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would be dropped from the course at any time. These were never easy choices to make.
Up until the end of selection, we had spent most of our time in and around the main house which was acting as the STS. Training changed all that; the candidates, instructors and camera crew all discovered the joys of the Scottish Summer in the Highlands. Midges, rain and wind made the next few weeks ‘interesting’. Trying to teach on a mountain top in the rain reminded me of the days when Ex DYNAMIC VICTORY was run in the South of Scotland, with the additional joy of the director asking if we could do a piece to camera again, so he could get an alternative shot! The candidates pushed themselves further than I expected during this phase, overcoming their fears and at times their physical limits. All the time they were being instructed and watched over by a range of experts, from whom we all learnt a lot about the skills required by SOE agents.
At the end of the process, it was interesting to see how the candidates had come together as a team. It was obvious observing them that they had started accounting for the strengths and
weaknesses within the teams that we allocated them. From my perspective it was interesting to see how selection had progressed from the early process developed ‘off the hoof’ by the SOE and selection at AOSB for example. I was also struck by the idea of selecting for teams rather than just individual leaders.
At the end of filming it was a relief to get back to the 21st Century, especially being able to grow my hair back! I’d enjoyed my time in the SOE and I was very pleased with the finished programme. I learnt a lot about the early psy- chologists involved in military selection. I had new concepts to think about in my own prac- tice and teaching, and I have been asked for my autograph... once!
I was a bit nervous going into the world of TV, but it has allowed me to engage with an audience wider than just the Cadets at RMAS. I have been invited to give talks, write articles, and engage in several events around the country that allow me to discuss the role of important psychology in the military, all from appearing on Secret Agent Selection: WW2.
Special Operations Executive Selection
Last year I was approached by a television production team asking whether I would be interested in a project to recreate the train-
ing and selection of Special Operations Execu- tive agents in the Second World War. As a mili- tary psychologist, involved in training officers, I jumped at the chance to investigate the early input psychologists had in selection and training of these agents.
The use of psychometrics in the military at the time was focused on specific aptitude testing, mostly for job specialism (Vernon and Parry, 1949). There would still be a need to assess for competency in skills, such as Morse code and wireless operation, but there was also much more to being an agent.
Dr Mike Rennie First Published in The Psychologist May 2018
Also to be considered was the range of back- grounds of the men and women being recruited, not the usual population military selection was aimed at.
As to the production itself, there were a num- ber of issues that needed to be addressed. One was that records were destroyed after the war. Another was that in the early days of the SOE, the Conducting Staff were creating the process as they went along and only after agents had returned from the field could their feedback inform the selection process.
Books like M.R.D. Foot’s SOE 1940-1946 and Secret Agent by David Stafford, provided us with insight as to the activities and personalities
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