Spies in the Workplace

Today, we’ll take another trip in the Wayback Machine. This is a story I wrote for UTAH magazine in May of 1993.  Wow, how time flies.

“Know Thine Enemy”
— Sun Tzu “The Art of War”
China, circa 300 BCE.

Knowing as much as possible about the products and problems of your competition may save your company time, money and effort solving problems on your own. Welcome to the world of espionage, think and counter think.

The Society of Computer Intelligence Professionals (SCIP) based in Washington D. C. makes a science of finding out everything about the competition. “Every business has a spy.” Says a P. I. (private investigator) who is a member of SCIP. They don’t use the word ‘spy.’ They prefer to be called Business Librarians, Strategic Planners, or some other euphemism, but what they really do is spy on the competition. They know where the C.E.O. of your company went to school, what he/she likes and what direction he will take given a particular set of circumstances.

Competitive intelligence is the underbelly of an otherwise legitimate business discipline. “Let’s say a client hires me to find out all I can about a new disc drive being developed in Silicon Valley,” says the SCIP guy. “Do I get hired as a janitor or place someone as a receptionist? No, I spend a week or two going to every bar within 5 miles of the plant. Get to know the bartenders. Find out who drinks there. Every company has a hangout. People like to be with people they know and talk about things they have in common. When I find out where the company or department drinks, I start going there. I join the softball team. I guarantee within 30 days they will tell me anything, because they are excited about what they’re doing. Of course they’ll say it’s confidential, but engineers have inquiring minds, and they’re not capable of not talking about their work. The European idea of putting a woman in bed is passe’. Just buy him a drink and ask what he’s working on.”

LOOSE LIPS

It seems Americans are much more open with information than their European or Asian counterparts. Kellogg in Battle Creek, Michigan used to give plant tours to school children and serve Froot Loops on ice cream at the end of the tour. Before long kids were being crowded out by heavily accented European and Asian men taking notes. Kellogg tried to ban note taking, but the men started coming on every tour memorizing model numbers of machines and plant layouts. Finally, the company stopped all tours.

“In other countries, it’s part of the culture that no one talks,” says the P.I.
“If you go to a party at the Bulgarian embassy, it’s taken for granted that everything is bugged. Once you leave Foggy Bottom though, no one believes it’s done here. A company in Silicon Valley used to throw lavish parties for the hottest engineers and software writers in the industry. It was an honor to be invited. You get 150 hot shots drinking in a room, and of course they’re going to impress each other with what they’re working on. The morning after the party the host is happily editing the tapes of every conversation. The human voice operates in a very narrow range, and it’s very easy to eliminate carpet scrub, glasses clinking, and the sound of the band. Whatever the parties cost (and it was a lot!) it was paid back easily in information. The ‘Embassy Party’ is the oldest trick in the book, and it worked like a charm!”

The Europeans aren’t immune to competitive thrusts however (don’t ya love that phrase!). A classic case is a placement firm that specializes in putting high level executive spies in the board rooms of their client’s competition. If firm A wanted to bug firm B, it would arrange to have the placement firm find a job for one of A’s “unhappy executives” extolling the value of all the knowledge of A he would bring with him. B would pay a high price for the “turncoat” who would then siphon information from B and deliver it in exchange for a second salary to firm A.

Neat deal.

If you think this sounds like something the C.I.A. would be interested in, you would be right. Atlanta based Business Risk International is a worldwide organization peopled with ex-CIA, FBI and Secret Service agents. They are tasked with finding leaks in firms doing business with the US Government, particularly the Defense Department. “Almost anything is available if you know where to look,” says an agent who prefers to remain anonymous.

Some tips for the first-time spy / counter spy.

Knowledge is power. The more you know about your target and the person in the company likely to help you the easier your job will be. If he/she is an engineer, be an engineer. If he’s ex-military, be ex-military. Americans really do like to be helpful, and you are about to play on that admirable trait. Be prepared to explain how you got their name, and make your contact the solution to your problem.

You need him!

VERY IMPORTANT…You must be able to distill your quest into one pivotal question. Once you have that pivotal question, and the lowest person on the organizational chart who is likely to have your answer, you are ready for the kill shot.

My first job out of college was with a chemical company that made ABS plastic. Management wanted to know about how much ABS plastic our chief competitor was selling … VERY closely guarded information. In an extended coffee drinking session one morning, myself and a couple of other no goods came up with a plan to find out.

One of our female cohorts called the rail yard supervisor of our target company, pretending to be the editor of a material handling magazine, and asked him how he safely handled the highly flammable, explosive and carcinogenic rail cars of butadiene in his rail yard. He couldn’t wait to tell her what a great job he was doing, including how many cars a week he unloaded and how he stored and handled the material. Since we made the same A.B.S. (acrylonitrile, butadiene, styrene) compound, we easily deduced their monthly volume in finished product, and also picked up some valuable manufacturing tips.

Well, good luck in your new role as an industrial spy… but to paraphrase Sun Tzu, “When you bend over to look up your enemies’ skirt, be aware of your own skirt.”

Until next time, thanks for listening.
Duane