LMU Alumna Jackie Space Highlights the Power of Adaptability in Engineering Careers

Finding the right career path oftentimes requires adaptability or the ability to pivot. This is what Jackie Space, director of strategy and partnerships at Voyager Technologies, spoke to students about during her keynote address at Loyola Marymount University 's Seaver Spotlight event on March 24.

In her role at Voyager Technologies, Space, an Air Force veteran and LMU systems engineering alumna (M.S. '12), builds partnerships with universities and companies for the Starlab space station, specifically working on microgravity research and lunar base technologies. Starlab is a commercial space station that is going to replace the International Space Station (ISS) around 2029.

"When I was working on getting my master's degree at LMU, I didn't know how it would translate into the work I'm doing now," Space said during her keynote address. "None of this was planned, I wasn't thinking I would be at these types of companies - frankly they didn't exist yet," she said.

Space said she titled her talk "Engineering Adaptability: Building Your Path in a Rapidly Changing Industry" because she made a lot of pivots in her career, while also being able to spot new trends like the rise of commercial aerospace.

During graduate school while working full-time as a contractor in the government, she saw SpaceX come on the scene and start building rockets. "The idea of SpaceX was radical - before this only government had the money to build rockets," Space said.

"I really understood that the U.S. government was about to be disrupted," she said. "All the tech we were building inside the government was going to be built better in commercial."

Seeing that government was going to have to learn how to work with commercial, Space co-founded an innovation consultancy company for military and intelligence agencies called BMNT in Silicon Valley. Her company worked with every government agency on national security problems and helped influence the way government worked with commercial technologies.

Before getting to this moment in her career though, she told LMU students that she tried a lot of different roles and had many ups and downs. She spoke about being unhappy in her role as a logistics officer in the Air Force but realizing later that it helped her career. She also recalled the time she toured Vanderberg Air Force base during her service and saw rocket launches. "This moment changed my life, but I didn't know it at the time," Space said.

During this period, she felt like she missed her chance to go into aerospace because she didn't have the right degree to pursue it. She had a B.S. in behavioral sciences from the U.S. Air Force Academy. After leaving the Air Force, she worked for a Hollywood talent management agency and as a business broker for ice cream shops before returning to government as a contractor. This decision inevitably helped her earn her engineering degree. Her company sent her to LMU to earn her master's degree in systems engineering.

Space encouraged the auditorium of LMU students to be curious, forge their own paths, and figure out what they do and don't like through work experience. She also emphasized the importance of learning soft skills in addition to technical skills.

"How do you present your ideas and get people to agree with your ideas?" she asked. "It's not always the most technologically skilled person; it's the person that gets people to believe in them."