The finalists for WashingtonExec’s 2023 Pinnacle Awards were announced Sept. 25, and we’ll be highlighting some of them until the event takes place live, in-person Nov. 16.
Next is Jonathan Pettus, senior vice president of aerospace, defense and civil operations at Dynetics, Inc., a Leidos company, who’s the National Security/DHS Executive of the Year, Private & Public Companies, finalist. Here, he shares recent key achievements and career turning points.
What key achievements did you have in 2023?
The year 2023 has been a dynamic and impactful one for our Leidos Dynetics team with a number of strategically significant accomplishments in high priority national security programs. Despite the fact that the U.S. has led the way for 50 years in research and development of hypersonic systems, we now find ourselves trailing our strategic competitors. This year, my team has achieved major advancements by supporting our customers in restoring our leadership role.
The first is in the completion of the first eight common hypersonic glide body vehicles for the U.S. Army’s first Long Range Hypersonic Weapon battery to be fielded. This required a collaborative effort between the Army, Navy, National Lab partners at Sandia and APL, and a variety of industry teammates.
Another significant accomplishment is the development and initial flight test for the nation’s new high tempo hypersonic flight test program called MACH-TB (Multi-Service Advanced Capability Hypersonic Testbed). My team, as the prime contractor, partnered with OSD, Navy, Sandia National Labs, Oak Ridge National Labs, NASA and other industry partners to conduct the groundbreaking initial flight test leveraging a commercial launch vehicle.
We accomplished this in just under 50 days after receiving the contractual direction to proceed. This demonstrates the speed and agility needed for the U.S. to regain our leadership in hypersonic systems development.
What was a turning point or inflection point in your career?
I have had two major inflection points in my career. The first came early in my career as a government leader when I moved from a NASA field center to NASA Headquarters to become NASA’s chief information officer. Moving to an enterprise leadership role at that point in my career was exciting but also frightening.
Learning to lead change at an agency level and gaining the experience of engaging the executive and legislative branches of the federal government was instrumental in the rest of my government career and helped prepare me for the second major inflection point ⏤ a transition to industry leadership.
I made the decision to leave NASA and take a leadership position in industry because of the opportunity to broaden my contributions to national security and to challenge myself to utilize my previous experience to serve government customers.
In just over five years, I am amazed at how much I have learned about industry’s side of the business. I am convinced that both government and industry would greatly benefit if more leaders had experience on both sides of the relationship.