So, what exactly do you do for 3 days when you come to Houston for the Informant Management Course?

First and foremost, you are going to have fun learning and building skills you already possess! I think you will find the pace of the course enjoyable but also full of new concepts. No big deal if you don't grasp everything the first time around--we will go over whatever you need to discuss further during and after class, if necessary! Also, I am always available to you 24/7 for any clarification or new ideas you may have with informants or your cases.

On day 1 you start with learning how to locate a pool of potential confidential informant (CI) candidates to support your investigation(s). You will learn how to create a blueprint for the ideal informant, something very similar to a job qualifications posting to select the best available candidates utilizing a screening and rating sheet. After selecting three candidate informants for evaluation, you will further assess one of two candidate informants toward recruitment conducting two assessment/recruitment interviews. You will also participate in both a classroom and off-site elicitation exercise to assist with extracting impromptu information from the public in a friendly, non-alerting, and conversational manner. You will finish up with an off-site area familiarization exercise for the day 2 surveillance detection segment.

On day 2 you will resume with the second of two assessment/recruitment interviews. You will learn how to prepare contact/meeting plans to debrief your informants and direct CI evidence and intelligence collection. You will learn how to utilize surveillance detection methods before participating in a surveillance detection exercise attempting to determine whether you are, or are not being followed on the way to meet with your informant. You will finish up with learning the importance of implementing contingencies and cover stories, managing communication devices, and using electronic surveillance devices to collect evidence and intelligence to support your investigations.

On day 3 you start off taking the 45-question multiple-choice/true-false open-book examination. You will review eight versions of reports, selecting the best reports for submission to the investigative files. You finish up the day early after conducting a group exercise evaluating CI performance for continued operation or potential closure.

Of course, there is a lot of reinforcement, explicit detail and discussion in between but these are the collection of all main topics presented in the Informant Management Course over three days.