How to attack ANY PROBLEM like a FBI Investigator

*PROBLEM – something you are trying to solve, a business you want to start, a trip you want to plan, planning to pay off your credit card, creating a new product for your existing business, etc. (when I use PROBLEM in this post, I am referring to any and all situations that you want to do, but do not know how to do successfully at the moment)

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​This blog stems from a conversation I had with a friend of mine that works in the FBI on criminal investigations.  She was interested in starting a boxing program for youth that might be non-profit or part of a city program.  She wanted to charge right in to the Chief of Police to ask to start the program right away, but realized that she might need a little more advice before taking that action.  She came to me for advice.
 
I am a busy person, so my first suggestion was to treat the process of creating the boxing gym in the same way she would treat an Investigation she was doing as part of the FBI.  However, it was not easy for her to think about the steps of investigation she used in the FBI and apply them to creating a city youth boxing program.  As we had the conversation and I walked her through the steps, likening each one to an investigation step she would take in her job, the plan of attack became clearer to her.
 
Going through this process with her made me realize that a lot of people have the skills to solve any PROBLEM they encounter.  They just cannot transfer the skills they have for solving a PROBLEM in one sector of their life to another sector.  Out of that realization, this Blog post was born.

​1. Identify a Subject

• In the FBI, a suspect/subject will be identified through a tip or as part of another investigation.  Unlike the NSA that is just collecting more and more data and possibly looking for patterns, the FBI narrows its focus to a specific investigation and tries to solve it
• The first thing any Investigator must do is identify the PROBLEM.  Until you know what you are trying to do or figure out, you will just be running around blind.  No one wants to be running around blind or wasting their time, so start at the beginning and decide with some specificity what PROBLEM you are trying to solve.

​2. Learning about the Subject

• In the FBI, there may already be a tip.  The Investigator needs to start with the tip and try to learn as much as possible based on what they were given already.  Then the Investigator will directly learn more about the subject. They may pull government records, make a chart of the subject’s family members and friends, etc.
• For you as an Investigator, this will probably start with some reading.  Start with Google or a Wiki to understand the basics about your PROBLEM.  Then read more specialized articles in the area of your PROBLEM.  Finally, if you have someone that you know who has solved the same or similar PROBLEM, ask them what they know about the PROBLEM.

​3. Identify Contacts

• In an FBI investigation, they agents are looking for contacts of the subject.  This maybe to see if a low level subject answers to someone above that the FBI is more interested in, or it may be to see who the subject works with and see if any of those people could become a confidential informant (a CI) for the FBI, that will help them build their case from the inside.
• In this step, you are looking for other people that can help you solve your PROBLEM.  This could mean finding a mentor or a coach; it may also mean finding someone more experienced in the area of your PROBLEM who is willing to give you advice.  You can ask these contacts about how to get started addressing your PROBLEM, or how they got started when they began addressing their PROBLEM that is similar to your own.  The contacts you make will be of huge value, because they will provide information to help you start, and can help you avoid making mistakes that they have made in the past.

​4. Identify any peripheral contacts that may be involved

• Once the FBI has identified primary contacts, they begin to look for other contacts at the periphery.  These contacts may not know that they are helping the subject in some way, or they may be observing from a distance, so they know some information, but not everything.  When the FBI is building a case, these peripheral contacts my only provide a tiny piece of the story, but they still have value because they fill the holes in the case.
• These people exist for those solving a PROBLEM too.  It might be talking to a lawyer, an accountant, and/or a government official.  These people may not be as valuable or as exactly on target as one of your contacts, but they can provide specialized information about one area of how to solve your PROBLEM.

​5. Investigate the financial implications

• The FBI investigators that are “on the ground” send the suspect out to the financial investigations department if they find a credible threat in their suspect. 
• The same procedure applies to your PROBLEM.  The investigation you have been doing so far has been free, most likely.  Now you have to look at your PROBLEM and see how much it will cost to solve (we differ here from the FBI because they are following the money trail, and we are investigating the costs to us).  You need to look at all the costs, the ones up front and the ones down the line.  If it is a PROBLEM that you are solving in order to make money, then you might need to do some serious thinking about whether or not what you plan to do is financially viable.

6. Surveillance 

• A lot of what FBI investigators do (while finding contacts and all of the previous steps) involves observing the actions of the suspect to build the case.  Where do they go, who do they meet, where are they spending money, what are they buying, etc.?  All or some of these details may become important in forming the case against the suspect.
• You want to do the same thing… observe.  Look at other solving the PROBLEM, see and understand the whole process.  This is where you pick up the details and figure out what works and what doesn’t.  By observing what others are doing, you will be able to know enough to put the details in place for your plan to solve the PROBLEM.

​7. Create a plan for what happens next

• In the FBI, the investigator and Attorney in the Department of Justice will be taking all the pieces of research, learning, observation, contacts, etc. to see if they have built a case and if they are ready to go in front of a grand jury for an indictment.
• The plan you create to solve your PROBLEM will be different depending on what the PROBLEM is… you probably would have even been putting pieces of the plan together along the way.  If you want to start a business, you would be making a business plan.   If you want to take a vacation, you’ll be making an itinerary.  The key thing here is to take all you have learned so you are able to execute the plan smoothly and smartly.

​8. Cut through the red tape

• Yes, there is always red tape.  Supervisor approval, getting a jury indictment… Red tape exists in the FBI.  However, agents prepare to get through the red tape and have all of their ducks in a row, in order to take the case through to a conviction.
• A lot of time, if you have a big plan you will have to get licenses or permits from all different levels of government.  You may need to make purchases to put your plan into order.  This step is often the most annoying step in the entire process of solving your PROBLEM, but if you don’t cut through the red tape now, it will come back and hurt you later.

​9. Execute the Plan

• For the FBI, this is when the Department of Justice Attorneys either strike a deal or have a case in front of the jury for the case on the subject that they started with identifying way back in Step 1.
• You’ve jumped through the hoops, you know what to do, now go out and do it.  Just remember, that not all plans are fool proof, so also be ready to roll with the punches and make adjustments to the plan as necessary so you can solve that PROBLEM.

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