Interview: John Kringen Director for Intelligence

Black Collegian, Oct 2006

A Conversation with CIA Leadership Concerning Its Diversity Initiatives

In August THE BLACK COLLEGIAN visited the Central Intelligence Agency to discuss with executives the issues that are facing the Agency and how having a diverse workforce helps the CIA in its mission. The discussion participants were John Kringen, Director for Intelligence; Carmen Medina, Associate Deputy Director for Intelligence; and Gertie Starks, Management Leadership and Diversity Programs.

TBC: Please tell our readers more about your background. How did you go from being a college professor to working at the Central Intelligence Agency?

Kringen: I had been teaching at the University of Maryland and also doing research for the Department of Defense. A representative from a defense contractor heard me give a presentation at a conference and offered me employment with his company. However, I accepted an offer from the Agency. If my parents were asked, they would tell you they are not surprised that I chose to work for the CIA.

TBC: This is the third in a series of interviews we have had with the Directorate of Intelligence (DI) leadership. In the first, your predecessor, Jami Miscik, talked about diversity and why it is critical in your business. Last fall, Carmen Medina provided us with her views on diversity. After 18 months in your position, what is your view on diversity?

Kringen: As Carmen alluded to in her interview, we have been under a lot of pressure in regards to the quality of work that we do and ensuring that our analysis includes different perspectives, different views of the world. The criticism levied at us has been one of groupthink. We view diversity in the broader notion; we need individual opinions and a variety of viewpoints. In the DI, we must create an environment in which people from different backgrounds feel comfortable expressing different views, because it matters in our analytical work. We need people who are able to challenge conventional wisdom, to lay out alternative arguments, so that we don't automatically march down the path where we arrive at a wrong conclusion. I have always thought the strength of our approach to hiring is that we have our managers directly engaged in whom we hire. We build relationships with campuses, and we do that with some planning and forethought as to where we can get a diversity of students. That has been a key to our success in terms of attracting people from different regions of the country and from different ethnic backgrounds.

TBC: How do you communicate your view of diversity to your management team?

Kringen: We started under my predecessor, Jami Miscik. She required each office to put together a diversity strategic plan. After I became Director for Intelligence, we had a session to review those plans. We said: "Here is what you said you were going to do. Now, how have you actually executed those plans?" Part of the plans fit in our outreach and recruitment initiatives, and pan had to do with overall management practices. It is like with anything else: If you think it's important, you have to engage your managers.

Carmen Medina: I might add that we had a meeting where we discussed how well we did as a Directorate in the past year. We talked about everything: the quality of our product, our retention statistics, our language skills, also on the table was how well we did in terms of diversity. We had a conversation about the percentage of minorities in our offices' management teams. I am encouraged that we now have made at least enough progress on this issue that we can actually begin to have such a conversation. And, it's a meaningful conversation, not just about the diversity in our office, but the diversity of our management team. Even as we have increased our hiring in a spectacular way, we have continued to bring in a diverse pool of candidates, but we are still not as diverse as we would hope. What's important is that we not only talk about diversity as a management team, but that we do so in the context of our most strategic goals. We don't have a separate meeting about diversity.

TBC: How is your view on diversity communicated to the workforce at the CIA?

Kringen: Carmen Medina, Peter Clement (Deputy Director for Intelligence for Strategic Programs), and I are pretty active in engaging the workforce. We participate in management offsites; we are invited to various employee groups. We speak to groups of potential employees, such as those Gertie invites to visit headquarters as part of our diversity outreach initiatives. We are invited to participate in affinity group offsites. We welcome any opportunity to speak with employees about our values, about diversity, and why diversity is important. We are constantly on the road talking about what we are trying to do as an organization, which includes our approach to diversity. Gertie delivers a presentation on "Valuing Diversity in the Dl" to all new employees as they enter the Career Analyst Program (CAP).

Gertie Starks: We encourage our employees, including our student interns, to participate in affinity groups, and we value the feedback from those groups. Our employees participate in offsites where they discuss issues of importance to them. These issues can range from mentoring to employee development to challenges they face in the Career Analyst Program (CAP). Directorate management is invited to participate. They listen to what employees have to say. And, 1 can say that decisions have been made and actions taken based on these discussions.