James Valenti is the Assistant Director for the Office of Geostationary Earth Orbit Observations. In this role he supports the director with oversight of the program and ground and flight projects.

From 2012-2021, James was the GOES-R ground segment project manager. From 2010-2012, he served as the ground project’s assistant project manager. Prior to joining the GOES-R Program, Valenti served in many capacities in multiple offices within NOAA's National Environmental Satellite, Data, and Information Service (NESDIS) since 2001. From 2001 to 2002, he worked in the Office of Satellite Operations (now Office of Satellite and Product Operations) as the Polar-orbiting Operational Environmental Satellite engineering team lead. In 2002, Valenti transferred to the National Polar-orbiting Operational Environmental Satellite System program office to be the ground system division lead.

 Before joining NOAA, Valenti served as a space operations officer in the United States Air Force where he worked as the project manager for the Air Force’s Nuclear Detonation Detection System ground data processing system. He also served as the field liaison and as a flight commander for the Defense Meteorological Satellite Program office.

Valenti holds a Master of Space Operations degree from the Air Force Institute of Technology along with a Bachelor of Science degree in aerospace engineering from Penn State University.