Differences in Organizational Culture

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Differences in Organizational Culture Heather J M Mathews University of Phoenix MPA 503 Public Administration Institutions and Processes William Humphreys October 17, 2023

Differences in Organizational Culture This essay is an analytical comparison of the CIA and the FBI. The following topics are discussed in-depth: the FBI and CIA culture such as their historical roots, the organizational structure changes, the 9/11 Commission, the leadership culture of the two agencies, other organizations, organizational performance and recommendations for improvement, and theories and concepts relating to the two agencies. FBI and CIA Culture: Historical Roots Discussed below are the historical roots of the different organizations and behavioral cultures present in the FBI and Cia and a thorough discussion of how these cultures affect their work, in both good and bad ways. The CIA has not always existed. Before World War I there was a lack of surveillance on foreign intelligence. The first agency to be started was the Office of the Coordinator of Information. It was not until after World War II that the President first realized the desperate need for and importance of intelligence gathering and clandestine operations. According to the Central Intelligence Agency (n.d.), “The Office of Strategic Services (OSS), our Agency's forerunner, was created during World War II and was America’s first global intelligence organization. OSS was capable of coordinated espionage, covert action, and counterintelligence- all of which are pieces of today’s CIA” (History of CIA). The OSS was later abolished and turned into the Strategic Services Unit (SSU) until the United States could figure out a more sustainable option (Central Intelligence Agency, n.d.). The SSU was later converted to the Central Intelligence Group (CIG) which was given authority to be able to go outside the limited scope they had available before. CIG was given the ability to conduct independent research and analysis, this allowed for them to go beyond coordinating intelligence to producing the intelligence needed.

The problem of this agency was the constraints placed by the Department of State and the armed services. According to the Central Intelligence Agency (n.d.), “The National Security Act of 1947 established CIA as an independent, civilian intelligence agency within the executive branch” (1947 September 18 The Central Intelligence Agency). This allowed the Agency the ability to monitor the Nation’s intelligence activities as well as allowing control over collecting, evaluating, and disseminating intelligence that would impact National security. The CIA organizational and behavioral culture affects their ability to perform their job because they work loosely around the law which can result in them being more susceptible to persecution under the law due to mistakes made during the investigation procedures and dependent on their techniques used during investigative interrogation procedures. The history of the FBI is not as illustrious as that of the CIA, but it is far more entertaining considering the grounds on which it was formed. The FBI was essentially put into place by President Teddy Roosevelt after Czolgosz’s Folly. Roosevelt had no tolerance of corruption or the “malefactors of great wealth”. According to the Federal Bureau of Investigation (2022), “He was a believer in the law and in the enforcement of that law, and it was under his reform-driven leadership that the FBI would get its start” (A Brief History: The Nation Calls, 1908-1923). The start of the FBI, however, did not fall as a Congressional Act, more of an act of disobedience by Charles Bonaparte after Congress charged Roosevelt as grabbing executive power which banned the loan of Secret Service operatives. The organizational and behavioral culture of the FBI affects their work in a positive way because they have less chance of prosecutorial issues when trying to go after the criminals they are trying to catch. This means that their cases tend to stick more permanently. Their history has allowed them more efficiency than the CIA due to the way they operate and how they got started.

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The FBI’s history had simple foundations that allowed for a modest easy start with some pretrained Secret Service agents. FBI and CIA: Organizational Structure The following is an in-depth discussion of how changes in the organizational structure of the FBI and CIA can produce changes in the organizational and behavioral culture and a thorough discussion of how likely is it that the two agencies will be able to change their cultures and develop effective communication strategies among the two agencies. Right off the rip there is an immediate difference between the FBI and the CIA websites. According to The Federal Bureau of Investigation (2022), “We protect the American people and uphold the U.S. Constitution” (para. 1). Essentially this breaks down to their most important goal is to protect American’s while at the same time making sure that the constitution is followed and abided by in the defense of American’s even if it is an American committing the crime. According to the Central Intelligence Agency (n.d.), “We are the Nation’s first line of defense. We accomplish what others cannot accomplish and go where others cannot go” (About the CIA). One states they are the first line of defense, while the other states that they protect the American people and uphold the constitution. Both protect American citizens, but one upholds the constitution as a primary goal. The two agencies have always been at odds due to their difference of goals. According to Kettl (2020) “For years, the two agencies had coexisted uneasily: the CIA focused on digging out information abroad on threats to the United States, while the FBI concentrated on dangers inside the country” (p. 197). The CIA operate on close boundaries to being almost nonlaw abiding; whereas the FBI operates closely to the law so that they can avoid any prosecutorial challenges when they catch

their man. The FBI is linear, and the CIA is nonlinear in the ways they approach their cases. The FBI is more formal and rigid in the way they approach each case. The CIA is more loosely programmed in the ways they handle their cases. The fact that these agencies run so differently makes communication between the two agencies difficult. 9/11 Commission The following discusses the 9/11 Commission proposal and if it is an effective idea or not. According to O’Connell (2006), “The attacks resulted, at least in part, from a massive breakdown in the intelligence system designed to identify threats to the nation’s security and to provide policymakers with sufficient information to protect against them” (p.1). The proposal would ultimately reconfigure the Executive and Legislative branches of the government and would streamline them into a more efficient and communicable set of operating branches. The 9/11 Commission made a proposal that would “contemplate a shift from decentralized, redundant agencies and decentralized, redundant oversight toward centralized, nonredundant agencies and centralized, nonredundant oversight” (O’Connell, 2006, p. 2). This would also provide a more united front for the agencies and help to avoid the lack of communication that has already occurred for the 9/11 attacks. These attacks could have been prevented if the FBI and CIA had communicated and cooperated based on information they had on hand. The issue is that unity has its costs and its benefits and the price to be paid may be higher than the benefit of the unity of each set of operations. According to O’Connell (2006), “Unification may encourage coordination across agencies and committees and reduce resources devoted to maintaining duplicative structures, among other benefits. Unification can, however, have costs as well: for example, destroying needed safeguards and eliminating beneficial agency or committee competition. Finding a desirable and politically feasible balance between

unification and redundancy is a difficult task, and a pressing one” (p.3). Ultimately, the different cultures of both agencies make it difficult to unite them, especially when they follow different methods of investigation. However, being united under a centralized advocate who can be called upon to combine the different gathered information into one report might make their communications more effective. Overall, it is the viewpoint of this author that the proposal is effective in the way it combines communication but ineffective in the fact that is does not offer solutions on how to cost effectively reduce certain agencies while maintaining the important safety protocols as they have been placed to protect the agents, agency, and their ability to perform their jobs with minimal interference. According to O’Connell (2006), “In short, the Commission called for a fundamental organizational shift in the federal government's national security intelligence work, from multiple, weakly coordinated intelligence bureaucracies and congressional overseers to a largely unified bureaucracy with just one or two congressional overseers” (p.11). One of the problems created by this proposal has been the clash between government agencies and the new Director of National Intelligence (DNI). The DNI has repeatedly taken staff from certain agencies and the agencies felt that this was a breach of power, and it has created a power struggle. FBI and CIA: Leadership culture The following is an evaluation of the leadership culture of the FBI and CIA, which includes a clear discussion of ways an organization’s culture might change. Both the FBI and CIA operate under autonomous leadership. According to Roberts (2009), “Autonomy refers to an agency’s ability to craft and implement a perspective independent of elected politicians and other agencies” (p.1-2). This means that they tend to operate outside of other governing bodies

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with little to no interference or consequence. According to Roberts (2009), The FBI exhibited a clear instance of autonomy when, with a view to its long-term responsibilities, it resisted remaking itself as a counterterrorism agency to the degree that politicians requested. The second case, involving the CIA, produced more mixed results. The agency appeared to exhibit autonomy by exercising its powerful security tasks, including control over information and covert operations, and by resisting a broad agreement for major organizational change. Nevertheless, its large number of administrative and analytical rather than executive tasks prevented the agency from developing the coherent, independent perspective that is part of full autonomy. The analytic organizations of the CIA had neither the reputation nor the executive authority to produce full autonomy. Though they are different in many respects (and the FBI is older), both agencies have had difficulty reorienting to better integrate domestic and international intelligence-gathering functions” (p.2). The FBI regulates itself closer to the law which allows them to have more autonomy than the CIA who operate close to being outside of the law. Other Organizations The following is a comparison of two other elected positions that fall into the executive branch and a thorough discussion of the leadership culture of each organization. The first organization to be analyzed is the National Security Agency (NSA). According to Patrizio & Richards (2021), “The National Security Agency (NSA) is a federal government intelligence agency that is part of the United States Department of Defense and is managed under the authority of the director of national intelligence (DNI)” (para.1). The NSA was created to intercept signals and report important communications to the military. This was done to create a unified cryptologic effort with the armed forces to act on critical military-related issues in support of national and tactical intelligence objectives. Most would view the NSA as a

government agency created to spy on American citizens themselves based on the kinds of surveillance that has been conducted in the past. The NSA is not an autonomous agency as it routinely is interfered with by politicians and their secret agendas. The second is the National Reconnaissance Office (NRO). According to the National Reconnaissance Office (n.d.), “NRO systems address the nation’s toughest intelligence challenges, providing information and perspectives unavailable from other sources” (About Us). The NRO is not an autonomous agency. They report to the director of national intelligence and the secretary of defense and operate under both Title 10 and Title 50 authorities. They receive their assignments from the Director of the NSA and Director of NGA (National Geospatial- Intelligence Agency). Organizational Performance and Recommendations for Improvement The following is a detailed overview of each organization’s performance and includes innovative recommendations for improvement where needed in the agencies. The FBI operates close to the law and with almost flawless execution. Their room for improvement would be streamlining their communications with other intelligence agencies to help further protect American citizens not only from internal threats but also external threats. The CIA operates loosely within the law which makes it harder on the judicial system to do its job. This is an area where the CIA could use improvement. It is important to get the criminal, but you also must make sure that the judicial system can do its job to prosecute that criminal and they cannot do that if the criminal was coerced into perjuring themselves. The CIA also needs to work on charing communications with other agencies in a more efficient manner. The fact that this agency has been reformed so much throughout history is an indicator that there is always room for improvement.

Conclusion In conclusion, this essay has discussed in-depth the historical roots of the FBI and CIA, their organizational structure changes, the 9/11 commission, the leadership culture of the FBI and CIA, two other organizations, the organizational performance and recommendations for change in the FBI and CIA, and theories and concepts that surround the organizational and behavioral cultures of each agency.

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References Central Intelligence Agency. (n.d.). We are the Nation’s first line of defense . Central Intelligence Agency. https://www.cia.gov/ Federal Bureau of Investigation. (2022, March 31). Welcome to fbi.gov . FBI. https://www.fbi.gov/ National Reconnaissance Office. (n.d.). We see from the perspective of stars . About NRO. https://www.nro.gov/About-NRO/ O’Connell, A. J. (2006). The Architecture of Smart Intelligence: Structuring and Overseeing Agencies in the Post-9/11 World. California Law Review , 94 (6), 1655–1744. https://doi.org/10.2307/20439079 Patrizio, A., & Richards, K. (2021, May 27). What is the NSA and how does it work? . Security. https://www.techtarget.com/searchsecurity/definition/National-Security- Agency#:~:text=The%20NSA%20is%20in%20the,information%20over%20to%20the %20military . Roberts, P. (2009). How Security Agencies Control Change: Executive Power and the Quest for Autonomy in the FBI and CIA. Public Organization Review , 9 (2), 169–198. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11115-009-0078-7

Differences in Organizational Culture

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