Maybe in some jobs, but the FBI Director is not a position within the chain of advancement. It's (ostensibly) a 10-year appointed position, subject to the whims of the President (since Hoover, no one has served their full 10 years, with the sole exception of Robert Meuller who served 12 years thanks to a waiver granted by Congress. It's the difference between an appointed official and a career official. Those who aspire to advance within the FBI will advance to positions of task force heads, heads of field offices, and heads of divisions within the FBI. The position of Deputy Director is the zenith of advancement within the FBI, as that is not a presidential appointed position.
The biggest problem in choosing an FBI Director is that there are no set qualifications for the job. It's generally prosecution lawyers, judges, attorneys general, some with FBI special agent experience, but not necessarily. In the 45 years since Hoover's death we have had 14 FBI directors (appointed and acting). That's an average of 3.2 years per term. Picking someone outside of DOJ/FBI may be cause for them to be viewed as an outsider, but at 3.2 years per, it might not matter. It's the career people who run things, anyway. But that's why I think someone with a 20 year history at the FBI at various positions within the Bureau should be the primary candidates for the job. After that you start looking at people with 20 years experience as a federal prosecutor and/or 10 years on a federal court bench. It's those 20 year FBI people and the 20 year federal prosecutors and judges who have the most intimate knowledge of how the FBI works.
I'm not going to talk about what I do in John's chair when John is on a plane, out of town.Don't you hope to park your shell in John Elliott's chair someday?
