Latest / Energy Empire / "Nobody Cared About Deployment" — Who is Jigar Shah? (Part 2)

Transcript

"Nobody Cared About Deployment" — Who is Jigar Shah? (Part 2) · Energy Empire

0:00
There were a lot of people going, I don't think your
0:02
model's working, Jigger. Like I, I, I think you should
0:06
give up and do something else. And like, now everyone's like,
0:09
oh, it's amazing. And $10 billion raised and 2000
0:12
assets. But like, while we were doing
0:15
it, people really were whispering in the corner going,
0:19
I don't know about that vanity project that Jigger's doing.
0:22
Like, I don't think that's working right.
0:23
We really had to stick with it. Hi, my name is Jigger Shaw.
0:33
I'm a clean energy entrepreneur. And I'm Jamie Nolan, a clean
0:36
energy communications consultant, and this is Energy
0:39
Empire Jigger. I'm super excited for today's
0:43
episode, our second in our series of your your biography.
0:48
We're getting into who is Jigger Shaw and what makes him who he
0:51
is. Are you?
0:55
I don't like talking about myself, I like learning about
0:58
all these other extraordinary people that we get to talk to.
1:01
Well, I like it because even in doing the prep for these
1:05
recordings, I learn more about you and about, you know, how you
1:09
became the, you know, the, the personality that you are and
1:14
that the force of nature in our industry.
1:16
So we are going to we're going to dig right in here.
1:20
In our first segment in this series, we talked about the
1:23
founding of Sun Edison. That was a big focus of our
1:26
interview. And so now we're moving on and
1:29
we're we're talking about you left Carbon War Room and then
1:33
you wrote a book. I don't know if if all of our
1:36
listeners know necessarily that you were an author.
1:38
I have a signed copy behind me on on the shelf.
1:43
So you sat down to write a book. You're a talker, you're a
1:47
podcaster, you're a deal maker. What made you feel like those
1:51
ideas needed to exist in book form?
1:54
What was kind of the Was there a frustration behind it?
1:56
What was the story you felt like you needed to tell specifically
2:00
in that form? Well, I think you know that
2:02
before I met you, I had this wonderful guy in my life, Rob
2:07
Wise, who had helped me at Sun Edison and helped me at the
2:10
Carbon War Room. And he thought we need to write
2:14
a book. He was like, you know what, like
2:16
you know, you have all these great ideas and remember, we had
2:19
just finished the Carbon War Room experience, right?
2:22
I had left Carbon War Room and we created this whole series
2:25
called the Creating Climate Wealth series, right?
2:28
Because part of I think the underlying feeling was that at
2:35
the time, people really thought that they were going to change
2:38
how large corporations operated. And what we realized at the
2:42
Carbon Memoriam was you were really going to see the change
2:45
from entrepreneurs, innovators, new companies, and they were
2:49
going to force large corporations to change because
2:51
they were going to disrupt them, right?
2:53
And so that's really where the creating climate wealth story
2:57
came from. I also, you know, had all these
2:59
other disparate thoughts that needed like to get put into a
3:05
frame that made some sense. Like for instance, I hated the
3:08
word impact investing as if like investing in clean stuff, like
3:13
meant a sacrifice, which I never like thought that, you know,
3:17
investing in clean stuff was a sacrifice.
3:19
I always thought it was good business, right?
3:21
Like, I mean, obviously some transactions take more time.
3:25
Like you can't just download the documents on LegalZoom and
3:28
invest in it. And so you have to like actually
3:31
think about things. So it takes a little bit more
3:32
time to do stuff. And so I wove that into it.
3:36
But then there were other things like just the power of being
3:40
available, right? I mean, which is a superpower I
3:43
still have today, but like, you know, like the fact that nobody
3:48
seems to like have business cards at the time, like
3:51
everyone. I mean, I always carried them.
3:53
I don't anymore just cuz I find that like no one actually does
3:56
anything with them, but I'm available on like LinkedIn or
3:58
Twitter or whatever it is. Like, I just feel like it's
4:01
amazing to me how many people don't make themselves available
4:05
and don't answer questions and don't figure out how to be
4:09
helpful to the next generation of folks.
4:12
And so like, I had a lot to say and so I said it.
4:15
Sure. Yeah, that mean, I mean you are
4:16
very accessible. You may or may not have made a
4:19
comment that you were more accessible than a ham sandwich.
4:25
I loved how we owned Josh Hawley in that interview or in that
4:31
hearing. Call that comment in a
4:32
congressional hearing. And then I also do recall that
4:36
you may or may not have dressed up as a ham sandwich for
4:39
Halloween that year. Yeah, I probably took it too
4:42
far, but it was so no. I thought it was great.
4:47
I feel like we can we can safely recount that anecdote now.
4:51
Oh my God. Well, I mean, Jigger, I know
4:52
I've seen you fire off 1000 ideas in a single meeting.
4:55
This is why I really do need recordings whenever you and I
4:59
have a phone call because otherwise later I'm like left
5:02
trying to decipher. You just can't get them out of
5:05
you fast enough. And I'm trying to to furiously
5:07
take notes. A book requires you to organize
5:10
all of that into something more linear.
5:12
So was that hard for you? Like what's it kind of the
5:14
process look like as the book was coming together?
5:18
It was hard. I mean, I used a ghostwriter,
5:20
which made my life a lot easier. And basically it was, it was
5:24
about like just getting all of your thoughts on a page and then
5:27
figuring out how they relate to each other.
5:29
So one of the things that like came out of that effort was
5:32
recognizing that the clean energy sector, like many
5:36
sectors, but I think especially the clean energy sector, wasn't
5:40
going to get solved by 5 super large corporations.
5:44
It was really going to be a million companies that do you
5:49
know like $10 million worth of business every year, right?
5:51
Or 100,000 companies doing $100 million worth of business every
5:56
year, right? That's how we were going to get
5:57
to the trillion dollar impact that we needed to get to.
6:01
And when looking back on it today, like that is exactly how
6:05
we got here. When you think about how many
6:07
awesome entrepreneurs like, you know, install solar in their
6:10
communities, sell electric vehicles, do maintenance on, you
6:14
know, equipment, right, like figure out how to help
6:17
transition folks, it really has been an extraordinary industry.
6:22
And we've hired so many people. I think every year there are
6:25
thousands and thousands of people who join our industry,
6:28
not just in the United States, but hundreds of thousands of
6:31
people around the world who've joined our industry.
6:33
And today, thank God for them, right?
6:36
I mean, with all of the disruption in the Straits of
6:38
Hormuz and the conflict in Iran, like they're all stepping up in
6:42
their specific countries to help people with solutions, with
6:46
solar panels, with battery storage, with wind power, with
6:49
electric vehicles. I mean, and so a lot of what I
6:52
talked about was the power of entrepreneurship and the power
6:55
of small businesses. But the other thing that I
6:58
talked a lot about was the power of finance and the power of
7:02
capital, right? And figuring out how to tap into
7:04
mainstream capital. One of the things that I got so
7:07
frustrated by was how many people thought that we needed
7:11
impact investing dollars and needed to figure out a way to
7:13
get people to give us cheaper money than what mainstream
7:17
capital cost. And convincing people that
7:21
pivoting towards mainstream capital is how you make big
7:23
change. And that was not common
7:26
knowledge back in 2013. Yeah, that's a really
7:28
interesting point. And that kind of does that
7:30
follows you kind of followed that thesis statement through to
7:33
your work at LPO where, you know, kind of, I would say like
7:37
a core idea in this book is that we need a deployment, not
7:40
invention. The the core argument is that we
7:44
don't need to invent new technology.
7:46
We need to deploy what already exists using smarter business
7:49
models. I mean, you've been saying the
7:50
same thing for years now. In 2013, however, that was
7:54
really contrarian and most of the climate world was still
7:57
obsessed with breakthrough tech. So did people push back and did
8:01
you get called naive? Yeah, it's so funny because like
8:06
people obliquely refer to it as like deployment versus
8:09
innovation. I'm so tired of that.
8:12
And like, I look back and I'm like, wait, I think they're
8:14
talking about me. Like, I guess, I guess they're
8:18
talking about the fight that I started.
8:19
But you know, like, I mean, who could be against innovation?
8:22
It's not like I was ever against innovation.
8:25
But what I found was that no one cared about deployment.
8:28
They were sort of like, well, if it happens, great.
8:31
If it doesn't happen, well, it wasn't meant to be and it was
8:35
more sinister than that. Like when it didn't happen,
8:38
people didn't try to identify the reasons why it didn't
8:41
happen. They would say that the
8:42
technologies weren't good enough.
8:43
This is this is primarily what my beef is with like Bill Gates
8:47
and you know, Vinod Khosla and some of those folks is if the
8:51
technologies that we're representing didn't immediately
8:54
take off like the Internet or computers or whatever it is that
8:57
they were involved in, they were like, well, the something must
8:59
be wrong with the technology. Not that like, oh, there's
9:02
structural barriers to permitting or utilities aren't
9:06
even allowing folks to have permission to connect these
9:09
systems to the grid. Right?
9:11
Like it it obviously couldn't be anything other than the
9:14
technology is somehow flawed is was what they were saying and
9:18
that just irked me to no end. Absolutely.
9:21
I mean, and again, I think these are the same themes you're still
9:24
talking about. And you were you were, you were,
9:26
you know, pounding the pavement trying to get people to to
9:30
realize that the big challenge was business model innovation
9:34
and not necessarily technology innovation back then.
9:37
And I still think that's like a big focus of what your core
9:40
message is. So did you find that the book
9:44
changed anything? Like did deals happen because of
9:47
it that it opened doors that wouldn't have opened for you
9:50
otherwise? You know, it's one of those
9:54
things where so many people have read the book, right?
9:59
When I, when I published it, I ended up self-publishing it just
10:04
because I went to all of the publishers and it just seemed
10:08
like such a fiasco to work with them.
10:11
And so I worked with this group called ICOSA.
10:13
There's still a few videos that they took of me on YouTube from
10:17
when I had black hair. And you know, they had me like
10:20
writing stuff on a whiteboard. And the way that we sold all
10:23
these books was I just said yes to every single keynote address
10:28
that people asked me to give to everything that year, right?
10:31
Just said yes to everything. And and my speaking fee was
10:35
basically you had to buy enough books for half of the audience
10:40
if for me to speak. And then I would sit there and
10:42
like sign all these books. And so many people got a book.
10:48
It was crazy. Like even today people are like,
10:52
look, see, I got a book from you at this conference and like you
10:56
signed it. And, and I don't know of any
10:59
specific deals that that came out of it, but I have to say
11:03
that like so many things go my way that probably shouldn't or
11:09
don't need to. And I think it's because I've
11:12
been accessible. People have seen my book,
11:14
they've read my book. They've like, you know, like
11:17
followed stuff that I've said, as you suggested, like I've been
11:20
consistent. Like I don't like, I feel like
11:22
everyone thinks that I'm giving hot takes, but I feel like it's
11:25
the same hot takes, just maybe said slightly differently since
11:28
2013. And so no business has been
11:31
really good. And so like I think it was
11:33
positive even when I started generating capital, I remember
11:36
we just kept like boxes of books and everyone who visited wanted
11:40
a book. So then that was another way.
11:43
We got a lot of books out the door.
11:50
This episode is supported by S2G Investments.
11:53
If you've been listening to me, you know that I'm done talking
11:57
about R&D. We have the technology.
12:00
The real question is can we deploy it at scale?
12:04
When I joined Sanjeev Krishnan on the S2G podcast, we skipped
12:09
the hype and talked about what actually matters, affordability,
12:13
fit for purpose, capital and getting real infrastructure
12:17
built. S2G Investments is one of the
12:20
only firms who brings that same deployment first mindset to
12:24
energy, agriculture, and the oceans, connecting the dots
12:29
across the real economy. Listen to the S2G Podcast on
12:34
your favorite podcast app now and start with my episode on
12:39
energy affordability. I love that so much.
12:48
And that's a perfect segue into your kind of your next big gig,
12:52
General Capital, cofounded in 2014 by you Scott Jacobs, who
12:58
was former McKinsey and Matan Friedman Venture Capital
13:02
Resource Finance. And the core idea at Generate
13:06
was infrastructure as a service like financing, building, owning
13:09
and operating sustainable infrastructure assets.
13:12
And you guys worked across energy, water ways,
13:15
transportation. It was very broad remit.
13:17
And by 2024, Generate had raised more than $10 billion in total
13:21
capital and built a portfolio of more than 2000 sustainable
13:26
infrastructure assets, which is just incredible in 10 years.
13:30
So talk to me a little bit about the origin story.
13:33
How did you and your Co founders come together and kind of where
13:37
did the concept come from? So Scott and I have known each
13:41
other for years. He was on the Obama transition
13:44
team and he was the one who brought my name forward to
13:49
Richard Branson to actually hire me for the Carbon War Room.
13:53
So I have him to thank for that as well.
13:55
So Scott and I used to the three years and then Scott and Matan
13:59
overlapped at Harvard Business School.
14:00
I always seem to start like companies from with people who
14:04
went to Harvard Business School like some of this and was the
14:06
same. And so they knew each other.
14:10
And so Scott brought Matan and I together and it was fantastic.
14:15
Like, I mean, Scott was just a master fundraiser, big thinker
14:20
about how, you know, capital markets work.
14:23
I, as we just talked about with my book, was talking about
14:26
business model innovation and so many people were doing it right.
14:30
So many people were like batteries as a service, solar
14:33
hot water as a service, right? Like, you know, renewable
14:36
natural gas as a service, right? So like a lot of people were
14:41
doing the business model innovation that I was talking
14:43
about. And then when they went to go
14:45
raise money, there was nobody to raise money from, right?
14:47
Like everyone was like, that was just in a book, like we're not
14:50
doing that. And so so, you know, like
14:53
generally capital became the place that people came to for
14:57
these great ideas. And we were the group that would
15:01
spend time with them. Like, if you remember my story
15:04
at South Edison, I mean, we had closed the first couple deals at
15:07
like Whole Foods and Staples and IKEA and other places.
15:11
And then when I went to people who I would have thought would
15:14
funded the project, they were like, solar's too weird.
15:17
I mean, there's no way we're going to be the first investor
15:19
in solar, right? That seems too risky.
15:22
So we wanted to be that place that I could have come to, you
15:25
know, when I was going out to raise money for Sun Edison,
15:29
right, for project finance. And we were that place like we
15:31
would give everybody their three hours or 4 hours and we would
15:36
let them fully explain their businesses.
15:38
And sure, we had to pass on a lot of stuff.
15:40
That was Matan's job. He was like the no person and
15:44
like someone had to be the no person.
15:45
That's how you make money in this business.
15:49
But it was so fantastic. Like we were, we're the 1st $100
15:52
million into battery storage. We were the first $100 million
15:56
into renewable natural gas. We were the first $100 million
15:58
into behind the meter natural gas, which is so funny because
16:02
now everybody's like doing it for data centers.
16:04
And so like we were like cutting edge in so many places and and
16:10
yeah, and then and we started a whole new business model too,
16:12
right? We were a C Corp.
16:14
We were not a font. And so we were a corporation and
16:17
people bought shares of our corporation.
16:19
We were not a fund. So we did all sorts of crazy
16:22
things. That part of it is really
16:24
interesting to me and Generate didn't just write checks, they
16:28
built, owned, operated the assets.
16:29
They're still doing that today and that is very different from
16:32
a traditional fund. So why did you guys decide to
16:35
structure it that way And you know, what were you trying, what
16:39
problem were you trying to solve that kind of traditional finance
16:43
was really missing the boat on? So one of the things we realized
16:47
early on is when you're a fund structure, you have a fund life,
16:50
right? So people give you money, but
16:52
then they expect it back in like 7 years or eight years or nine
16:57
years. And what you realize with these
16:59
companies is it you can't promise that, right?
17:02
Like like when we invested in renewable natural gas, I think
17:05
we probably put our first investment in like maybe
17:07
20/17/2018. We had a lot of challenges like
17:11
the first project didn't work right, right.
17:13
We had to like bring in an expert to help fix it, etcetera,
17:16
etcetera, generate upcycle, which is what that company is
17:19
called now is just put itself up for sale and they're doing a lot
17:23
of stuff. This is 2026.
17:24
So this is like 9 years later and they finally got all of the
17:28
projects working beautifully. The returns are exactly what we
17:31
thought they were going to be just three or four years later
17:33
than we expected and everything's going well.
17:37
But like, you need permanent capital to make those kinds of
17:40
investments. Like what happens a lot of times
17:42
is if you have to give your money back to an investor after
17:46
seven years, but the entrepreneur is on the cusp of
17:49
getting it all right, but you've just run out of time, then you
17:52
sort of force them to do dumb things to be able to give you
17:56
your money back faster so you can give it back to LP's, right?
18:01
And so that doesn't align interest between the investor
18:04
and the entrepreneur. And we wanted to fully align
18:06
interest between what we were doing, what they were doing, and
18:09
the C Corp was the only structure we could use.
18:12
And then funny enough, Trump came into office in 2016.
18:15
And when the Trump tax bill passed, they cut corporate taxes
18:18
from like 35% to 15%. So then everyone was like,
18:21
Jugger, you guys are so smart. I can't believe you guys like
18:24
figured that out and knew that was going to happen.
18:26
And obviously we had no idea that was going to happen.
18:28
We like completely did not predict that at all.
18:30
But then a lot of other people started copying what we were
18:34
doing. So one thing that you referenced
18:37
in our last episode is that when you sold Sun Edison, you told
18:40
the buyers exactly what not to do, which was do not use your
18:44
own balance sheet, always use other people's money.
18:47
And then infamously, they did the opposite and they ran it
18:50
into the ground. So when you were building
18:52
generate, was that cautionary tale in the back of your mind
18:55
like did was did watching someone else destroy the prior
19:00
company that you had built shape how you structured this one?
19:05
I mean, in some ways, right, you, you partner with people
19:09
that you think are going to be awesome.
19:10
Although I had great partners at Sun Edison, I think that in
19:14
general, I find that every situation is different.
19:16
So you have to turn the page and I did like obviously it.
19:19
So I said and I also turned the page at generate capital right.
19:22
Remember, like in 2021, when I joined the Biden administration,
19:25
they forced me to sell all my shares in Generate capital.
19:28
And so I did. And so, you know, I didn't think
19:31
about it at all. I didn't coordinate with
19:33
generate while I was in office, etcetera.
19:34
So I, I don't think that that's what I was focused on, but I
19:39
think what I was focused on was figuring out how you actually
19:43
unlocked these projects. So the one of the things that we
19:47
did when I was at Generate was we, we always expected our deals
19:53
to go bad, right? We expected the, the sponsor,
19:57
right, that we were investing in was going to lose interest in
20:00
the project or somehow not be able to manage the project.
20:04
So we hired people in house that were experts and everything.
20:07
And sometimes it took us like 2 years or three years after we
20:10
made an investment to find the right people.
20:12
But we always dedicated ourselves to doing that.
20:15
And that made us better because we were prepared to step in and
20:19
operate the projects if you know, something went wrong.
20:23
And we had to do that a lot actually.
20:24
And, and I don't mean that. In a negative way, I don't mean
20:27
that like in the sense that the people that we invested in were
20:30
bad people, but like sometimes it's a things don't go right.
20:33
And like the assets themselves are fine, The batteries are
20:36
fine, the renewable natural gas plants are fine, the generators
20:39
are fine, but you have to you have to lean in.
20:43
And so part of I think what we learned it generate was just not
20:47
to be a financial investor, but actually to be a partner with
20:53
these companies and really think through what would what could we
20:58
do to best help them succeed. And that I think was a
21:03
completely different point of view than the rest of the
21:05
investment, you know, sort of field.
21:08
I love that and what tremendous value for the companies and to
21:13
know that you have that level of expertise inside of your
21:17
investor, which I mean, it's very similar to kind of like how
21:20
things worked at LPO, right? We had subject matter experts in
21:24
every single technology area and it definitely is a huge value
21:27
add. So at generate, of course, the
21:30
team there, you expanded your technology areas, you expanded
21:33
into fuel cells, anaerobic digesters, battery stores, water
21:37
infrastructure, EVs, and then you actually became one of the
21:40
largest owners of renewable natural gas in the country.
21:44
So what was the first non solar bet?
21:46
And were you nervous at all about moving beyond what you
21:49
knew so well? So I definitely think that the
21:53
battery storage deals that we did, which were the first deals
21:56
that we did, we're not, you know, something that caused any
22:00
nervousness at all because it felt very familiar to what we
22:03
knew about the solar space. The renewable natural gas stuff
22:06
we did was terrifying, like, because it was all new, right?
22:11
Not only were you working with waste management and like the
22:15
sanitation department to get food waste or large
22:19
manufacturers like Unilever and others who were making like ice
22:21
cream at the time. And, you know, then if they had
22:24
a bad batch, they needed someone to take it off their hands and,
22:27
and, you know, do something with it, right.
22:28
And so that was an entirely different set of feedstock
22:31
providers. Then when you looked at the
22:33
technology, everyone was like, oh, yeah, it works fine.
22:36
Like, don't worry, just like, sign here and we'll build the
22:40
project. And of course, it never worked.
22:42
Well, like, we needed like, deep packaging systems because
22:45
sometimes, like, like the bad ketchup was already in bottles.
22:49
And so you need to squeeze it out of the bottles, right?
22:51
And so then there were like machines for that.
22:53
Then you had to like, digest it. And that was like a science
22:57
experiment, like if the bacteria like ever like had a bad day,
23:01
then like, you know, your natural gas production was off
23:03
and then you may had to like you like, you know, like it may have
23:07
all died, right? And so like just a level of
23:09
expertise. There was not something that I
23:11
knew anything about at all. And so then we went out to find
23:14
them and like, I remember going to the first RNG conference and
23:17
there were like 97 people there. That was the total number of
23:21
people at this conference, right?
23:23
It was such. A small.
23:24
Sector like 2015, 2016, because we started looking at deals, we
23:29
always looked at deals for like 2 years before we pulled the
23:31
trigger on our first deal. And and then I'd meet people and
23:34
I was like, wow, like you're really talented or wow, you're a
23:38
big talker, but you really don't know anything about what you're
23:41
talking about, right? And like you could tell like
23:43
just sizing people up and so like that was fascinating.
23:47
But then even the regulatory affairs stuff was different,
23:49
right? So at the California Public
23:51
Service Commission, the team that worked on renewable natural
23:54
gas was completely different than the team that worked on
23:56
electricity, right? So like my entire network was
23:59
useless when it came to renewable natural gas, right?
24:02
I had to like meet all new people on the regulatory side,
24:05
all new people on the legislative side, like, you
24:08
know, like, you know, cuz like some of the ways that we made
24:10
money was through regulation, right?
24:12
Like the low carbon fuel standard program in California.
24:15
So you're like, what is the LCFS program and how does it work,
24:19
right? And so it was just so new, but
24:24
you were looking at it and going like, these farmers are actually
24:28
storing manure in pits, unlined pits that are clearly illegal
24:34
from EPA. And they don't want to do stuff
24:37
that's illegal. But the stuff that was legal was
24:40
just too expensive and they couldn't like, get milk to you.
24:44
Like if, you know, like they had to do things legally, right?
24:47
And so like, we did a big anaerobic digester with, Do you
24:51
like the Fair Life brand of milk?
24:55
Yeah. So like, they had this massive
24:58
facility in Indiana, right? And so we did them.
25:01
And so like, just learning all about, like, what Fair Life did
25:05
and like, how they made money. They were like a like, did you
25:08
know that they made no money whatsoever on dairy?
25:11
Like they didn't make any money on milk.
25:13
They made money on the brand fair Life, right?
25:16
And so like, so when they like built up fair life to be this
25:20
big company, I forgot who they bought it.
25:23
They sold it to like Coca-Cola or something.
25:24
They sold it for like $4 billion, right?
25:27
And like, you're like, oh, they don't make money on cows and
25:31
milk. They actually make money on
25:34
branding in the grocery store, right?
25:36
Like, so many new things to learn about and all of it was
25:39
awesome. Yeah, I actually, I had a
25:42
renewable natural gas client. Shout out to Brightmark.
25:46
They were one of my first clients when I went out on my
25:48
own as a consultant and they put so much faith in me.
25:51
They were actually my longest running.
25:53
It's still to this day the longest place I've ever
25:55
technically worked. I supported them for five years
25:58
and they did a lot of renewable natural gas projects with with
26:03
dairy farmers specifically all across the country.
26:05
We've got to do an RNG episode Jigger, because it is such an
26:08
interesting sector and it, it's such common sense.
26:12
It makes so much sense when you actually learn about all of the
26:16
many, first of all, environmental problems that it's
26:18
solving. It creates another stream of
26:20
income for, for folks in rural areas.
26:23
It's a win, win, win all around. And particularly when we're
26:27
facing all of these fossil fuel and security issues, prices,
26:31
price issues with the, the conflict in Iran.
26:34
Let's do an RNG episode since that's something we have in
26:37
common. We both worked in that sector
26:38
and it's really important and I don't think a lot of people know
26:41
about it. No, we should definitely do
26:43
that. And so many of our friends in
26:45
the environmental movement like have mixed feelings about it
26:48
because they think we're extending the life of the
26:49
natural gas industry and all sorts of other stuff.
26:52
So I I find. It won me over.
26:57
I totally agree, it won me over too, but I find that the
27:01
political part of it is complicated.
27:04
Sure. Well, we're here to break it all
27:06
down for folks, so we'll have to, we'll have to get that on
27:08
the books. But going back to your time at
27:12
Generate, you've been honest and we talked about this in the
27:15
first episode, that you've always been a great hustler, but
27:18
you weren't necessarily the best manager from the beginning.
27:22
And you mentioned Bryant, Rob, Brian Robertson ran the board
27:26
and did the fundraising at Sun Edison.
27:28
And then it Generate you had Scott and Matan.
27:31
So how did the three of you divide up the work and did you
27:34
really feel like you guys had a good dynamic and the right team
27:37
to complement one another's strength?
27:39
It was fantastic. Scott raised all the money, so
27:42
it was great and Matan helped him do that just because
27:45
everybody wanted to meet the chief investment officer and you
27:48
know, like they don't want to meet me too.
27:50
So it wasn't like I was chopped liver, but like I was less
27:53
important, I think, than Scott and Matan.
27:55
And then Scott really managed the board, although, you know, a
27:58
lot of the folks who were on the board were good friends of mine.
28:00
I definitely brought in almost all of the business while I was
28:03
there. One of the really weird things
28:06
though, was Matan, like is such a investor investor, right?
28:10
Like, I mean, just like, like to say no a lot like, you know,
28:13
really dug in deep. And he and I, like, one of the
28:18
things that I taught Matan was I was like, you need to leave some
28:22
money on the table. And because he was, he always
28:25
tried to get the very best deal on every single investment that
28:29
we made. And I was like, Matan, there's
28:32
only 1000 people that matter in the entire country.
28:35
And if you piss off one of them, then like that's like 75 people
28:40
that are going to hear about that and they're never going to
28:42
do business with us. And then if you piss off another
28:44
one, that's another 75 and never be business with us.
28:48
So like, like, yes, we could have made an 18% return there.
28:51
If we give on these two points, we'll make a 17.1% return.
28:55
We should do that and like leave more money in their pocket.
28:59
And he would grumble all the time.
29:02
And then by the time, like we like finished working with each
29:06
other, he was like, I see your perspective.
29:09
And like, because we developed a reputation for being a great
29:12
place to get money from because we were not overly harsh, right?
29:16
That we wouldn't take the letter of the contract and screw people
29:20
over with it. We would like be reasonable,
29:23
right? I think some of that changed
29:25
after I left. But like, but it was like, it
29:28
was a real thing that we did and it caused a lot of the best
29:33
entrepreneurs who could have gotten money from other people
29:36
to choose to get money from us. Yep, I get it.
29:39
So you also mentioned that Generate was the moment in your
29:43
career when you finally hired a coach, a leadership coach.
29:48
So what did that process teach you?
29:50
And what was the biggest thing that you feel like you got wrong
29:54
about leadership earlier in your career?
29:58
Well, I think the big thing I got wrong is just that
30:00
leadership takes work, right? Like it takes education, it
30:04
takes practice, it takes role-playing.
30:08
All of the things that you're like, I'm just learning on the
30:11
job. It's fine.
30:13
It's not fine. You actually need somebody to go
30:16
to and say, hey, I've had these situations, what could I have
30:20
done better, right? How could this work?
30:22
Or when you do those assessments right, and you get your, you
30:27
know, your scores right, and you're like, you know, am I an
30:30
ENTJ or an ENTP or like all these other things like Myer
30:34
Briggs, etcetera. What does that mean?
30:38
I am an ENTP, Yeah. Are you?
30:42
I'm an ENTJ which I don't think will surprise anyone.
30:45
No, no, it's fantastic. But like, like things like, for
30:48
instance, like I have a hard time, you know, really
30:54
prioritizing the person in front of me over my own needs, right?
30:58
And so I work super hard at that.
31:00
And people, you know, I find that surprising.
31:03
They're like, oh, like you like seem like you are always
31:06
prioritizing the person in front of you.
31:07
I'm like, well, that's leadership training.
31:09
That's like me like, you know, practicing for a long time, like
31:13
left to my own devices, Like I'm always trying to get the most
31:16
like out of the interaction that like, I wanted, right?
31:20
Not necessarily what they wanted, right?
31:21
And so there's just all of these things that you learn.
31:24
And the other thing that happened from that was it was
31:28
regular. It was like, you know, a regular
31:30
process. And so when you know something
31:33
is coming up and, you know, it's sort of like going to a trainer,
31:36
right? Like when you know, you have to
31:37
do it, you're like, OK, like I need to like, you know, make
31:41
sure that I'm thinking about all the steps I'm taking between
31:44
sessions, right? And am I doing the homework
31:47
assignments that he gave me? And, and so I think that it's
31:50
super important. And it's one of the things,
31:51
reason why when I was at LPOI found it shocking that the
31:55
Department of Energy gave people free executive coaches and no
31:59
one used them. And so I like made it my mission
32:02
to force everyone to use the free executive coach functions
32:06
at the Department of Energy. The woman, the one woman, Lexie
32:09
was amazing and so glad that we used her.
32:13
So if someone's listening to this and they're early in their
32:16
career and they want to do what you've done some some version of
32:19
that, build something and clean energy that actually changes the
32:22
world, what's the one piece of advice that you'd give them that
32:26
you wish someone had given you? That change happens really
32:35
slowly and then all at once, right?
32:39
Like, I just think that there's a lot of people who need this
32:43
sort of feedback, right, to, to continue to motivate themselves
32:48
to keep going. They need to see what they're
32:50
working on actually working, right?
32:53
And like they need to see that there's a response that they
32:56
expected back from customers or clients or whatever.
32:59
And you know, in my whole career, it's really been, you
33:03
are the one who has to have faith in your ideas.
33:05
You have to be the one who actually believes that what
33:08
you're doing is going to be true.
33:09
Now, like, you listen to investors, you listen to, you
33:13
know, partners and employees and others, and you take feedback
33:16
and you make your story better. But ultimately, you're the one
33:20
who has to believe in that. And sometimes it takes years
33:23
like a generate capital. When we first went out to close
33:28
money, people like laughed at us and said, there's no way I'm
33:31
giving you money on the terms that you're asking for.
33:34
We closed $55 million total in our first close and we thought
33:38
we needed maybe like two $300 million.
33:41
Like it was a disappointing first close.
33:43
Now I didn't find it disappointing, but I was told
33:45
later that it was probably disappointing, right?
33:48
And then it started succeeding and then we got a few more
33:51
people on board. And then we did a second close
33:53
that was 133 million. So it's like $80 million of
33:56
additional money that we're able to raise.
33:58
And then, and then we sort of had to like wallow in the
34:01
wilderness for like 2 years. And then we finally got Alaska
34:04
permanent to put in $200 million two years later, right.
34:09
And so it took a long time for us to be successful.
34:13
Like there were a lot of people going, I don't think your
34:16
model's working, Jigger. Like I, I, I think you should
34:20
give up and do something else. And like, now everyone's like,
34:23
oh, it's amazing. And $10 billion raised and 2000
34:26
assets. But like, while we were doing
34:29
it, people really were whispering in the corner going,
34:33
I don't know about that vanity project that Jigger's doing.
34:35
Like, I don't think that's working right.
34:37
We really had to stick with it. Did that make you have doubts,
34:41
or were you just so sure in your vision that you just, you know,
34:46
kept moving forward with confidence?
34:49
I appreciate the fake question, given that you've known me for a
34:52
long time. No, I never had doubts.
34:54
Like I don't think I'm a doubt person, but I appreciate you had
34:58
to ask the question. No, like, I mean, it's just one
35:00
of those things where like I am happy to be challenged all the
35:03
time and I I relish it because that's how I become better.
35:07
But the notion that like I'm going to like, you know, start a
35:11
new company, like it took me two years between the carbon war
35:14
room and starting generate capital because I was looking
35:16
for a good idea. I wasn't just going to jump into
35:20
the next thing, right? Like, like you know, Scott Matan
35:23
and I planned it for a year. We tested with people, we like,
35:26
pressure tested it. Is there really a need for this,
35:29
etcetera, etcetera. Once we determined we were going
35:31
to do it, we were going to make it successful.
35:33
Like no, never had a doubt. Love that because I, as someone
35:38
who's worked closely with you for a few years now, both inside
35:42
and outside of government, you know, we both are entrepreneurs.
35:46
I own my own company and you know, now we're partnering here
35:48
on this project with Energy Empire and, and I have, I have
35:53
leaned back on your confidence multiple times and it's always
35:57
there to catch me, which has been it's a great quality that
36:01
you have as a leader and as a partner, as somebody who is
36:05
partnered with you in a venture that you really do have that
36:09
vision and you are very confident in that.
36:12
And so I know that that's something that I appreciate.
36:15
And I'm sure that your other, your other partners over your
36:17
the course of your career have also found is one of your best
36:21
qualities. Thanks so much for joining us.
36:29
The second episode in our series about who Jiggershaw is and his
36:34
whole journey. I'm loving these conversations.
36:38
I'm getting to learn more about him and I hope all of you are
36:41
enjoying it as well. And soon we're going to have an
36:44
opportunity for you to send in your questions for Jigger for
36:48
our third part in this series is where we will dig into his move
36:53
over to the loan programs office and the legacy of his work
36:57
there. Obviously, I'm very excited
36:59
about that one because luckily I was there to witness a lot of
37:03
that. So thank you so much for
37:05
listening. You can find us wherever you get
37:07
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37:11
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37:16
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37:18
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37:20
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37:23
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37:26
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37:33
So thanks so much and we'll see you next.
37:40
Time.