The Need for Improvement: Integrity, Ethics, and the CIA

Abstract

While these diverse voices from across the CIA are addressing different issues from at times divergent perspectives, they are linked by a common concern for the integrity of the organization. This concern speaks both to effectiveness and to ethics, to how capably we achieve our mission and how honorably we go about doing it. The two, of course, are intimately linked; over time, even the most effective organization will be tripped up or eaten away by unethical behavior. At a moment when the Agency is engaged in numerous efforts to improve its effectiveness, ethical issues are also much on people's minds. In a series of conversations with people from throughout the Agency, it was the four broad issues addressed by the speakers quoted above-issues of ideology, dissent, failure, and management-that I heard about most often as challenges to our integrity as an organization, and as critical determinants of our ability to navigate the potential minefield of ethics.

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Document Details

Document Type
Technical Report
Publication Date
Jan 01, 1998
Accession Number
ADA525099

Entities

People

  • Kent Pekel

Organizations

  • Central Intelligence Agency

Tags

Communities of Interest

  • Human Systems

DTIC Thesaurus Topics

  • Accountability
  • Business Administration
  • Careers
  • Case Studies
  • Cold War
  • Commerce
  • Education
  • Espionage
  • Instructors
  • Lessons Learned
  • Management Personnel
  • Organizational Structure
  • Personnel Management
  • Psychology
  • Students
  • Training
  • United States

Readers

  • Military History of the United States in the 20th Century.
  • Systems Analysis and Design