What do you get if you cross a Greek Orthodox guy from Athens and a Jewish girl from Long Island; and then mix in two Ivy League degrees and a 26-year career in the Central Intelligence Agency? If you haven’t worked out that this refers to Marc, given that he is mentioned in the episode title, you can probably forget ever having a career in intelligence. Mark is brimming with vitality, chock full of stories, and can talk baseball and wings as well as the finer points of Algerian politics or US grand strategy in the Middle East. If you ever pull up a bar stool next to Mark: you’ve hit a home run!

Mark’s new book, Clarity in Crisis: Leadership Lessons From the CIA, distills the insights he derived from his career and is available in the International Spy Museum’s bookshop.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices