Colonel Heather Bogstie, Senior Materiel Leader, Resilient Missile Warning, Tracking, and Defense Acquisition Delta, United States Space Force
Interviewer: Maria Aspan, FORTUNE

MPW Next Gen 2022 - Let’s Talk Space Force - Launching Into Year Three With Colonel Bogstie

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Colonel Heather Bogstie, Senior Materiel Leader, United States Space Force
Interviewer: Maria Aspan, FORTUNE

MPW Next Gen 2022 - Let’s Talk Space Force

three years ago the newest branch of the US Armed forces was formed the U. S. Space Force charged with defending U. S. Interests in space from adversaries on Earth and in orbit. Think kind of like Starfleet but it's actually in real life. Right, okay. We are really really excited to have with us today. Colonel Heather bog sty of the U. S. S. S. To talk about how she manages this new frontier of defense. From technology innovations to navigating complex geopolitical issues. Please welcome Colonel Heather bog styx. Senior material leader Resilient missile morning tracking and defense acquisition, Delta of the United States Space Force for a conversation with Fortune. Senior writer Maria aspen. Colonel Bugsy, thank you so much for joining us today. Thank you for having me. Getting any startup off the ground is a big endeavor. Getting a startup military agency off the ground amid a fair amount of jokes and a netflix comedy series um must have been a pretty big task. Can you tell us three years in what the reality is of Space Force and what you're working on? Absolutely. So my perception is that our perspective is that the Space Force has actually been a long time coming. When I joined the Air Force in 1998 I joined to do space acquisitions, which is what I get to do now. Um There's a community of us that have been doing space in the Air Force for a long time. And so um the transition of the Space force in terms of the missions that we're accomplishing are largely still the same. We're just in a different service and we actually are now being prioritized as such amongst the other services to um, fund our systems and a more strategic manner moving forward. Um, the cultural aspect of this space, the force has been a lot of fun to deal with. I personally love watching the shows. I think they're, they're a hoot. Um, uh, it's fun to see how people think the Space force is and should be just similar to how, you know, Doctors watch Grey's Anatomy. They're probably kind of laugh a little bit at it. We do the same thing. Um, you know, I think a lot of us are inherently space nerds. We've all all grown up on Star Wars and Star trek and, and you know, all these other sci fi shows that are out there. We just love them. Uh, knowing that that's not really the reality today, but there might be some interesting components of that. That could be our vision for the future. So, um, culturally, I think it's been a lot of fun. Um, we have had to kind of do a little bit of marketing on the, the show Space Force a little bit just to make sure that, um, we all know it is serious, serious service. There is a threat out there that were actively working towards defeating here. Um, it's not just fun and games, We have mission systems that we are, are fielding in different manners because the adversarial threat coming out as much faster these days. Um, and it's required us to pivot how we acquire our weapons systems in the future. Tell us a little bit more. So you said you work on space acquisitions. Um, you have a very impressive title that I cannot entirely explain. Could you tell us a little bit more about the work that you do and what specifically you focus on? Sure. So a senior material leader is um, a step up in program management for an Air Force Space Force officer and acquisitions. Um, Generally your coded to a different type of career field within the service. Um, it's one in acquisitions, which is the career field where we build our weapons systems. So we work a lot with our contractors to assess uh, schedule, risk, cost performance, um, on our different systems to ensure that we can feel them and hand that capability over to the war fighter for operations. So in general, we start off as a program manager. Um, when you have demonstrated a certain level of leadership abilities, you get uh promoted to what's called a material Leader. So there's a lot fewer of those opportunities that are out there. And then um, once you have proven success in leadership as a material leader, uh, you get boarded again too, be a senior material Leader, which is what I am now. And so I have a number of different programs within my, my organization, in the Space Force. Our organizations are called Deltas. So I am in charge of an acquisition Delta. So we acquire systems and it's basically a conglomeration of different programs and uh, the mission set that um, I'm I'm leading is resilient missile warning, missile tracking, missile defense mission area. So, um, it's in a mission area that we call missile warning. Um, right now we have had the luxury of being dominant in space from a missile warning perspective. Um, but we are knowing now that our adversaries, specifically China and Russia are developing new weapon capabilities that are um, coming at us much faster, more rapidly. Um, the capabilities are doing things that we haven't seen before. They're more maneuverable and less predictable. And so we need to build systems that can track uh, those hypersonic glide vehicles in a much better manner. So the systems that were acquiring in my specific acquisition, Delta is focused on uh, fielding uh, systems that are going to be tracking uh, those hypersonic glide vehicles. Russia and china. I mean from a, from a civilian perspective, from a business perspective and economic perspective, we've certainly seen um, a lot of reason to be concerned. We were just hearing about Brittany Grenier, we've seen Russia's invasion of Ukraine. How are you thinking about both of those countries? And what are you doing and threats that they pose? And what are you working on at Space force to help defend our country. There's a number of capabilities, not just in the hypersonic glide vehicle area that we are tracking in terms of new capabilities that Russia and china are fielding, there's other things that they are putting on orbit that are very concerning to us and we want to ensure that we have the appropriate Western systems that can appropriately respond if those systems were being used. What we're really focusing on is as they feel these new demonstration capabilities, what is their intent behind them? And that's what we're really trying to ensure that we can counter is uh, if they were to actually exercise that intent. So switching gears a little bit and I want to open it up to questions in a minute. But um, again, for from a business perspective, you know, before, before we saw billionaires buying social media networks, we saw billionaires racing each other into space and there's been a big expansion of commercial interest in space. How does that affect what you're working on if at all? It absolutely does. And we want to leverage the commercial capabilities as much as possible um, in the Department of Defense, we are stewards of taxpayer dollars. So we have to be very judicious on how we spend your money um, and, and fielding the weapons systems that help protect you all. Um, we have to be very, a little bit more risk adverse than we'd like to be um, to ensure that we get these capabilities on orbit, but if we can leverage what the commercial companies are doing, um if they put more of those capabilities on orbit, if they improve the access to space through their launch vehicles, then it drives the cost down overall. And so what we're really trying to leverage and capitalize on is all of the commercial industry and growth that we're seeing right now use those um, those commercial parts and capabilities as much as possible so that we can field our systems quicker, more responsive and at a better price point. Are there any questions? I think everybody's still possibly in a post lunch coma. Okay. See one. Hi, my name is Claire present an english. I'm ceo of a group called New Leaders Council. I'm actually really curious. We'll first have to say thank you for your service and um curious about after your year in your career in the military, has this been an opportunity to really feel like an entrepreneur? Um in terms of also the background in government, it's not usually the place that's perceived as a place where you get to be creative and really innovative and explore. And I'm curious about if you can talk to us how this new role and um launching our has helped, I guess unleash that new part of your career. No, I'm super great question. Thank you. I'm super stoked to be in the current position I'm in right now. My previous job, I also got to work in some of the innovation and prototyping space and you had mentioned even before Maria that it's kind of like a startup in a sense and it is, you know, that we're only three years in. So the Space Force's new, we're trying to figure ourselves out as an organization. Um, you know, we're trying to figure out what our culture is. We just, we just got a Space force song that was recently released, We're working on uniforms. Um, a number of things. We're onto our second Chief of Space Operations right now, which is really exciting. General Raymond just retired and now we have General Saltzman who took over. So we're starting to mature and we're starting to grow that culture. And it's really exciting, you know, at this point in my career to um be able to influence a little bit of, of what that service is gonna look like long term. Um, when we talk about new capabilities and bringing them on board, it's also really exciting time to um, the way that I'm currently acquiring, um, my missile warning missile tracking system right now is in a different way. So we are absolutely looking at new ways that we can feel our systems, we had the luxury of fielding a satellite once every 10 years because we didn't have that threat coming at us. And now that it's coming more frequently, we really want to be sure that we can get inside that threat loop and feel systems in a, in a 2 to 3 year cycle. So having that launch access to space is really important in driving down that cost. Um, using all of those commercial lessons learned and commercial parts from industry to help drive down the cost, build smaller satellites, get technology on orbit and a more frequent basis. That's very important to what we're doing right now. So we're really truly pivoting our architecture and missile warning and missile tracking towards bringing in some of that innovation that we're seeing from, from commercial industry. Um, in addition, I get to start my, my acquisition Delta itself is brand new because this is a first time that we're fielding a system this way it space systems command and uh, that in itself has been like a startup. Uh, so we're trying to find people, uh, you know, across civilians, military contractors to help uh, build up our organizations. So we have the appropriate resources are trying to find spaces for us to sit. Um, we're trying to establish our own culture as well. So what kind of office things do we want to do to help continue, inspire and and grow our organization, our own culture within the greater space force culture. So it's very exciting time. Um, I'm very glad that I'm, I'm here right now, uh, capitalizing on all the space innovation that we're seeing and I get to start new organizations and really set a new and interest foundation for the future. Can I ask you to talk a little bit too just about, I mean, so full disclosure, sci fi nerd. I went to space camp, I wanted to be an astronaut growing up, so it's very cool to interview you and to see that you can actually do work in something called the Space Force. How did you first get interested in space and what sort of got you into this role? Funny you mentioned it. Um, so first of all, my father was in the army, so I grew up in the service, I know what it means to serve. Um might I have a very long family heritage of service. So um, I knew that was very important to me. Um second of all, I actually got to go to space camp as well and I was hooked after my first, uh, my first week there, um I ended up going back to space camp an additional five times. I was lucky I lived in the Atlanta area, so I had access to Huntsville Alabama, which is where space camp was. And then I went to school in Auburn, which was right up right down the street. Uh, so I got to be a counselor at space camp and give back, I love space camp. Uh, not, not to say I'm doing a plug, but you know, nobody's asking me to do this, but this is a truly inspired me though. I don't think I would be here without the service of my family and um, and without that inspiring catalyst of space camp to really show that space successful to everyone. You don't have to be a rocket scientist, you don't have to be an engineer, There's so many roles and jobs within space, whether you work for Nasa or the government that you can, or a commercial industry partner that you can serve space and help promote what's going on in the space renaissance that we're seeing right now. So you're also, um, you're you're working, you're high up in the military, you're high up in the aerospace industry, both fields not exactly known necessarily for their gender diversity. Um, what's changed over the course of your career, has it gotten any better? And what are you working on to make it better for others? It's interesting. I think it's still a work in progress, to be honest. Um, as I have moved up in the ranks, obviously there's fewer and fewer of of women that I'm seeing a smaller peer group right now, we're looking at overall in the space force, 29% are women. Um, as colonels in the space force, there's only about 14% that are are women. Um, so it's still a pretty small number. Um, and I think we have room to grow, but I'm really optimistic about Space force because I think it's doing a fantastic job of looking across the board at how to be more inclusive how to you know incorporate diversity in what we're doing. Um there's different teams of initiatives going on. One in particular women's initiative team that has really helped improve standards for family leave care telework policies, uniform standards that we had to deal with from the 60s that now we're finally coming into the 2000s. It's great. Um And you know a number of issues that don't just affect women but also affect men and parents and families moving forward. So I'm really optimistic that the Space Force is really looking at a whole person because um we're small service and we need to retain as much talent as we can and being accommodating towards some of these personal issues. Uh It's really gonna be helpful for us moving forward in terms of retaining that talent. What have been some of the other challenges of just getting this agency off the ground and turning it into a full fledged um military agency? I'm lucky that we're a little immune from all the machinations happening in D. C. But I hear about it here on the west coast. Um I would say a lot of it has to do with some policy um Just trying to break through how do you set up a whole new service? They haven't done this since 1946. The latest service was the Air Force that came out of the Army and so um standing up a new service in itself, they had to go through a number of legal questions and and work through some paths. Um The service is set up in three field commands. So we have the Space Operations Command which is called First Love It. Um and that's where the true war fighters are, the operators of our systems are. They sit and they operate the spacecraft at different locations across the world. Um So they're part of the second field command is called Starcom. They get cool name too. Uh they're in charge of tests and and training. So all of our training that we do as officers will come and and enlisted troops will come through Starcom. Um and then we work at Space Systems Command, we don't get the cool name, but we get the cool place. We're in Los Angeles. So our headquarters there with a number of units across the United States. And so I think as we've been setting up these field commands, there's been some nuances and challenges on, you know, how to move personnel over from the Air Force system to the Space force system. It's not impossible, but um they're still doing some work towards that. Um But another really exciting point that um that we're working on is bringing in inter service transfers. So we are actually bringing in members, not just from the Air Force, which is where most of us came from, but from the army, the Navy and the marines and so bringing in those folks, um, we're super happy to have them. They're amazing assets because they really bring that warfighter perspective to um, the systems that were acquiring. Um, but you know, just kind of the machinations of moving from one organization to another. Just mostly administration, I would say it's kind of the biggest challenge. Red tape is universal, right? In terms of mission performance though. I mean we're still getting the mission done. And so that has never changed again as we cut away from the Air Force into the Space Force. Um, we are still able to procure the systems that we have always been trying to procure. So Colonel Boxy, thank you so much. We hope to have you back for a future space force birthday to care more about your progress. Thank you so much. Thank you.