EL SEGUNDO, Calif. -- Space Systems Command (SSC) welcomed Ms. Natalie Riedel to the Command’s executive director seat in February 2026, at Los Angeles Air Force Base, California
A member of the Senior Executive Service, Riedel is the most senior ranking civilian of a workforce of over 15,000 military, civilian and contractor personnel across close to 30 operating locations with a more than $19 billion annual portfolio of agile, integrated and resilient space capabilities that address critical national imperatives and joint warfighter requirements.
Prior to this position, Riedel was the director of contracting for SSC and the head of contracting activity for the USSF from 2021 to 2026. In that position, she was responsible for more than 2,570 contracts valued at $81 billion and the career development and training of approximately 250 military and civilian contracting professionals.
Recently, Riedel sat down with SSC Public Affairs at the Field Command’s Los Angeles Air Force Base headquarters to talk about her current role and what’s ahead for the U.S. Space Force’s acquisition Command.
Q: You’ve spent most of your career in contracting – what appealed to you most about taking on the Executive Director role?
Riedel: I did a lot of work in contracting with regards to the development of the workforce – it was a smaller workforce, and I made a lot of progress from when I started in 2021. So, the idea of being able to scale some of those positive impacts we made on the contracting workforce to the other functionals was really appealing to me. If you think of workforce development, value of position, pay pools, talent management across the board, we put a lot of focus on this in contracting and it is one of our strengths. I really wanted to be able to expand that to other functionals that maybe didn’t get quite as much attention or love. Making sure we can do that across the board is really what appealed to me.
Sometimes it’s OK to get out of your comfort zone. This was a tough decision for me to leave contracting – it’s been a wonderful experience for me and has given me exactly what I need for the Executive Director job. Sometimes we have to get a little uncomfortable and take on those challenges.
Q: How has your work in contracting prepared you for this role?
Riedel: Contracting is foundational to acquisitions. I truly believe that if you work as an integrated team- the program manager, the financial manager, contracting, security, logistics, even cyber, to plan your acquisition strategy, the resulting contract will be clearer and smoother to execute. The contract sets the foundation for the rest of the acquisition, so in that lane, I think it set me up really well to be the senior civilian program manager.
I’ve worked with all of the other functionals many, many times for more than 20 years now, so being given that opportunity to be that senior civilian was very appealing. Also, in contracting, we were responsible for more than hundreds of personnel, including military and civilians, and this role really gives me an opportunity to expand on that.
Q: What would you say is the biggest challenge SSC is facing right now?
Riedel: The number one priority for me right now is working with our S1 (Human Capital Directorate) team to fill critical vacancies. More funding is coming in Fiscal Year 27 that will come with more billets, a larger execution role, and we need to fill these vacancies in order to execute. We need talent. We obviously took a big hit in 2025 – that was a rough year for everyone across the board. We lost a lot of civilians, and we are now in a rebuilding year. We are working on targeting top candidates and making sure we get the talent that we need to execute the mission going forward.
The Space Force is not brand new anymore, but we’re still the newest service, and we’re still that sort of shiny leading edge that people want to be a part of. We’ve been to seven hiring events this year with our S1 team and have more than 1,000 resumes right now that we’re going through, so people are interested. They’re excited about the Space Force. This is a great time to be part of the space mission.
Q: What are some of your first-year objectives for SSC?
Riedel: I would say hiring and culture are probably my top two objectives. We’re doing a full-court press – (SSC) has an aggressive goal of hiring 100 new employees per month until we fill all of our vacancies. We know where the long poles are and where the bottlenecks are, and we are removing those and asking for assistance where we can, so we can get after that 100 per month. It’s an aggressive goal, but we have to get there. We must find and hire the talent. The new, increased budget will require more personnel to execute, and we have to rebuild from where we were back in January.
As far as culture goes, we’ve had a bit of a deficit for almost 10 months after our former executive director, Ms. Joy White, retired. I’m coming in and helping to rebuild that culture around military and civilian personnel and how valued they both are at this command and in the Space Force. I think it was a hard year for civilians and so just bringing the team back together and connecting them with the mission is one of my top goals for this year.
Q: You are overseeing a command that has close to 30 operating units, across many different geographic locations – what kinds of challenges does that pose?
Riedel: There are different needs, different requirements at every location. The cost of living in Los Angeles is always challenging, so we are trying to hire at other locations and we’re trying to incorporate all of the locations into the command. So, for example, if we have an All-Call, the senior leaders will arrange to attend at different sites. For the last All-Call, for example, I joined the team at Patrick Space Force Base, Col. Andrew Menschner (deputy commander of SSC) was at Vandenberg Space Force Base… we usually have a senior leader in Colorado Springs and someone in Albuquerque. We try to arrange for every team to have a senior leader participating at their location and that has helped to bring those geographically separated units into the fold, helping them to feel like they’re part of the team.
We’re making those changes and have heard some really positive feedback so we’re going to keep it up.
Q: What are some other positions SSC is looking to fill? (Contracting, civil engineering, financial management, human resources, logistics, even firefighting)
Riedel: I think the easy answer is “Everything.” Contracting is near and dear to my heart – I think they are the most understaffed, hovering around 60 percent, trying to get closer to 80 percent. But we are also hiring firefighters at our Space Launch Deltas. We are hiring engineers; we’re hiring program managers. Cyber is at the top of the list –we need those cyber experts in order to get after the mission. We are hiring in all different fields and looking for talent at all levels. We need the recent college graduates and we need mid-career professionals. We’re hiring at all levels.
Q: The USSF is only six years old, but SSC has been here since 1954, under different names and structures. How do you think Guardian culture is evolving at SSC with this blend of old and new?
Riedel: I think we are evolving from having an Air Force culture, to more of a Guardian culture. And what does that look like? When we were first formed, it wasn’t evident. We were still trying to figure out what we wanted to be, and what we wanted to look like. A big part of the culture is shifting that risk tolerance. It used to be that we did not have a high risk tolerance, but we are willing to take on a bit more risk now in order to execute the mission – we’re also using more commercial (off-the-shelf products). That’s a shift in mindset – some of these exquisite systems that we’ve developed – we’re moving away from that. It’s OK to try something different, we can try a new strategy, use a new tool or authority, and we will provide top cover. The CSO (Gen. Chance Saltzman) has said we’ve inherited too much of our culture from the Air Force, so let’s take what we have and let’s iterate on it. Let’s make it better. Also, the Secretary of War (Pete Hegseth) has explained that acquisition is a war-fighting function – that’s a different mindset for people. That’s something we are excited about evolving into.
The good news is, it’s all not fully baked yet. Our culture is still evolving, and our personnel are able to have an influence and an impact on what that looks like going forward. I think that’s exciting.
Q: What would you tell a young person who’s trying to decide on a career about the kinds of opportunities available in the U.S. Space Force?
Riedel: I would say that the Space Force offers more opportunity to lead than any other service. We are so small that the responsibilities are just greater. We’re relying on our junior workforce more than any of their counterparts in our sister services. And because we are so small, we need very competent teams. We need to have those experts. Oftentimes our teams are maybe just two to three people, versus these large Air Force teams of maybe 10 to 15 people. And so our people are empowered, expected and challenged to take on more and make more decisions. I think people like that. They appreciate it, and it makes each of us feel connected to the mission.
It also gives more opportunities to travel. Our space mission is global. So, there’s a wide variety of missions and career fields that we support and there are opportunities all over the world now.
Maybe you wanted to be an astronaut, but it didn’t work out. If you’re interested in space, you can still be involved in the space mission and serve your country. It’s a phenomenal opportunity, and you support all the other services, because every service relies on space capabilities. We’ve now got a seat at the table for all the training exercises. We are foundational to some of those exercises – no one is moving things around without space. Everything we do, from the communication to the images to the weather to the launches – space is in every part of the fight.
Riedel began her Air Force career in May 2003 after graduating from the United States Air Force Academy, Colorado, with a Bachelor of Science in Business Management. During her four-year Air Force career, she was responsible for a broad range of contracting activities, including negotiating and administering multi-million-dollar efforts, interpreting acquisition policy and regulations governing DoD procurements, and advising the program manager on key decisions by translating complex requirements into executable and sustainable contracting strategies.
Riedel separated from active duty with the rank of captain in 2007 and continued working for Air Force Space Command as a support contractor with MCR Federal. She began her career in civil service in 2011 as the contracting officer in charge of the Enhanced Polar System Control and Planning Segment Source Selection in the Military Satellite Communications Directorate at Los Angeles Air Force Base.
She then moved to the Advanced Extremely High Frequency program where she was the contracting officer responsible for a suite of contracts valued at over $10 billion. Following her time in Military Satellite Communications, Ms. Riedel was promoted to the position of Deputy Chief of Contracting for the Space Superiority Systems Directorate.
She was then promoted to serve as the Chief of Contracting Office, Air Force Rapid Capabilities Office, at Joint Base Anacostia-Bolling, Washington, D.C. In this position, she managed four divisions and was responsible for a diverse portfolio of contracts including multiple Acquisition Category 1 programs.
She had held an unlimited warrant as a Procurement Contracting Officer from 2011 to 2021. She also holds an Acquisition Professional Development Program Level III Contracting Management certification and Level I Program Management certification.