International cooperation

What the CIA and Britain's MI6/SIS should learn from each other

Like any major organization, a spy service must constantly endeavor to improve. But unlike most other industries, learning from competitors is not that easy in the spy business. After all, organizational methodology and operational tactics are some of an intelligence service’s most closely guarded secrets.

But there are two human-intelligence focused spy agencies can learn from each other: the CIA and its British equivalent agency, the Secret Intelligence Service. With many shared interests, these two services work together to define the special relationship between the two countries. Only the NSA and its British equivalent, GCHQ work more closely together. Thanks to that trust, the two services have the ability to scrutinize each other for their own improvement.

For a start, the SIS could learn from the CIA’s recent focus on expanding its workforce diversity. While the SIS is focusing more on the espionage benefits of this diversity, it should copy the CIA and appoint a diversity-lead who has open-door access to the SIS chief Alex Younger. Doing so would emphasize diversity not just as an institutional priority but as a mission necessity.