PROGRESS REPORT PERSONNEL OFFICE

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP78-04718A002700130005-5
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: S
• Document Page Count: 9
• Document Creation Date: December 9, 2016
• Document Release Date: May 11, 2001
• Sequence Number: 5
• Publication Date: December 31, 1951
• Content Type: REPORT

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PROGRESS REPORT
PERSONNEL OFFICE
CONFIDENTIAL
1 October 1950 - 31 December 1951
I. Concept
The operations of the Personnel Office have the aim of equipping
the Central Intelligence Agency with a program 'Rg per
ace
to obtain, develop and maintain
an effective working force to carry on the Agency's objectives. The
general purpose of the personnel program of the Agency is to contribute
to effective management of the Agency's mission wherever the utilization
of its personnel resources are involved. To realize this purpose, the
Personnel Office must operate as a strong staff unit to give special
attention to the development, interpretation and application of personnel
policies, and must stimulate supervisory line officers to carry out sound
personnel policies objectively and efficiently.
The organisation of he Personnel Office
possible for Personnel-Birogtw and members
in the formulation and coordination of policies
is patterned to make it
of his staff to assist
and procedures and to
foster their application through continuous consultation with operating
personnel and through providing specialized advice and assistance. hith-
in this general framework, the Personnel Office develops staffing objec-
tives with operating officials; conducts a comprehensive program for
recruiting candidates for all categories of Agency positions; undertakes
assign-
careful screening of applicants to ensure most appropriate initial
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as will bring about proper use of the skills and abilities of the
persons already employed by the Agency; procures and assigns military
personnel detailed from the Defense Department, and performs necessary
administrative work resulting from those assignments; plans and adminis-
ters programs for position classification and wage establishment; provides
staff leadership for the administration of an Agency career service
program designed to widen the scope of competence and abilities of career
employees; provides employee counseling and welfare services; furnishes
personnel testing services; plans and administers non-operational skills
training programs; performs necessary employment recordkeeping operations;
conducts such personnel studies as are essential to support operating
programs and represents the Agency in liaison activities with the Selective
Service System in connection with draft deferment problems affecting CIA
employees, the Defense Department in connection with military personnel
detailed to the Agency, the Federal Personnel Council, the Civil Service
Commission, the State Department, and the United States Employment Service
with respect to matters of personnel policy and operations, particularly
those relating to recruitment activities, and with the Bureau of Employees
Compensation in connection with compensation claims arising out of CIA
employment.
II. What Has Been Done
There are summarized below the principal accomplishments of the
sonnel Office during the report period:
Staffing goals reflecting actual personnel requirements were
established and plans for personnel recruitment drawn to
accomplish these goals. Expressed in numbers of new employees to
be appointed from September 1951 until June 30, 11,52, these
plans establish the following quotas:
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The organization of the Personnel Office was completely reconstructed.
The functions of personnel procurement and of classification and
wage administration were centralized. The remaining personnel
services and operations were grouped under two units, one serving
covert organizational components, the other serving overt organi-
zations. In addition, a staff group was established to function as
an arm of the Personnel Director to assist in carrying out effective,
coordinated work throughout the Personnel Office. The mission of
this special staff is to analyze personnel operations and evaluate
results, acting as an internal auditor and cozptroller for the
Personnel Director, as well as to carry on studies into new methods.
Since its inception in early summer 1951, this staff has completed
a comprehensive survey of the policies, organization, and procedures
relating to the recruitment of personnel for Agency positions; the
personnel procurement activity was subsequently re-organized in
accordance with the staff's findings and recommendations.
Considerable progress has been made in simplifying and standardizing
personnel methods. Uniform procedures have been adopted for many
operations carried on in the Personnel Office which were formerly
performed through the employment of separate processes by the two
operating personnel divisions (overt and covert). These improve-
ments have extended to applicant processing operations., personnel
transactions and recordkeeping tasks, and the reporting of personnel
data.
Problems and difficulties formerly experienced by the Agency in
connection with the need to obtain draft deferments or cancellations
of calls to active military service for reservists have been almost
wholly, through the working out of patterns of liaison with
the National Selective Service Headquarters and with the Defense
Department.
A program for establishing an Agency career service was inaugurated.
A Career Service Committee comprising high level Agency officials
has been constituted to plan the principal elements of the program.
Individual working groups have been named and are functioning to
recommend (1) selection criteria to control the designation of
employees who will comprise the career service, (2) systems of perfor-
mance appraisal, (3) procedures for providing job rotation opportuni-
ties, (Li.) career benefits for personnel in the career service, (5) stand-
ards and methods for recruiting career trainees, and (6) scope of
extension training facilities to be developed.
III, Why It Has Been Done
The rapidly expanding scope of the Agency's intelligence and opera-
tional activities and commitments dictated an acceleration of personnel
operations to supply the correspondingly expanded personnel requirements,
The need to strengthen the Personnel Office to respond to the Agency's
staffing requirements is illustrated by the following tabular summary of
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CONFIDENTIAL
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position vacancies in relation to authorized personnel allottments at
various times throughout the period:
Total
Authorized
Strength
October 19%
January 1951
April 1951
July 1951
September 1951
In addition, it was necessary
Per Cent
of Vacant
Vacancies Positions
20.57
27.56
33.33
33.62
26.x.8
to develop a personnel organization
equal to the task of providing personnel support and services to carry
on the Agency mission. In many respects the Agency personnel progran
differs from the general pattern of Government personnel activity. Since
channels outside the Civil Service register system. Many of the cate-
system, the recruitment process Xs desi,ed to locate personnel through
the Agency's positions are excepte?~'?.from the Civil Service competitive
gories comprising the Agency position structure represent occupational
fields unique to the public service. The sensitive nature of the Agency's
mission and the security aspects involved contribute to the recruitment
problem. The prospective field of applicants is greatly curtailed by the
basic requirements which must be observed before any individual may be
considered for employment. The completion of personnel security checks
involves so prolonged time lapses that many applicants accept positions
elsewhere, thus nullifying a considerable amount of recruitment effort.
CONFiDENTIAL
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Many candidates for employment are rejected for security reasons. Such
considerations as extra-hazardous duty, proximity to potential enemies,
lack of health and medical facilities, inadequate living conditions,
absence of educational and recreational facilities, and unfavorable
climates combine to make recruitment of adequately qualified personnel a
difficult task. The results of current studies disclose that in excess
of 30 per cent of the applicants for whom appointment processing is started
fail to be hired either for security reasons or because of declination
on the part of the applicants.
Inherent in the magnitude of the task allotted to the CIA is the
requirement of organizational effectiveness. Because such effectiveness
is closely related to the'caliber of employees, it was recognized that
positive steps would have to be employed to develop a definite Agency
career service concept. Essential to such a program is (1) a recruitment
plan for locating candidates with special promise, (2) the means for
identifying employees in the Agency who have potential for further develop-
ment, (3) arrangements for improving the knowledges and abilities of
these persons through training, rotation and other experiences, and (4) a
body of career benefits adopted to develop individual incentives and
career group identification.
IV. How It Has Been Done
All work connected with developing, locating, and drawing upon
sources of personnel to keep the Agency staffed was consolidated under
25X9A2 a single recruitment leadership. Where a total of had been
allotted formerly to carry on recruitment work, the staff was enlarged to
25X9A2 comprise In order to increase individual productivity,
recruitment officers have been permanently assigned to prescribed geographic
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areas; generally their assignments require concentration on specific occu-
pational categories or individual Agency organizational segments. New
sources of recruitment are developed on a continuing basis. At present,
the register of such sources (which are regularly contacted for general
or specific recruitment needs) comprises 615 colleges and universities,
135 vocational and trade schools, 2)40 trade and industrial establishments,
and 250 other activities (government agencies, former OSS officials, etc.).
Indicative of the enlarged recruitment activity is a comparison between
the number of applicant files set up during the periods November 1919
through October 1950 and November 1950 through October 1951:
Total
Monthly Average
November 1949 - October 1950
13,996
1,166
November-1950 - October 1951
25,720
2,143
Development of the career service program was initiated through the
Director's designation of a Career Service Committee of Agency officials,
and the establishment of a technical staff in the Personnel Office. The
Chief of this staff group serves as Executive Secretary to the Committee;
in addition, he provides general staff and coordinating leadership for
career service activities carried on throughout the Agency.
V. Where We Once Stood
In the past the size of the Personnel Office in the Central Intel-
ligence Agency has generally reflected a concept of personnel management
to process employment papers. However, even to operate in this limited
role, the staffing, of the Personnel Office had not been adequate to cope
with the demands resulting from the expanding character of the Agency's
organization. The skeleton btaff of personnel technicians had been so
preoccupied with day-to-day operating pressures that little, if any,
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attention was devoted to performing those functions which comprise a
truly constructive personnel job.
VI. There lie Now Stand
Actual appointments per month are not yet equal to the monthly
quotas set by the Personnel Office. However, when full productivity is
obtained from the present corps of recruitment officers (mcst of whom
have been newly employed by the Agency) these goals should be substantially
exceeded, so that by the end of the current fiscal year most of the
currently existing position vacancies, as well as those resulting from
employee turnover, should be filled or committed. In addition, the other
activities and operations of the Personnel Office have been staffed so
that they can be adequately geared to the expanded recruitment program.
The Agency's goal to establish a career service has crystallized into
a definite program, with the organization of a specialized staff body
within the office of the Personnel Director, responsible for giving
technical assistance to, and coordinating the work of, Agency offices
engaged in career development activities.
VII. V3hat Remains To Be Done
As the Personnel Office succeeds in obtaining personnel in adequate
numbers to meet the Agency's personnel requirements, considerable work
remains to be done to shape a program of sound personnel management within
CIA. It is recognized. that effective personnel recruitment cannot be
c'rried on in the place of continuing; and systematic in-service place-
ment work to ensure the b__est_us e of ?employees'k abtiea.. d capacities
in the organization. Personnel procurement and placement operations, in
particular, need to be correlated with training and career development
programs in order to create a framework within which employees may perform
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most competently. In collaboration with other Agency offices, considerable
effort must be devoted to installing the procedures through which the
Agency career service program can function effectively. These procedures
involve such aspects as appraisal of employee performance, and the identi-
fication and selection of personnel to participate in programs of job
rotation and training designed to expand the scope of their knowledges
and abilities in preparation for assuming increased responsibilities.
It will be necessary, also, to continue and to broaden steps which have
just been started to incorporate within the Agency personnel program
general responsibility for personnel operations pertaining to all types
of deep cover personnel, other than field agents and indigenous employees.
This extended responsibility will include such functions as recruitment,
selection, compensation, employee benefits and separations.
~ONE1~~-'
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