This exclusive interview is your chance to learn more about the author. Matt OKeefe (Group Vice President, Oracle Utilities Opower) shares his approach to leadership, the key points to achieving a just energy transition, and the importance to Oracle Utilities of pursuing Environmental, Social, and Governance goals.
This interview was originally published in The Global Power & Energy Elites 2022
What’s the best book you’ve read or the best podcast you’ve listed to this year?
A powerful read is The Topeka SchoolBen Lerner. The story is about how we got to where we are today, and how cultural divisions have impacted our lives. It follows the story of one man’s development from his teenage years through his early adulthood around 20th century. The book’s main message is about communication. It is about how communication can be used to connect or distract, divide or persuade. This message is powerful because I have seen how valuable listening is and how much less it is to speak.
Being an avid runner, I am always interested in the classics. This American Life podcast. I listened to a fascinating one-on-one conversation that took place between a man living in North America with a man living in Kabul, Afghanistan during the recent evacuation. It was a fascinating and deeply personal conversation between two people. It showed many interesting aspects of the way we talk and the challenges of cross-cultural communication in times of crisis. It was about how people lived in a big world, where reaching out can forever change someone’s journey.
What qualities do you consider make a leader a success?
We are an exceptional team within an ambitious organization. Our mission is to accelerate the clean energy revolution, decarbonisation, energy affordability, as well as accelerating the pace of change. This mission is what drives our employees to go to work every day.
Recently, I went on a listening tour along with small groups from my team. I was able to discover what motivates people to do more than their job by engaging in smaller groups. The response was amazing. It all came back down to the mission across the board.
What do you think it takes to make a just transition possible?
This is a topic that we should all be discussing because it is essential to achieve the energy transition with economic and environmental justice at its core.
This is something I believe we will have to think about when making long-term investments. As an organization, our core purpose is to work closely with utilities to address their biggest problems through changing peoples’ behavior.
Even though the changes in behaviour can be subtle, they can have a big impact on your appliance purchase decision or thermostat setting point.
These changes are especially beneficial from a budget, health, and environmental perspective for our most vulnerable customers. To make the greatest positive impact, it is important to include groups in the decision-making process.
We must analyse and assess whether there are any unintended consequences of shifting to more expensive energy sources, or if we are improving one area’s environment.
Because we see economic justice and environmental justice as interconnected, it is crucial that our business focuses on them both. We can only succeed if we look at the way we design products to help everyone on this journey to decarbonisation.
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About Matt O’Keefe
Matt’s career has been about the intersection of government, business, economic development, the environment. He is currently the Opower Business Leader at Oracle Utilities. His mission is to accelerate the clean energy revolution, decarbonisation, and energy affordability. Matt was previously employed by Opower, the California Energy Efficiency Energy Industry Council, and CleanTechLA City of Los Angeles. He is also on the Board for Directors of the California Efficiency + Demand Management Council.