July 9, 2007
When Evan Lesser hears officials lament the lack of skilled linguists in the intelligence community, he gets frustrated. That's because he knows where to find about 2,000 Arabic speakers, 475 who can speak Farsi and another 250 or so who know Pashto. Lesser has their résumés, and is trying to find them new jobs.
He is the founder and director of ClearanceJobs.com, a Web site that matches employers with U.S. citizens who already have government security clearances. It's important to emphasize that last part: ClearanceJobs will not post a résumé from anyone who doesn't already have an active clearance with a government agency, which is hard to get and can take more than a year. In effect, these people -- who speak the languages the intelligence community needs most in its repertoire -- have overcome the biggest barrier to entry in the spy business.
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Given everything Lesser has to offer, one might imagine intelligence hiring officials would have long since beaten down his door. But the response has been tepid.
It's not so much uninterest, Lesser thinks, but red tape. Large companies, such as IBM, haveused ClearanceJobs and "within a day start making hires," he says. "The government is not so easy." The hiring process at a federal agency is a drawn-out, regulated affair, requiring longer applications and more background checks.
The government also runs its own recruitment site, USAJOBS.gov, so it could be that agencies are just more comfortable using that resource. Intelligence divisions also have their own electronic job boards to which applicants can submit résumés. But those people don't necessarily have security clearances, and once they're hired, the employees effectively are sidelined as they wait for them.
