We’re passionate about impact.

Our Mission

At The Solarium Group, we are on a never-ending quest to find better, more cost-effective, and more impactful solutions for our clients. We have a passion for exploring the unknown and difficult to solve. We search for evidence that leads to new insights, new courses of action, and new discoveries that drive results.

Our Values

    • Positioning The Solarium Group as an industry thought leader requires unrivaled vision, persistence, and execution. We never settle — in everything we do, we challenge our ideas of what’s possible in order to be the best versions of ourselves.

    • We set and achieve ambitious goals, work constantly to improve, and are dedicated to helping our team (and our clients) realize success.

    • We maintain high standards of quality and ethics, are confidential in discussions and decisions, and are honest about our own biases.

    • We preserve client confidences.

    • We keep our commitments, act consistently and fairly, and do what we say we will.

    • We believe in helping others, and take satisfaction in providing effective solutions that address your greatest challenges. 

    • Our drive and energy are contagious, inspiring our clients and those around us.

    • We meet our challenges with creativity and optimism, pushing ourselves beyond our limits. 

    • Innovation motivates action: to take risks, encourage curiosity and new ideas, learn from mistakes, and constantly strive to exceed expectations. Through innovation, we generate solutions for our customers and raise the bar — both within our workplace and throughout our industry.

    • Our team is committed to lifelong learning that facilitates our ability to think critically, understand deeply, apply knowledge practically, analyze thoroughly, evaluate honestly, and create openly.  Learning breeds innovation within The Solarium Group.

Who We Are

The Solarium Group (TSG) is a boutique strategic consulting and advisory firm that partners with clients from the private, public, and not-for-profit sectors to address their most critical challenges. Our network of world-class experts and consultants comprise of retired, senior-ranking U.S. diplomats and military officers with collective experience in over 100 countries around the world. Whether through implementing a foreign assistance project, embedding a TSG expert within your organization to provide technical assistance, or developing a leadership seminar for your organization’s executives, TSG is ready to deliver the results you need.

TSG understands the complexity and intracacies of navigating U.S. foreign policy, US foreign assistance, and partnering with the US government and the private sector because we live it each and every day. This is where we thrive, and is why we are perfectly positioned to work with you - foreign governments, international organizations, government agencies, non-governmental organizations, and multinational corporations - to represent your organization’s interests. We take the guess work out of working in unknown and complicated environments, and know how to respond to any crisis calmly and sensibly, seize every opportunity, and maximize exposure to benefit our clients. With unrivaled expertise in partnering with governments and private sector organizations of all sizes, TSG represents an optimal choice for collaboration, problem solving, and solutions.

The Birth of Solarium

Project Solarium, launched by President Dwight D. Eisenhower in 1953, was a bold and methodical exercise in strategic planning. Faced with the complexities of the Cold War, Eisenhower convened three teams of top thinkers—military leaders, diplomats, and scholars—to rigorously debate and develop competing strategies for countering Soviet expansion. The process was not just an academic exercise; it was a masterclass in structured decision-making, forcing participants to challenge assumptions, pressure-test ideas, and align national policy with long-term strategic imperatives. The result? A pragmatic, sustainable doctrine—known as the New Look—that shaped U.S. foreign policy for decades.

At The Solarium Group, we embrace this same spirit of intellectual rigor and strategic foresight. Just as Eisenhower recognized that the best solutions emerge from disciplined analysis and diverse perspectives, we approach our work with a commitment to deep thinking, creative problem-solving, and pragmatic execution. Whether advising governments or businesses, we help clients cut through complexity, explore multiple strategic pathways, and craft solutions that are not only bold but built to last.

Leadership

Businessman in a suit with USAID logo and American flag in background.

Meet Troy

Troy Tillis is the CEO and founder of The Solarium Group, and is responsible for the strategic direction, vision, growth, and performance of the firm. As a senior executive of the USAID Foreign Service with over 17 years of international experience - a career that has spanned four continents and18 countries - Troy brings a unique blend of strategic insight, diplomatic acumen, and global operations and foreign affairs expertise to the creation of TSG.

Mr. Tillis holds a M.A. in Strategic Studies (National Security) from the U.S. Army School of Advance Military Studies, a M.S. in International Trade and Development from Oklahoma State University, and a B.S. in Management (Organizational Behavior) from Northern Illinois University. He was a Master's International Program (MIP) fellow at Oklahoma State University, serving his Peace Corps assignment in North Macedonia from 2006-2008.