Enabling a Responsive and Agile Intelligence Enterprise

The IC has shifted from a Cold War footing in response to the evolving threats facing the United States and its allies. The Community faces a wide range of intelligence and analytic challenges with many unknowns – both traditional and asymmetrical. In addition, the rate of change is more rapid than ever. This combination of factors generates new intelligence challenges; as a transformational leader in the IC has said, “How do we solve problems that we have not yet conceived of?” In other words, how can a large, multi-tiered, and compartmentalized enterprise like the IC act with speed and agility? Large bureaucracies, by their nature, are typically slow and laden with process.

However, the IC has demonstrated it can operate effectively and quickly. One example is its role in the successful campaign to energize and support the Northern Alliance to overthrow the Taliban in Afghanistan in the winter of 2001.

Other examples include the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) Analytic Transformation

Initiatives (e.g. Mission Manager Concept, Rapid Analytic Support, and Expeditionary Response Teams) and the ODNI’s Rapid Technology Transition Initiative. The task now is to leverage these successes and accelerate transformation in other areas.

http://www.afcea.org/mission/intel/documents/SprinIntel08WP.pdf