CIA releases Diversity and Inclusion Strategy for 2016-2019

On February 9, CIA released its Diversity and Inclusion Strategy for 2016-2019 (PDF 639 KB), which presents a unified roadmap for diversity and inclusion goals, actions, and accountability measures at CIA over the next three years. This strategy builds upon the foundational work of the Director’s Advisory Group on Women in Leadership (PDF 179 KB) and the Diversity in Leadership Study (PDF 152 KB), which identified barriers and factors that undermined greater diversity and inclusion within CIA’s workforce and leadership ranks.

In a statement made in connection with the release of the strategy, CIA Director John Brennan said: “Excellence in foreign intelligence demands broad perspectives, both in our understanding of a complex world and in our approach to challenges and opportunities. Broad perspectives come from diversity in thought, ethnicities, backgrounds, and experiences. Embracing and leveraging diversity through an inclusive culture fosters innovation, new ideas, and new insights which is at the heart of what we are charged to do and is what will drive mission success.”

The Diversity and Inclusion Strategy lays out the three key goals below to ensure that every CIA officer is able to bring a full range of views and talents to the CIA mission. This will help CIA become increasingly capable of closing persistent intelligence gaps and provide unique insight and support to its customers.

• Weaving diversity and inclusion throughout the talent cyclefocuses on performance management, talent development, and learning to prepare employees and managers to fully benefit from a diverse and inclusive workplace.
• Becoming an employer of choicefocuses on enriching our workforce by recruiting in diverse communities across America and cultivating an inclusive culture that encourages collaboration, flexibility, and fairness to create an organization that is a model employer for the full diversity of America’s talent.
• Increasing diversity of leadershipfocuses on training current leaders, managers, and supervisors to develop every officer’s potential to prepare a diverse bench of future Agency leaders.

CIA’s Chief Diversity and Inclusion Officer Maja Lehnus emphasized transparency and accountability in a statement about the strategy: “We will regularly report to the workforce our progress and setbacks and will be transparent about where we are today and where we intend to go.” She also added that the success of the strategy is the responsibility of all Agency officers and asked the workforce to consider what they can do to ensure CIA leadership recognizes and leverages the diverse abilities of the workforce.

Source: CIA