Stephen Marrin

14 January 2004

Draft Essay
Professionalizing Intelligence Analysis

Professionalizing intelligence analysis by creating an American Intelligence Analysis

Association that combines the three different intelligence analysis specialties—national security,
law enforcement, and business intelligence--into a single intelligence analysis profession could
improve the processes of decisionmaking in their respective fields. In all three cases, intelligence
analysts use similar techniques to achieve the same goal: provide information to improve
decisionmaking. Yet despite the existence of multiple kinds of intelligence analysts and the
similarities between them, no intelligence analysis profession exists. Unlike the legal and
medical professions, intelligence analysis is not defined by systemic formal knowledge, does not
involve high levels of individual autonomy, and standards are not formulated or enforced by
other members of the occupation. While there may be good historical reasons for explaining
why intelligence analysis has not developed into a formal profession, the failure to
professionalize has led to uncertainty regarding the very duties of intelligence analysts, great
variation in the competence and skill of individual analysts, and an overall diminution in the role
that intelligence analysis could play in decisionmaking. Creating a single intelligence analysis
profession out of its multiple specialties would go far towards ensuring the protection of national
security and homeland security—as well as increasing private industry’s profitability--in the
future

For most of this century national security intelligence analysis—the predominant

intelligence analysis specialty--has been practiced as a craft rather than a profession due to its
relatively small personnel base and lack of external scrutiny. When national security intelligence
agencies were institutionalized after World War II, relatively few individuals practiced
intelligence analysis compared to today. Due to the small size of the function and its secretive
nature, personnel practices were based on an apprentice model and individual development and
performance was more ad hoc than structured. As the Cold War advanced, the processes of
intelligence analysis adapted to new technologies and growth in the size of the intelligence
bureaucracy, but it remained secretive and did not have much external scrutiny. Without external
pressure to formalize procedures, national security intelligence analysis failed to develop into a
profession. This is not to say that no progress was made, for along the way a lot of good thinking
was done in terms of developing better ways of doing analysis. In addition, various institutional
capabilities were built to advance analytic knowledge such as CIA’s journal Studies in
Intelligence and its Center for the Study of Intelligence as well as the creation of the Defense
Intelligence College, since renamed the Joint Military Intelligence College. Yet despite these and
other positive developments, formal professionalization did not occur.

As the Cold War progressed, both law enforcement and private industry began to develop
structured intelligence analysis capabilities for the most part modeled on national security
intelligence. While a theory of intelligence has not yet been formally articulated, the basic

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purpose of intelligence analysis is to assist decisionmaking by integrating and assessing the
utility of information acquired both overtly and covertly. The primary defining characteristic that
affects both the need for and use of intelligence--and should form the core of any intelligence
theory--is the application of power. Contrary to the popular aphorism, knowledge is not power.
Knowledge alone is powerless. But knowledge can facilitate the application of power by
providing information that enables power to be applied more precisely than it otherwise would
have been. While intelligence analysis is popularly associated with national security, it also
exists to a lesser but expanding degree law enforcement, homeland security, and private industry,
and any other industry where collection and analysis of information can be improved via
delegation to people whose sole task is to assess the utility of that information for
decisionmaking. Yet despite the establishment of two additional intelligence analysis specialties
—and respective associations including the International Association of Law Enforcement
Intelligence Analysts (IALEIA) and the Society of Competitive Intelligence Professionals (SCIP)
intelligence analysis did not professionalize to any great degree. The various intelligence
analysis literatures have expanded to address the interests of the different specialties, but the
common bonds between them have been for the most part lost in the particularized substantive
focus of each specialty.

The failure of intelligence analysis to professionalize has led to negative consequences

for decisionmaking in national security, law enforcement, and business intelligence. In all three
intelligence analysis specialties, a key factor in the quality of the finished intelligence produced
is the skill and ability of the intelligence analyst. Yet no official standards exist to ensure the
competency of individual analysts. Intelligence analysis as practiced by each specialty is
unregulated, unstandardized, and lacking in all but the most rudimentary aspects of
professionalism. Some specialties or agencies have more structured and rigorous standards and
development programs than others, but in the end each agency, department, or company creates
its own standards for hiring, and developing intelligence analysts. This inconsistency leads to
widely varying analytic duties and quality of performance both within and between each
intelligence production entity. The lack of a single definition for intelligence analysis means that
intelligence analysts do whatever it is that they are assigned to do, regardless of whether that
entails lower-end tasks such as data processing or data correlation, or higher-end tasks such as
expert evaluation and assessment. In addition, with no check on analyst competence or analytic
quality, intelligence consumers have no assurance that intelligence analysis is consistently
reliable. They also have no assurance that the informal code of intelligence ethics—consisting, in
essence, of both independence and objectivity—has been complied with. The end result of this
failure to ensure analytic quality or reliability is a general tendency on the part of intelligence
consumers to underutilize the full capabilities inherent in intelligence analysis as a
decisionmaking support function.

Professionalizing intelligence analysis would improve the contributions that intelligence

analysts make to national security, law enforcement, and private industry decisionmaking, and is
possible through the integration of the common aspects of each of the three analytic specialties.
Each analytic specialty has developed its own core set of principles and understandings whose
common aspects could be codified by a single American Intelligence Analysis Association that
spans all intelligence analysis specialties and provides the common ground through which
professionalization could occur. To facilitate the creation of this new American Intelligence

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Analysis Association, its mission and objectives could be modeled on the American Medical
Association. While some aspects of the medical profession are substantially different from
intelligence analysis, others are strikingly similar, such as medical diagnosis. More importantly,
the medical profession is able to find common ground and bridge differences between many
different medical specialties that have very different substantive knowledge bases. The methods
used by the AMA to integrate the various medical specialties into a single profession could
provide a model for the professionalization of intelligence analysis through the integration of its
three distinct intelligence analysis specialties. A single over-arching organization built on the
commonalities of intelligence analysis across the specialties could single-handedly define the
intelligence analysis profession by:
• articulating a common set of basic intelligence analyst competencies,
• establishing minimal educational requirements for prospective new intelligence
analysts,
• creating common training programs supplemented by specialized training
programs for each analytic specialty,
• encouraging the development of continuing professional education opportunities,
• identifying common best practices,
• aggregating and disseminating knowledge of the profession through conferences
and a common journal that contributes to a core professional literature, and
• enforcing basic standards through certification or licensing procedures.

Fortunately, many of the building blocks for this American Intelligence Analysis
Association already exist or are currently under development in one or more of the disciplines:
• Competencies: In the mid 1990s, the CIA and other national security intelligence
agencies devoted much attention to their various analytic disciplines and the
competencies required for each. David Moore and Lisa Krizan have advanced this
work in their article titled “Core Competencies for Intelligence Analysis.”
• Minimal Educational Requirements: In addition to dedicated intelligence
analysis education and training programs located in the various departments and
agencies, some academic programs have begun to provide a core intelligence
analyst curriculum such as Mercyhurst University’s Research/Intelligence Analyst
Program.
• Training: Building on the programs already in existence at the Joint Military
Intelligence College and other military intelligence organizations, in 2000 CIA
created the Sherman Kent School to improve training for its analysts, and in 2002
created CIA University as a mechanism to integrate all its training efforts under
one single institutional superstructure. At the same time, bridges were being
created between the educators in the various specialties. In 1998, Mercyhurst
University’s Research/Intelligence Analyst Program began to bring together
members from all three specialties to discuss issues of mutual concern. Out of this
grew the Generic Intelligence Training Initiative that attempted to define a core
intelligence analysis training course applicable to all specialties.
• Continuing Education: Each specialty has its own informal continuing
professional education opportunities either structured through the agency or
department, or through the relevant analytic association such as IALEIA or SCIP.

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 • Conferences and Literatures: The national security intelligence literature is
extensive and growing, and while both the law enforcement and business
intelligence literatures are smaller they are growing at a brisk pace as well. Each
specialized intelligence analysis association sponsors a journal oriented to its own
members, and the common links between each of the specialties is being
explored. In terms of conferences, each association sponsors its own conferences
in addition to specialized conferences such as the academic International Studies
Association’s Intelligence Studies subsection. Bridges between the specialties are
also being built; in addition to the annual Mercyhurst University Intelligence
Colloquia, in 2002 CIA’s Kent Center sponsored a conference titled
“Understanding and Teaching Intelligence Analysis: A Discipline for the 21st
Century.”

Since the 11 September 2001 terrorist attacks, more resources than ever before have been
devoted to understanding the role of intelligence analysis in protecting national security. Bridges
are being built between national security and law enforcement intelligence analysts in
intelligence production with the creation of the Terrorist Threat Integration Center and in
analytic training and education with the FBI Academy’s development of an intelligence analysis
training program based on the CIA’s Kent School and CIA University assistance. With increased
funding has also come increased opportunities to develop the connections between the specialties
further. The proposed Mercyhurst Institute for of the Study and Application of Intelligence
(MISAI)—which is intended to “promote the legitimacy of academic intelligence studies, while
seeking to identify, employ, propagate and promote best study and application practices
throughout its various disciplines (national security, law enforcement, business and
academia)”—is a good step towards the professionalization of intelligence. After all, the founder
of the American Medical Association originally suggested the “establishment of a national
medical association to ‘elevate the standard of medical education in the United States.’”1 But
professionalization requires a centralizing association, and for that reason the American Medical
Association was founded in 1847. Intelligence analysis has come a long way over the past 50
years, but it has a long way yet to go. Creating a single association to bridge the commonalities
between the various intelligence analysis specialties would provide the mechanism through
which professionalization could finally take place.

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http://www.ama-assn.org/ama/pub/article/1916-4389.html