Via FAS – CRS report – The U.S. Intelligence Community: Selected Cross – Cutting Issues, Anne Daugherty Miles, Analyst in Intelligence and National Security Policy. April 12, 2016.

“This report focuses on cross-cutting management issues that affect the Intelligence Community’s (IC’s) ability to counter “pervasive and emerging threats” to the United States and balance resources both appropriately and wisely. As the IC’s senior manager, these issues ultimately fall within the Director of National Intelligence’s (DNI’s) area of responsibility. The DNI is charged with integrating the community of intelligence agencies so that they operate effectively as one team. There are no easy solutions to the challenges examined in this report. The IC’s efforts to demonstrate progress are hampered by difficulties such as the IC’s diffuse structure—a confederation of separately managed component parts; the unique demands of operating in secret; the interrelationships between many issues; and diminishing resources. The issues selected for examination in this report were chosen because they affect a number of agencies and are widely discussed by professionals within and external to the IC (and are not so complex that they need their own separate report)…Polygraphs – Although polygraphs are required by every agency, their reliability and validity are questionable. As the IC moves toward CE, are they still necessary?…”