Michele Assad
Former Intelligence Officer,
National Clandestine Service, CIA
www.michelerigbyassad.com
My first overseas experience was right after I turned 18 years old. I went on a mission trip to Egypt to volunteer at an orphanage and then to Russia, Ukraine, Egypt, Israel and Palestine.
One step of faith after the other, and I found myself throwing my resume into a bin in the Career Center labeled, “CIA.” It landed on top of hundreds of other student resumes. At that time, I was working on my master’s degree in Arab Studies at Georgetown University. To my utter surprise, several weeks later I received a series of phone calls from Agency recruiters…Years later, after many ups and downs and painful employment processing, I was scheduled to begin training as a Clandestine Recruit in January 2002. Soon after I learned this incredible news, the planes hit the World Trade Towers and the Pentagon and I immediately knew that all of those years of travel and study had been preparing me for this highly unique mission: the work of a counterterrorism officer in the CIA.
As a woman there is a soft undercurrent of bias that exists in the world of intelligence and security that women are not suited to the task of working with terrorism sources or planning and executing counter-terrorism operations. Furthermore, there is a general assumption (made by people of all stripes) that if you are nice, smiley, or friendly, then you are not sophisticated in your understanding of the world, unable to operate in difficult environments, or unsuitable to go against some of the most manipulative and challenging sources in the world.
My friendliness often gets mistaken for naivety, but that could not be further from the truth. Of course, I can’t help what people think or assume about me—none of us can. So I have learned how to take those disadvantages and turn them into advantages: Go ahead. Underestimate me, but in the process of mis-assessing my skills and experience, I will achieve my objectives in a very subtle but highly effective way. Most often, the other person doesn’t realize what’s happening. My emotional intelligence is far higher than people assume and I have been able to figure out how to use my interpersonal skills, intuitive nature, and personality to get what others cannot. Intelligence work is not a game of brawn, but a game of the mind, and it takes intuitive people to do it well.
Until you put your training to use, you have no idea how it’s going to work out, in addition to the jittery feeling of “starting a new job,” I was extremely nervous knowing that I was about to engage very capable and street smart sources. These guys could determine very quickly whether you knew your stuff. They are no fools. If you have risen to the ranks of being an amir or insurgent leader, then you have the wits to be able to manipulate and control others. You can read people quickly and determine whether you can walk all over them, or whether you are willing to put your life in their hands.
The other wild card was the understanding that these men would only see me as a pretty female with whom to flirt, not an intelligence officer with whom to work. They would not think I was smart or experienced, and I had to prove to them, very quickly, that I was a person with whom they should partner. I had to establish a strong sense of trust with them to get them to provide sensitive intelligence—they had to know that I could handle this information and not blow their cover.
Still, predominately surrounded by men, I have encountered the same issues I have always faced. I have tried and tested methodology for establishing my professionalism and getting good results. I live and breathe counterterrorism, security, foreign affairs, and culture.
My hope is to inspire women to realize that they are also capable of performing the extraordinary things that they could have never imagined. As women we have to stop selling ourselves short. We have to trust our inner intuition… to walk us in the direction the Divine has set out for us. It is when we push past our fears that we discover the inner treasures about ourselves that we never knew. And this is when we begin to understand our calling and life’s purpose.
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