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Galaxy Program Offers Intensive Leadership Development for Guardian Officers, Civilians

  • Published
  • By Lisa Sodders, SSC Public Affairs
Guardians and government civilians looking to boost their USSF careers even higher have a unique opportunity via Space Systems Command’s Galaxy program, a junior force rapid professional-development program that provides a fast, flexible, rapid capability delivery experience for early career Space Force acquirers.

Members are tasked with advancing acquisitions solutions for operational gaps in under six months. Two cohorts move through the program every year; the next cohort, XIV, will run from early April 2026 to early October 2026.  

During the six-month program, Galaxy fellows visit critical USSF stakeholders and partners including intel, operations, Joint units, the Pentagon, Capitol Hill, Silicon Valley, and many industry partners. This global tour exposes Galaxy members to the breadth and depth of the USSF and defense ecosystem, giving them critical insights and perspectives early in their careers. By interacting with industry partners, Galaxy members learn how the USSF can better collaborate for mission success.

Participants also are assigned books on topics including leadership, decision-making, modern warfare and geopolitical issues to broaden their knowledge base.

They spend four months of the program tackling specific Lines of Effort (LOEs) at various program offices.

“SSC commander, Lt. Gen. Garrant, chooses his six most challenging acquisition problems for Galaxy cohorts to work on; this is where a company grade officer (CGO) or junior civilian can make a real impact over four months,” said Capt. Drake Williams, Galaxy cadre member, and former member of Galaxy Cohort IX.

“The outcomes we’re looking for are enhanced decision-making skills, learning how you can rapidly deliver capability with the acquisition system, accelerating the learning curve with hands-on expertise, and strengthening our partnerships with Capitol Hill, the Pentagon, and industry,” Williams said.

Recent Galaxy members have integrated artificial intelligence into operations, expanded Joint space operations, and embedded into cutting-edge Joint software teams, among other high-impact assignments.

“The program really intends to push you outside your comfort zone,” Williams said. “If you're in launch, you won't be assigned a launch LOE - we're going to put you in something like Space Sensing or Special Programs. We try to give you an experience that you wouldn't otherwise have and match you to a project that you will excel in, find value in, but also be incredibly challenged in.”

Williams said before he was in the Galaxy program, he worked in a large program office. He enjoyed the work but felt like a “cog in the machine” at times. He applied and was accepted to Galaxy IX and was tasked with awarding a follow-on contract to the Immersive Digital Facility.

“My LOE had me working on AI and Cloud, nothing like what I had previously worked,” Williams said. “Awarding the follow-on contract was an incredible, complex, and challenging process. There were a lot of stakeholders, a lot of expectations, and $20 million on the line.

“The more I worked it, the more I realized that if I did not put in the work, it simply would not get done,” Williams said. “I was given extreme ownership and responsibility there and that took me out of the ‘cog in the machine’ mindset and put me into the action officer, stakeholder, and mover mindset. It changed my career entirely. I’ve been working in that program for the past two years – and it’s been incredibly rewarding to feel like I am someone who can get things done and make real change in the U.S. Space Force.”

Capt. Jake Mendoza was in Cohort XII, and worked with the Tactical Surveillance, Reconnaissance and Tracking (TacSRT) program on developing a data analytic sandbox for his LOE.

“TacSRT leverages industry to build Operational Planning Products in support of Space Force Components and Combatant Commands,” Mendoza said. “Developing the data analytic sandbox served as a way to create a testing environment to validate and verify new industry analytic providers before supporting TacSRT.”

“Building the data analytic sandbox was an effort to bring in more industry partners to expand capabilities and it taught me how we can leverage small non-traditional industry companies,” Mendoza said.

Capt. Michael Forlife, who was in the Galaxy IX cohort, joined the U.S. Space Force as a U.S. Army IST (Interservice Transfer) and had served in the USSF for just a year at the time. He found the travel aspect extremely helpful.

Forlife explained, “Both as a junior CGO and an IST, to see what there was in the Space Force – what bases could I be assigned to? What units are there, both operationally and as an acquisitions professional? What are people doing and who can I support next in my service? It was incredibly helpful to get quickly spun up on the service and space enterprise as a whole, for professional development and improving job performance with an enterprise mindset.”

“I’ve gained multiple mentors from this program,” Forlife said. “All the bases, all the units we visited – senior leaders told us, ‘Hey, please reach out to us, long-term, six months, a year down the line, whenever you’d like, let us know where things are going and what you’re thinking of doing next.”

1st Lt. Kevin L. Chang, deputy program manager for Protected Tactical Waveform over Commercial, 1st Lt. Garrison Lagapa, deputy program manager for the Rapid On-Orbit Space Technology and Evaluation Ring with System Delta 89, and Capt. Gerald Hills Jr., System Engineering and Architecture lead for the Space Systems Integration Office (SSIO), are all part of the Galaxy XIII cohort, and recently completed seven weeks of travel around the world, visiting USSF installations and those of international allies and commercial industry partners in Hawaii, Korea, and Japan, as well as in the continental United States.

“Focusing on Hawaii, I think it set the stage for us for traveling the rest of INDOPACOM because they are the ones in charge of the whole Area of Responsibility (AOR) – they are the decisionmakers for what happens in Hawaii, Korea, Japan - everything from Hollywood to Bollywood,” Lagapa said. “It’s a big AOR, so getting that leadership perspective and how we feed capabilities into that AOR is interesting to see and learn.”

“While stationed at SSC in Los Angeles, I previously hadn’t had much exposure to end users or the combatant commands,” Lagapa said. “Being able to sit down with them, talk to them, get their perspectives is very different from our normal jobs. I’ve never learned so much about a combatant command before getting out to the actual people who are in that area, running those missions.”

Chang said he applied to the Galaxy program because he wanted to learn more about the wider USSF.

“I’ve been working at Tactical SATCOM for all four years I’ve been at SSC and I’ve always heard about the missile defense portion of what we do. I’ve heard about the intelligence collection that we do, about our international partnerships and I really wanted to delve a little deeper into that and see how it all ties back into the work that I do,” Chang said. “It helps make you a better officer overall when you have that 30,000-foot view over the entire Space Force.”

Hills, whose background is primarily in engineering, said he pursued the program to strengthen his understanding of acquisitions and the broader mission.

“I wanted to expand my perspective on what’s possible and gain firsthand exposure to mission areas I had mostly encountered from a distance,” Hills said. “Having a senior mentor in a part of the enterprise I hadn’t yet experienced directly was an opportunity to grow in a deliberate way.”

Applicants to the program can be CGOs (Second Lieutenant, First Lieutenant, and Captain) or government civilians (GS 11-13 or NH 02-03) with less than 10 years of acquisition experience, and hold a Secret or TS/SCI security clearance. They must have spent a minimum of one year on station and be willing to commit to the program fulltime.

The program looks for candidates who show initiative in their current job and who are identified as self-starters; have expertise in their current area but are seeking wider breadth; are risk-tolerant and capable of tackling hard problems.

“I just encourage anyone and everyone to apply,” Chang said. “It’s great for your career broadening and to help you understand what the Space Force does at a high level.”

 

 

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