
TECHNICAL ADVISOR - SPACE SECURITY & DEFENSE PROGRAM (SSDP)
Department of the Air Force Headquarters
Colorado Springs, COFull-time$152–210K/yrPosted 4 days ago
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Job overview
The Technical Advisor to the Space Security and Defense Program serves as principal advisor and chief subject matter expert to the SSDP Director. The role drives space protection strategy, policy, and funding refinement; coordinates national-scope vulnerability assessments, mitigation strategies, and architectural evaluations; and works with senior National Security Space leaders and the Intelligence Community to advance space protection priorities and oversee program execution.
Skills & qualifications
Skills
Qualifications
Benefits
Full job description
Summary
Click on "Learn more about this agency" button below to view Eligibilities being considered and other IMPORTANT information. The United States Space Force (USSF) is a highly specialized, independent branch of the Armed Forces organized under the Department of the Air Force (DAF). Its primary mandate is to organize, train, and equip space forces to secure and maintain freedom of operations within, from, and to the space domain.
Duties
The Technical Advisor to the Space Security and Defense Program (SSDP) serves as the principal advisor and chief subject matter expert to the SSDP Director, driving space protection strategy, policy, and funding refinement for both USSF, OSW and ODNI. In this critical leadership capacity, the advisor coordinates national-scope efforts to develop vulnerability assessments, mitigation strategies, and architectural evaluations while ensuring all program activities align with overarching mission objectives. To achieve this, the advisor facilitates high-level collaborative discussions across operational, intelligence, and technical fields, interfacing directly with senior National Security Space (NSS) leaders to advocate for and enforce rigorous space protection standards. Finally, the advisor partners closely with the Intelligence Community (IC) to direct collection priorities, oversees robust project management and execution for the Annual Work Plan, and applies disciplined engineering practices to guarantee that all threat projections and technical solutions are analytically sound. Qualifications
Eligibility will be based upon a clear showing the applicant has training, education and experience of the scope and quality sufficient to effectively carry-out the duties of the position. Candidates must exemplify the corporate perspective, leadership vision, broad experience and character needed in the SES Civilian Executive corps not only to satisfy the immediate vacancy, but future vacancies which will occur in a variety of organizations, functions and locations. TECHNICAL QUALIFICATIONS (TQs): Applicants must reflect superior technical qualifications demonstrated through leadership and management in the following: TQ1. Demonstrated experience with IC and DOW organizations and their processes to initiate/fund new capabilities, perform acquisitions, and operate space capabilities in the context of the joint IC/DOW military operations. This includes understanding of space missions that need to be accomplished across the IC and DOW. TQ2. Demonstrated experience applying deep technical knowledge of technologies and space systems (US & Adversary) to assess methods to disrupt, defeat, or protect them. This includes technical depth regarding a spectrum of space superiority capabilities along with operational enablers such as Domain Awareness and C2. TQ3. Demonstrated experience leading teams to develop new concepts, analyze options with deep rigor, defend recommendations, and communicate to Senior Levels. A separate narrative statement is required..
Education
A degree qualifying for the 0801 General Engineer job series is required. To be acceptable, the curriculum must: (1) if an engineering degree, be in a school of engineering with at least one curriculum accredited by the Accreditation Board for Engineering and Technology (ABET) as a professional engineering curriculum; or (2) include differential and integral calculus and courses (more advanced than first-year physics and chemistry) in five of the following seven areas of engineering science or physics: (a) statics, dynamics; (b) strength of materials (stress-strain relationships); (c) fluid mechanics, hydraulics; (d) thermodynamics; (e) electrical fields and circuits; (f) nature and properties of materials (relating particle and aggregate structure to properties); and (g) any other comparable area of fundamental engineering science or physics, such as optics, heat transfer, soil mechanics, or electronics; or a combination of education and experience as required by the U.S. A master's degree or higher in engineering or a related scientific discipline is highly desired. Certification Required: ETM Practioner How You Will Be Evaluated
Applications will be evaluated against the foregoing qualification requirements. Failure to meet any one of the mandatory technical or senior professional qualification standards will eliminate a candidate from further consideration. A screening panel will evaluate the candidates for this position composed of senior executives selected for organizational and/or functional backgrounds relevant to this position. The panel members will individually review each of the applications in terms of the qualifications criteria contained in this announcement. The qualifications stated are the minimum requirements of the position to be Qualified, a rating schedule will be applied by a screening panel to determine which candidates are considered to be Best Qualified. Then, they will meet to discuss each application, and reach a consensus decision as to the best qualified, qualified or not qualified candidates. The panel will interview all of the best-qualified candidates based upon consistently applied criteria. The panel will then make a recommendation of those best-qualified candidates who should be referred to the selecting official, in priority order. Final selection of a candidate is contingent upon USecAF approval. Other Information
Veterans' Preference: Veterans' preference is applicable to Air Force Senior Level (SL) positions. Relocation Authorized: Payment of Permanent Change of Station (PCS) costs is authorized in accordance with the Joint Travel Regulations (JTR). Recruitment/Relocation Incentive: May be offered. Employed Annuitants (Reemployed Annuitants): Applicants in receipt of an annuity based on civilian employment in the Federal Service are subject to the DoW Policy on The Employment of Annuitants. Click here for more information. Direct Deposit: All federal employees are required to have direct deposit. Disabled veteran leave is available to a Federal employee hired on/after 5 Nov 2016, who is a veteran with a service-connected disability rating of 30% or more. For more information, click here. If you have questions regarding this announcement and have hearing or speech difficulties click here.
How this job compares
Set against the 475 open Technical Advisor jobs on Olive Jobs, counted November 3, 2026.
- Pay
- This posting$152–210K/yr
- US median$150–244K/yr375 salary ranges
This range's midpoint, $181K, is 5% below the US median midpoint ($190K) — in the middle half of Technical Advisor salary ranges across the US.
- Openings
- Olive Jobs lists 16 open Technical Advisor jobs in Colorado and 475 across the US. 6% of them nationwide are listed as remote or flexible.
- Hiring the most across the US
- Oracle70 open
- Amazon69 open
- Pacific Northwest National Laboratory49 open
- Experience
- Technical Advisor postings that state a minimum ask for 8 years of experience at the median; the middle half ask for 5 to 10 years (425 postings).
- Education
- 154 of the 475 open Technical Advisor jobs (32%) ask for a bachelor's degree or higher.
Counted across the open, public US postings on Olive Jobs on November 3, 2026. Pay medians are the middle values of the low ends and of the high ends of postings that list both ends of a range in the same cadence (a yearly salary or an hourly rate); a range's midpoint is halfway between its ends. Pay and experience figures resting on fewer than 20 postings are left out.
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