I don’t own a rearview mirror and I don’t look back.

There is a temptation to coast on their laurels, on their ‘secret squirrel’ status as an ex-spook, and that doesn’t work.

When that happens, I think it is due to a failure on the part of the former Agency person to adapt to their new role. “We both know people who have come out of the Agency, tried to work in the private sector, and crashed and burned. When asked about the transition to the private sector and how his Agency skills applied, Chris was candid. I can attest first-hand that he was a dynamic boss and even at the end of his Agency career, possessed of an energy level that would shame the Energizer Bunny.) (Full disclosure: Chris was one of my last Chiefs of Station before I left the Agency myself. The second was Ren Stelloh, who until July 2012 was CEO of PhaseOne Communications, a California strategic-messaging company. The first was Chris Burgess, now COO and CSO of Atigeo, a Bellevue, Washington firm focused on mining Big Data.

I asked the two former Chiefs how the skills they developed as field officers for the CIA translated to the more entrepreneurial existence of the private sector. A COS is the president’s senior intelligence officer and personal intelligence representative in the country where he or she is serving.

How do you become a spy agent