Closing the Circle Through Hopkins' Global Security Studies

Published June 8, 2026 | Request Information

At 55, Christian Forman boards a plane once a week from rural New Hampshire to Washington, D.C., trading the quiet rhythms of farm life for graduate courses in strategy, security, and global conflict.

For him, the commute is more than routine. It is a return.

“I’m coming back to study the stuff that I loved when I was in my early 20s,” said Forman, a student in the MA in Global Security Studies program at Johns Hopkins University who is taking advantage of the program’s online and on-campus curriculum flexibility. “I really enjoy being in the classroom with students decades younger than me. Their brains work faster than mine, but with 30 years of life experience, I have a few aces up my sleeve.”

Long before he became a successful entrepreneur, Forman studied international relations at Colby College and the London School of Economics. Global affairs and conflict fascinated him then. They still do.

But like many people fresh out of college, passion gave way to practicality.

“When I graduated, I needed to pay the bills and the rent,” he said. “I had been working as a journalist and made a deal with my wife, Angela, when we got engaged, that I would follow her to medical school. She chose Dartmouth, so we moved up here to no journalism jobs. I talked my way into a startup marketing role. And the rest, they say, is history.”

Forman spent more than three decades founding, growing, and selling talent acquisition technology companies designed to help organizations identify and hire exceptional people. His last company grew to 600 employees and $200 million in revenue and was sold to Alex Springer, the German firm that owns Business Insider and Politico.

Along the way, he developed a reputation as an expert in hiring systems and organizational talent strategy. But despite his professional success, his early interest in international relations never disappeared, and the experience he gained – at the intersection of technology and human potential – now directly informs his academic interests.

That learning happens against an unlikely home base: a working dairy farm in Meriden, New Hampshire. There, Forman and his wife – a family physician and farmer – live among registered Guernsey cattle on Mill Bridge Farm, producing award-winning ricotta cheese sold across the northern region of the state. Together, they also raised four children.

“Going back to school has been a remarkable gift,” said Forman, who is on target to graduate in spring 2027. “I am learning nuance, and my ability to understand what is going on in the world grows deeper every semester. The deeper I go, the more there is to learn.”

Retired from the day-to-day of running a business, Forman now has the opportunity to dig in. His current research focuses on how elite Special Operations Forces identify and select personnel for their ranks. He points to the first SOF truth, that “humans are more important than hardware,” as an idea that resonates deeply with his own professional background. After years spent studying how corporations recruit exceptional talent, he became fascinated by how military organizations assess individuals for “tip of the spear” positions.

“I really believe if we optimize the process of selecting people for these roles, the knock-on effects for national security are immense.” he said. “I am not going into this to get a job at the World Bank or one of the three-letter agencies. It’s probably too late for me to start a serious career in academics. That said, I do have a lot of gas in the tank and a lot of experience outside of government that could be helpful in ensuring our Armed Forces have the right talent for the right job. I hope that maybe some of the stuff that I work on will be thought-provoking enough to help our warfighters, even if it is only by one percent.”

He credits the program’s faculty with pushing him intellectually while respecting the depth of experience he brings to discussions. He especially praised courses taught by Jeremy Gwinn and Miriam Matthews for their rigor, responsiveness, and thoughtful feedback.

“Their commentary is super helpful, and I’ve been challenged,” he said. “I’m writing what feels like hundreds of pages every semester.”

What excites him most is the complexity of the work itself.

“The world is going crazy,” he said. “Everything we’re studying is changing in real time. The program takes me beyond the headlines and helps me understand more of the philosophical, conceptual underpinnings as to why the world works the way it does.”

There are moments when he imagines the alternate life he might have pursued had circumstances unfolded differently.

“If I hadn’t met Angela,” he said, “I probably would have ended up as a war correspondent.”

Conflict, he said, reveals humanity at its best and worst. The impulse to understand those stories – and the systems behind them – has stayed with him throughout his life.

Now, after years spent building companies and raising a family, Forman finds himself back where he started: immersed in international relations, asking difficult questions, and discovering new layers of understanding.

“I was looking for a world-class international relations and strategic studies program, and I found it at Hopkins,” Forman said. “Enrolling here has been an excellent decision. It’s a circle closing, and I have enjoyed every minute of it. It fills my cup.”