There has been a fair amount of discussion in the Transcript: 9/11 Commission Hearing on Law Enforcement, Counterterrorism on Knowledge Management, and the lack thereof in the FBI (compliments of the washingtonpost.com.)
The following is a portion of the staff chairman statement read by Christine Healey, on reforming law enforcement, counterterrorism, intelligence collection in the United States, specifically addressing Knowledge Management:
HEALEY: In the past, analysts were often promoted from secretarial and administrative positions, and they too often served as catch-all support personnel.
We spoke with analysts who were discouraged by the pace of reform. Indeed, we heard from many analysts who complained that they are able to do little actual analysis because they continue to be assigned menial tasks, including covering the phones at the reception desk and emptying the office trash bins.
As a consequence, many of the agents have very low expectation for the type of assistance they can get from analysts. Furthermore, there appears to be no process for evaluating and reassigning unqualified analysts.
To retain analysts, the FBI will have to provide them with opportunities comparable to those offered by other intelligence agencies.
The FBI reports that its counterterrorism analysis branch at headquarters has produced more than 70 strategic assessments. The demand for tactical analysis in executive-level briefings, however, has made it difficult for senior managers to focus their resources sufficiently on strategic analysis.
Knowledge management -- The terrorist attacks of September 11th revealed significant deficiencies in the FBI's information-sharing capabilities and processes, both with respect to sharing information internally with FBI components, as well as externally with intelligence and law enforcement partners at the federal, state and local levels.
While progress has been made in addressing these deficiencies, problems remain.
Information sharing within the FBI -- Although there are many explanations for the failure to share information internally, one of the most common is the FBI's outdated information technology, the automated case support system in particular. It employs 1980s-era technology that is by all accounts user-unfriendly. More troubling, the system cannot be used to store or transmit top-secret or sensitive compartmented information.
For a variety of reasons, significant information collected by the FBI never gets uploaded into the automated case support system or it gets uploaded long after it is learned.
K-Collector Topics: fair use Knowledge Management