Leading with Heart: US Space Force’s Bree Fram On The Power of Authentic Women’s Leadership

An Interview With Pirie Jones Grossman

You’ll help others flourish — When leading authentically, you’re leading as the best version of yourself. The journey to authenticity pushes people to be the kind of leaders that we all want in our lives. Good leadership enables us all to flourish, to reach higher than we thought possible, and accomplish shared objectives.

In today’s dynamic world, the concept of leadership is continuously evolving. While traditional leadership models have often been male-dominated, there is a growing recognition of the unique strengths and perspectives that women bring to these roles. This series aims to explore how women can become more effective leaders by authentically embracing their femininity and innate strengths, rather than conforming to traditional male leadership styles. In this series, we are talking to successful women leaders, coaches, authors, and experts who can provide insights and personal stories on how embracing their inherent feminine qualities has enhanced their leadership abilities. As part of this series, we had the pleasure of interviewing Bree Fram.

Colonel Bree Fram (she/her) is an author, podcast, host, keynote speaker, and active-duty astronautical engineer in the United States Space Force. Bree co-leads the Department of the Air Force LGBTQ+ Initiatives Team and previously served as President of SPARTA, a non-profit that advocates and educates about transgender military service. Her next book, with co-author Dr. Liz Cavallaro, Forging Queer Leaders: How the LGBTQIA+ Community Creates Impact from Adversity, is due out in May 2024. Bree’s full biography is available on her website and the views expressed in this interview are hers and not necessarily reflective of the United States Space Force or Department of Defense.

Thank you so much for joining us in this interview series. Before we dive into our discussion about authentic, feminine leadership, our readers would love to “get to know you” a bit better. Can you share with us the backstory about what brought you to your specific career path?

When I was young I wanted to be a paleontologist until a friend had me watch an episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation with them. From that point on I wanted to be an engineer like Geordi LaForge and help humanity expand into the stars. I graduated with my degree in aerospace engineering graduated in 2001 and was interviewing for jobs in the civilian sector when the United States was attacked on September 11th. My worldview changed rapidly and I no longer took for granted the freedoms and opportunities I’d been given by luck of where I was born. I wanted to be part of something larger than myself, to give back, and to help secure those same freedoms for future generations. About a week after the attacks I made the decision to join the Air Force. I’ve now served 21 years, having recommissioned into the Space Force after the service was created in December 2019 and have the opportunity to fulfill multiple passions.

Can you share the most interesting story that happened to you since you started your career?

Without a doubt, that’s the President of the United States attempting to fire me via tweet in 2017. It was just over a year earlier that the US Military had dropped the ban on transgender people being able to serve openly and the day I came out as a transgender woman. Despite a year of open and honorable service by a few thousand of us, the tweet struck like a lightning bolt out of a blue sky stating that the US would not accept or allow transgender individuals to serve in any capacity in the military. How do you react to something like that? It was a whirlwind day with the leadership of SPARTA, our education and advocacy organization, trying to figure out if any of us would have jobs in the near future, developing messaging points for the massive attention from local, national, and international news, and figuring out what to tell other service members. Eventually, we settled on the idea that the best thing any of us could do was to lace up our boots, go to work, and accomplish our assigned missions until or unless we were removed. Thankfully, the policy has since been reversed again and many more thousands of transgender troops are serving honorably and with distinction.

What do you think makes your company stand out? Can you share a story?

What I think really stands out about the US Space Force is our mission and our values. Our mission is to secure our nation’s interests in, from, and to space; an incredible scope that getting to space, operating there, and making sure we deliver valuable capabilities back to Earth. It’s really our people-driven core values of character, connection, courage, and commitment that enable us to complete that mission. We have the amazing opportunity to build a 21st Century military culture that allows everyone to bring their best self to the mission. That builds the bonds of teamwork which let us get after some really audacious goals and challenging problems such as tracking every object in space or delivering precision navigation and timing signals to everyone on Earth.

You are a successful business leader. Which three character traits do you think were most instrumental to your success? Can you please share a story or example for each?

I think it all comes down to mindsets and attitudes. For me it’s about being authentic, embracing humility, and putting the team first. For years I had to hide a huge portion of who I am in order to keep my career, an incredibly taxing experience. But when we are authentic, we don’t have to pay that mental tax. We’re free to dedicate the energy we spent on hiding a part of ourselves to the jobs we’ve been given and the relationships we have with everyone around us. By me being authentic, I was in a better place to help create the environment where others felt the psychological safety to also share their authenticity.

It’s important for all of us to realize just how little we know. Physicist John Wheeler said, “We live on an island surrounded by a sea of ignorance. As our island of knowledge grows, so does the shore of our ignorance.” No matter how much we know, we can always learn more. As individuals and as teams, if we take this to heart we almost have to take on a growth mindset that says we can be better tomorrow than we are today if we keep learning. It also gives us the grace to admit that we might be wrong and to work to find what’s right. If we ever stop learning we’re destined to be outcompeted and to fail.

Last, and despite my ego’s insistence otherwise, I do my best to ensure success is about ‘we’ and not about ‘me’. If the focus is on ensuring the team has the resources needed and are constantly developing, success is going to follow naturally.

Leadership often entails making difficult decisions or hard choices between two apparently good paths. Can you share a story with us about a hard decision or choice you had to make as a leader? I’m curious to understand how these challenges have shaped your leadership.

This is often a question of risk tolerance and understanding the capacity of your teams. I had a team doing phenomenal work to bring a life-saving capability right from the laboratory to the battlefield when another organization was struggling. They had excess funding, but not the bandwidth to utilize it appropriately and were going to have to transfer away a lot of the money. While my team could have kept on delivering results, I felt we had the opportunity to do a lot more and made the case that we could utilize the funds to vastly increase the scale of what we were accomplishing. It was a risk for the team and the organization, but we made it pay off. My leadership style tends to the riskier approach, which is why having members of the team willing to point out what you’re not seeing before you leap is so important.

Ok, thank you for that. Let’s now jump to the primary focus of our interview. Can you share a personal experience where embracing your unique leadership style, which might not align with traditional expectations, led to a significant positive impact in your organization or team?

Coming out, transitioning, and fully embracing my authenticity was certainly not what anyone who knew me professionally would have expected of me! For my first 13 years in the military I would have lost my opportunity to serve if I had done so, consequently I told almost no one. Yet, when I finally had that first authentic day at work, with my new name outside my office door, my team celebrated with cookies and camaraderie. The real difference was that I showed some of my vulnerability that my team hadn’t seen before. It pierced my own thoughts of the image I had been presenting. Suddenly, more folks were bringing me their challenges as though they previously felt I wouldn’t have been interested. As a leader, if your folks aren’t bringing you their issues, how can you help them? My authenticity was seen as an open door for us to work through challenges together and be even better at accomplishing our mission.

In your journey as a leader, how have you balanced demonstrating resilience, often seen as a masculine trait, with showing vulnerability, which is equally powerful, but typically feminine? Can you give an example where this balance created a meaningful difference?

I don’t think resilience and vulnerability are traits you have to balance or that to increase one you have to decrease the other. To me vulnerability is a path to connection; it’s not a weakness, it’s a way to let others in. Being connected can lead to an enhanced sense of resiliency because you know you’ve got a team of folks around you that share burdens and support one another through challenging times. When we don’t share our struggles, others who want to help simply can’t because they don’t know what’s happening. Be vulnerable to be resilient.

As a woman in leadership, how have you navigated and challenged gender stereotypes, especially in situations where traditional male-dominated approaches are the norm? What strategies have you employed to remain authentic to your style?

I’m often challenging gender stereotypes by my mere presence. There are a lot of very negative stereotypes of transgender women and who we are. Sometimes the challenge is as simple as proving we’re not someone to be afraid of. One former boss of mine told me I broke his stereotype simply by showing up to work everyday and doing my job. Talk about a low standard!

Though any good leader understands the need to adapt styles based on the situation, the trick is to not be someone else’s caricature.

How do you utilize emotional intelligence and active listening to create an inclusive environment in your team or organization? Could you share a specific instance where these qualities particularly enhanced team dynamics or performance?”

I think you have to use those skills to know when to call people in. That can be as simple as asking someone who’s quiet for their opinion during a meeting. Not everyone wants to volunteer their thoughts and some people like to talk far more than others, so being deliberate about creating space for every voice can help create the sense of inclusion and belonging.

What role has mentorship played in developing your authentic leadership style, and how do you communicate authentically to inspire and empower both your mentors and mentees?

While I can’t connect mentorship to developing my authentic style, it’s been hugely important in so many other ways. I feel the two most valuable things you get or can give in a mentoring relationship are honesty and time. Knowing that your mentors will make the time to provide their perspective and experience is incredibly empowering. If anyone in a mentoring relationship is ‘faking it’ the relationship is likely to fall apart quickly.

Ok super. Here is the main question of our interview. Based on your experience and research, can you please share “5 Ways Leading Authentically As A Woman Will Affect Your Leadership”? If you can, please share a story or an example for each.

1 . You’ll have more energy to do what really matters — When you’re not doing the work to hide a piece of yourself or to create and maintain a work persona that’s different from who you really are, you get to spend all that energy on positive things: connection, accomplishment, and joy.

2 . You’ll be trusted — Authenticity gets reflected and engenders reciprocal relationships. When people really know one another they develop trust in each other. Being honest and authentic builds the foundation for future growth.

3 . You’ll build a valuable network — Those relationships you’ve just put more into? They’ll pay dividends in both directions. Everyone benefits when we’re able to pool our skills or tap into specialized knowledge

4 . You’ll have the confidence to act –When you live by the standards you’ve set for yourself instead of what’s expected of you from others, there are a lot fewer calculations to do to figure out what others will think of your actions. You are the only judge. If you’re confident in who you are, being confident in your decisions comes a lot easier because you’ve already found the courage to be authentically you.

5 . You’ll help others flourish — When leading authentically, you’re leading as the best version of yourself. The journey to authenticity pushes people to be the kind of leaders that we all want in our lives. Good leadership enables us all to flourish, to reach higher than we thought possible, and accomplish shared objectives.

Are there potential pitfalls or challenges associated with being an empathetic leader? How can these be addressed?

Emotional and empathetic labor is hard work. As a society we tend to not think of it that way, but recovery from emotional labor is just as needed as from intellectual or physical labor. We need to take breaks, take vacations, and do the things that let us recharge. For me, mountain peaks recharge my batteries; hike up to them in the summer and ski down them in the winter! We each need to follow the same instructions we get anytime we board an airplane: put your oxygen mask on first. If you don’t regularly take care of yourself, eventually you won’t have what you need to take care of others.

You are a person of great influence. If you could start a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be? You never know what your idea can trigger. :-)

Oh, there are so many things and I wish we could do more in education, inclusion, exploration, and open-mindedness to the fact that different does not mean wrong. But if there’s one thing I would really like to see changed, its how near-sighted we are. We are so focused on the urgent problems of today that looking out more than a few months is often impossible. The really complex and challenging problems that humanity faces will take decades or longer to tackle. Drawn from ancient proverbs, the musical Hamilton asked and answered the question: what is a legacy? “It’s planting seeds in a garden you never get to see.” May we all plant the seeds of a better tomorrow, even if we’re not lucky enough to live in it.

How can our readers further follow you online?

Visit me at my website, connect on LinkedIn, or follow me on Instagram.

Thank you for the time you spent sharing these fantastic insights. We wish you only continued success in your great work!

About The Interviewer: Pirie is a TedX speaker, author and a Life Empowerment Coach. She is a co-host of Own your Throne podcast, inspiring women in the 2nd chapter of their lives. With over 20 years in front of the camera, Pirie Grossman understands the power of storytelling. After success in commercials and acting. She spent 10 years reporting for E! Entertainment Television, Entertainment Tonight, also hosted ABC’s “Every Woman”. Her work off-camera capitalizes on her strength, producing, bringing people together for unique experiences. She produced a Children’s Day of Compassion during the Dalai Lama’s visit here in 2005. 10,000 children attended, sharing ideas about compassion with His Holiness. From 2006–2009, Pirie Co-chaired the Special Olympics World Winter Games, in Idaho, welcoming 3,000 athletes from over 150 countries. She founded Destiny Productions to create Wellness Festivals and is an Advisory Board member of the Sun Valley Wellness Board.In February 2017, Pirie produced, “Love is Louder”, a Brain Health Summit, bringing in Kevin Hines, noted suicide survivor to Sun Valley who spoke to school kids about suicide. Sun Valley is in the top 5% highest suicide rate per capita in the Northwest, prompting a community initiative with St. Luke’s and other stake holders, to begin healing. She lives in Sun Valley with her two children, serves on the Board of Community School. She has her Master’s degree in Spiritual Psychology from the University of Santa Monica and is an Executive Life Empowerment Coach, where she helps people meet their dreams and goals! The difference between a dream and a goal is that a goal is a dream with a date on it!