Decision-making happens under increasing pressure to act fast even if the full picture isn’t there. This uncertainty is a reality intelligence analysts continuously face and must be comfortable with. Intelligence analysts are expected to shape awareness and provide decision advantage even when information is incomplete. In this environment, trust between analysts and decision-makers is both essential and fragile.
Professionalisation is a critical mechanism in strengthening this relationship. The expansion of the intelligence ecosystem now requires a wider endeavor, one that considers and includes to the conversation both the analyst and the decision-maker.
Professionalisation should not be confined to intelligence analysts alone, or reduced to the pipeline of certification-training-compliance. And professional standards ultimately derive legitimacy and impact only when they are mutually recognised and meaningfully integrate across roles.
Therefore, bringing analysts and decision-makers together to discuss professionalisation is a very powerful thing to do, especially as the aforementioned confinement can lead to misalignment amongst customers, decision-makers and analysis. In fact, one of the main obstacles to professionalisation lies in these relationships. When expectations are misaligned, that can undermine performance, collaboration and the quality of assessments produced.
At the i2 2026 Analyst & Decision-Maker Conference, this approach was put to the test. Participants at the conference engaged in a gamified reflective exercise to elicit a meta-reflection, gauging what intelligence analysts think…intelligence analysts think!
This exercise was based on a doctoral project interviewing and surveying intelligence analysts from the public and private sector to understand their views on professionalisation, standards and the adoption of new technologies - AI being naturally the elephant in the room.
Stuck between technophobia and technophilia, the study captures a complicated environment, a convergence point for all sectors, where professional standards are essential in keeping the profession integrous across groups and generations. All the while, intelligence analysts’ voice and agency are becoming ever so important as new labour dynamics emerge.
Participants in this exercise were divided into table groups and invited to collectively discuss and “guesstimate” the results of the study. Specifically, the were asked to anticipate how other analysts perceive meaning to professionalisation, job requirements, key obstacles and challenges, as well as the positive aspects of working in intelligence analysis across sectors.
The activity served as a closing, reflective exercise following a full day of workshops, presentations, and upskilling sessions. While initially met with some puzzlement, it also sparked curiosity. Participants were required to shift their mindsets and put themselves in the shoes of other intelligence analysts and their experiences. This approach encouraged deeper reflection on shared experiences and differences withing the profession.
Profesionalisation is understood as organisation and context dependent. It is challenging, complex, and sometimes contradictory. It is a privileged, uneven process, with a strong generational predicament.
While this session reinforced to an extent the ability for communities of intelligence practice to capture and anticipate responses of other communities of intelligence practice when it comes to the job requirements, the drivers and obstacles of professionalisation, as well as the shared positive experiences and aspects of the role day to day, there is still much work to do and bringing decision-makers into the conversation. Meanwhile, AI, tools, and the commercialisation of intelligence intensify noise in an already crowded information environment, placing additional responsibility on organisations and vendors to prioritise quality.
Ultimately, professionalisation calls for collective efforts in building a strong sense of community, where managers and decision-makers actively seek to understand the needs and gaps experienced by analysts, recognise the value they bring, and invest in building trust.
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