant does it for a living. Note recruitment drive; and that recruit is also used of organisations attracting members, including ones nobody wants recruiting anybody.
French recrue meant a fresh growth or new levy of soldiers, from Latin recrescere, to grow again — re- plus crescere, to grow. Crescent, increase and recruit are the same verb, so recruiting is regrowing an army.
From French - recruter (as a verb).
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA