On November 14 2018, senior officials from Guatemala’s Galileo University and its Security Studies Institute welcomed Prof. Alejandro Alemán, Dr. Alejandra Bolaños, and Dr. Fabiana Perera, members of the Perry Center’s Governance Program. The team was kindly received with opening remarks by Dr. Jorge Retolaza in his capacity as Secretary General of the distinguished academic institution. Subsequent working meetings included an in depth and extensive dialogue with Lic. Edgar Ricardo Bustamante Figueroa and with Lic. Edgar Lizardo Porres Velásquez, senior most authorities of the University’s Institute of Security Studies. The objective of these working meetings was to discuss the initial parameters for a forthcoming joint project. The central objective of this joint endeavor is to recover lessons learned from the Guatemala experience and its development of a National Security System in order to derive key principles that can be practically applied to the fostering and consolidation of interagency synchronization and alignment and to the production of concrete results in the areas of defense and security for the Hemisphere.