An Important Step at the CIA
By Douglas Farah
In an interview published in today's Washington Post CIA director Michael V. Hayden made a small but extremely important comment on how he plans to change the agency, particularly the analysis side. He said expertise and "time on target" would be rewarded, rather than just moving analysts around from one area to another, prizing generalists over specialists.
Within the intelligence community culture, those who specialized in a region or topic have traditionally had a limited career track and a slim chance of moving up the ladder. Now, said Hayden, rewards "could now go to someone who has been looking at Iran for 14 years."
This is a vitally importance paradigm shift, one that almost every reform commission on intelligence has recommended. In an era where the primary collection targets-radical Islam and China-require extensive language and cultural skills and knowledge, the routine rotation after a few months or years often simply served to perpetrate ignorance. My full blog is here.
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