2003 IMTA Proceedings - International Military Testing Association

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Bureau of Investigation and others. These personnel supported the notion that supervisors
report more often than coworkers, but neither set of people reports much. They offered a
series of reasons why this should be so, and made some recommendations to improve the
situation. Security managers suggested the following reasons why people may not report:
Cultural resistance.
Negative perceptions of reporting and its consequences (to the reporter and to
the person reported).
Lack of knowledge and experience of security officers, supervisors, and the
workforce with reporting requirements.
Unclear relationships between security, employee assistance programs, and
other functions in the organization.
Focus Groups
Supervisors and coworkers in focus groups supported the managers’ estimates on
the frequency of supervisor and coworker reports. They noted their own reluctance to
report on their colleagues. Reasons for not reporting included:
Cannot see the nexus between certain reportable behaviors and national
security.
Fear they will cause people problems.
Fear that reported colleagues will be harmed because the system may not be
fair to them.
Fear that they will lose control once the report has been made to Security.
Fear of negative repercussions to themselves for reporting.
However, they are not resistant to reporting serious infractions. It is simply that
the DoD Directive 5200.2-R reporting requirements are perceived as being too broad and
amorphous and, thus, very difficult to implement. The regulation requires that supervisors
be trained in recognizing “indicators that may signal matters of personnel security
concern” and that supervisors and coworkers report “information with potentially serious
security significance.” While these phrases may have been clear to the original framers of
the directive, they are far from obvious to personnel in the field. Noted a supervisor, “We
need clearer rules about what should be reported up the chain.” However, even in the
absence of such guidance, supervisors and coworkers do intuitively distinguish between
behaviors that are directly related to national security (which they say they have no
problem reporting) and behaviors that are associated with reliability and suitability for
employment (which they are hesitant to report).
The single most important reason employees gave for seldom reporting is that
they personally cannot see the precise connection—the nexus—between certain
behaviors and national security. They said that they do not know where to draw the line
between egregious security-related behaviors and gray-area suitability or personal
behaviors—the kinds of problems that, while important, are seen as less critical in terms
of security risk management and are not directly linked in people’s minds with the
compromise of security or with espionage.
If the connection were made apparent, they said they would be more motivated to
report in order to protect their country and national security. In response to this concern,
PERSEREC subsequently developed a brochure that lists behaviors that always should be
reported if they become known. Reporting these behaviors requires no judgment calls.
The brochure is called Counterintelligence Reporting Essentials (CORE): A Practical
45 th Annual Conference of the International Military Testing Association
Pensacola, Florida, 3-6 November 2003