Career Service Program

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP80-01826R000500190012-8
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: S
• Document Page Count: 6
• Document Creation Date: December 9, 2016
• Document Release Date: August 16, 2000
• Sequence Number: 12
• Publication Date: January 26, 1954
• Content Type: MF

- Approved For Releaise 2001/04/0 ? P80-01
26 January 1954
MEMORANDUM FOR: Director of Central Intelligence Agency
SUBJECT : Career Service Program
-
1. The purpose of this memorandum is to report to you the status
of the Career Service Program, and to obtain your approval of certain
steps *which should be taken to reorganize the present system of career
management.
2. The following major developments have been accomplished lathe
Career Service Program since 1 July 1953:
a. A legislative task force was established to examine
those aspects of employee benefits which could not be accomplished
agieleistratively. This group has finished its work. The CIA
Career Service Board has studied its report in detail and forwarded
it to you with its Approval. It recognized that the appropriate time
should be Chosen for submission of this legislation to Congress.
It is my opinion that it should not be submitted in the present
session. However, regardless of when it is submitted the study has
been made and the findings and recommendations and legislation pro-
posed willte valid in the future.
b. The Senior Executive Inventory has been completed. This
required the nomination by the top 70 executives in the Agency of
individuals coneMeredqualfied to be their successors. These
names were in turn reviewed by the Deputy Directors. The result
is approximately 200 names, now asseMbled in a loose-leaf notebook
for your use. It should be noted that a tremendous amount of work
was rewired to assemble the biographic data on these individuals,
in many instances still incomplete, due to the chaotic condition
of the personnel files. To insure proper security for the Registry,
the material was prepared in this office.
c. The charter of the Professional Selection, Panel was com-
pletely rewritten. Inasmuch as this is one of the important aspects
ef the proposed reorganization, it will be dealt with later.
d. An insurance task force has cleared actuaries surveying
types of insurance available to agency employees. This program
may result in a, more beneficial form of insurance for employees
and produce an added incentive for making a career with CIA. It
can proceed regardless of the organization of the Career Service
Program.
'Yr
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e. AWomen's Panel and a Junior Officer's Task Force have
prepared reports relating to the problems of women and junior
officers in making a career with CIA. Their reports have been
studied by the CIA Career Service Board. Any beneficial results
from these two studies will coee from the Personnel Office and
from the supervisors.
f. A task force commenced the preparation of &paper to
inform eepaoyees "What a Career in the CIA Means to You. It is
important that such a paper be produced. The leek of knowledge
about the career service program is very great overseas, and is
also epparept in Washington.
g. The CIA Career Service Board has ho Career Development
Slots assigned to it. These slots enable eeployees to take
external training or a tour, of duty with another office without
encumbering a elot in the parent office, although the parent
office must guarantee to have a slot open upon the employee's
return. The fact that there are still many of these slots open
is indicative of a lack of interest in career development or
encouragement of rotation among the offices.
h. The C/A Career Service Board worked with the Honor
Amaras Booed in developing a system of awards for meritorious
or valorous service. This has now been accomplished and there
is no purpose to be served for continued affiliation between
these Boards.
1. The CIA Career Service Board intereeted itself in
nominations for the Harvard School for AdvanmedManaemment and
tbe senior schools of the military services. The lack of interest,
particularly in the DD/P Area, in nominating candidates for these
sehools is also indicative of a lack of interest in career
development.
j. There are 25 other Career Service Boards in the Agency
besides the CIA Board. These include beards for all of the offices,
the DD/P staffs plus a, DD/P, DD/I and DD/A Board. These Boards
have fnnctioned with varying degrees of effectiveness and
authority. In many cases the Beards are purely advisory to the
office or staff chief; in others the Boards, in effect, have more
influence. Unfortunately tbe Bearda have concerned themselves
largely eith matters of prcmotion, transfers, etc.--personpel
actions previously handled on a routine basis by executive action
of the individual offices. There is no indication that creation
of "career service boards" has Improved these actions anly.
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k. The CIA Career Service Board has att,14?ted to arbitrate
a differenee of opinion between the rzo/A and DD I Boards. The
DCA Board holds that all administrative personnel in the DD/I
Axes should have career designations to DD/A Carter Service Boards,
e.g., &personnel officer in ORR would have a career designation
to the Personnel Office rather than ORR. There is an almost
unanimity of opinion against this in the DD// Area. In the DD/P
Area most administrative officers have accepted ropi career
designations, although it should be noted that this vas done with
somewhat of a shotgun Approach--they were told to either take ad-
ministrative designations or be prepared to explain in six months
Why they were in administrative positions.
3. It is my opinion that the following major defects now exist
with the CIA Career Service Program:
a. There are too many Career Service Boards and they are
improperly constituted. A career service board for each office
has simply continued office nationalism and done nothing to further
making CIA a career. The nuWber of boards creates a esate in
executive manpower for the participants and in clerical time for
support.
b. The career service boards devote the bulk of their time
today to matters that should be handled differently. ?mentions
should be a matter for intra-agency board's, not bordsT
later-office rotations or transfers cannot be handled on a
unilateral basis by an office board and therefore becomes a caae
of inter-office negotiation, or "slave mart" transactions by the
individual.
c. With the exception of one or two offices there is little
career planning by the Beards, yet this is one of the most
*portant aspects of career service and one of the most neglected
parts of career development. The lack of career planning is
smcbably the greatest single factor in poor morale in the Agency.
More and more eeployees are leaving the Agency because they don't
know vhat future there is in CIA.
d. The career service boards have served to dissipate both
the authority of the supervisors and of the Personnel Neregement.
It should be noted that the major single zees= for the creation
of a Career Service Program vas the failure of both the Personnel
Office and the supervisors in the Agency in personnel management.
But it is my opinion that continuation of a large number of career
service bcerda viii not solve the prdblem of personnel management--
for which the Personnel Office should be held responsible for policy
and the supervisors for ineammentation.
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e. As is natural in a government the career service boards
have tended to become paper-mills. The amount of paperwork done
by the various boards varies, but generally speaking it bas
gotten beyond either reason or value.
4. It is recommended that the following steps be taken to reorgan-
ize the Career Service Program:
-e,?7--
--p.,,,ouc_, a. All of the office career service boards beraleateNed and
in their stead be created five professional boards, namely: Intelli-
--IL-7 v7'---- gence OperaionsA Administration, Trallqug and Commuuications.
11-kfrelyce-444,e-616
b. The nueber of career designations be reduced from 26 to 5--
I. as above. However, there should be a limited nuther of sub-desig-
natio= such as Analyst, Researcher, ariartiii uuder Intelligence; 25X1A-
P5ycho1o8ica1, Espionage, and Paramilitary under Cperations; Person-
nel, Fiscal, Logistics umierildsinistration.Pocm cui