Joy Seitz is redefining what leadership and ethical business mean in the renewable energy sector.
In this episode, host Rosaria Cain sits down with Joy Seitz, Matriarch of American Solar and Roofing, to explore her powerful advocacy for women’s rights, corporate diversity, and clean energy.
This conversation goes far beyond just installing solar panels. Joy explains the deep interconnectedness of women’s equality, community building, and environmental protection. She breaks down the realities of the modern energy landscape, the massive power consumption of new data centers, and why she firmly rejects predatory solar leasing models in order to protect consumers.
You’ll also hear Joy’s remarkable career journey, from her early work in lobbying and venture capital to stepping up as Matriarch to right-size her company during difficult times. She shares how navigating childhood trauma fueled her visionary drive, and how she balances that energy with deep humility to build an employee-first company culture.
In this episode, you’ll discover:
- How empowering women with rights and equality directly leads to stronger communities and a focus on Mother Earth.
- Why Joy took a brave stance against solar leasing models to protect low-income and elderly homeowners from predatory sales tactics.
- The growing energy demands of data centers and why citizen-owned home solar and storage are critical for grid resilience.
- How implementing the Entrepreneurial Operating System (EOS) and Traction methodologies completely changed her world and gave her a life back.
- The distinct difference between a visionary leader and an integrator, and why a company absolutely needs both to thrive and scale.
- Joy’s personal reflections on the importance of self-love, setting strict boundaries with customers, and protecting employee weekends.
- Whether you’re an entrepreneur, an advocate for clean energy, or someone passionate about building diverse and ethical corporate cultures, this episode is packed with insights.
If you’ve ever wondered what it takes to buck industry trends, lobby Congress for consumer protection, and scale a business with unwavering conviction, this episode is a must-listen.
Full Transcript
Rosaria Cain 0:00
Good morning, everybody. We are here with Joy Seitz, CEO and owner of American Solar and Roofing, and so excited to have you here. You are known far and wide as an advocate for so many great things. Tell us about the things that make you happy to advocate for.
Joy Seitz 0:18
Oh my goodness. Where do I begin?
Rosaria Cain 0:21
It’s a long list.
Joy Seitz 0:21
That is a very long list. Yeah, first and foremost, women’s rights and which really parlays into everything, in my opinion. When women have rights and they have equality, statistically, we know that when you give women money and the skills, they will build community, and when you build community, you have less likelihood to be destroying planet Earth, right? You have less likelihood to be hurting children, and you will be focusing on Mother Earth. You will be focusing on the children. You’ll be focusing on next generation. So, if we, again, give more women more rights and more seats at the table, literally, figuratively, then all boats rise. So everything, I mean, solar rights, voting rights, choice rights, human rights, everything rights.
Rosaria Cain 1:20
Renewable energy.
Joy Seitz 1:21
And renewable energy.
Rosaria Cain 1:23
Right?
Joy Seitz 1:23
Yes.
Rosaria Cain 1:23
That makes the earth a better place as well.
Joy Seitz 1:25
Yes.
Rosaria Cain 1:26
And also maybe things like being a paragon of diversity in the workplace is a big thing.
Joy Seitz 1:32
Yes.
Rosaria Cain 1:33
And kind of bucking the trend of recent, recent events in politics and shifts in in trends
Joy Seitz 1:40
Yes.
Rosaria Cain 1:40
And also things like immigrant rights.
Joy Seitz 1:43
Yes.
Rosaria Cain 1:43
I mean, we’re we have an interesting situation that we’re in right now as a country, and all of these things are rising to the top of the forefront.
Joy Seitz 1:53
Yes, I’m hopeful. Scholars will say that things happen in cycles, right? Scholars will say, also, democracies do not last more than 250 years. So if we’re in a cycle of, you know, the last 25-30 years of corporate America from the Jack Welch world of fracturing workers rights and fracturing union rights and cutting out the bottom 10% and not focusing on culture and only focusing on shareholder value, right? We’re, we’re about 30 years into that test, and I think it’s showing that people are getting tired of it, and people can’t afford that anymore, and the marginalized are becoming more marginalized, and that is a problem for America, right? Like, if we do not have a middle class and we do not have an educated working class, and we don’t have diversity and we don’t have a strong culture, what is, what are we doing, right? What is, what are we going to do? What am I going to do as an employer?
Rosaria Cain 2:59
And also, do you see the shift around the world, because it seems like this, this wave is not really just our country, it’s we’re seeing it around the world.
Joy Seitz 3:08
Correct, yes. And again, I mean, I can’t speak so much. I mean, I was just on a call with a younger woman out of India, and she was talking about the patriarchal culture there, and how her dad would be served a piece of cake before the mom, and she was like, I’m not doing that. She was serving that piece of cake equally, right? And so if the young are seeing it and the young are tired of it, that’s again, as you mentioned, that fracturing throughout the world.
Rosaria Cain 3:41
Well, tell me about how those ethics are displayed in your company, because I think it’s pretty evident on your website and your culture and the things that I read about you, talk about that. I mean, you’ve been CEO since 2014,
Joy Seitz 3:54
Yes.
Rosaria Cain 3:54
And in the company since 2009.
Joy Seitz 3:56
Yes.
Rosaria Cain 3:57
So talk about how those have kind of been involved throughout the culture the company.
Joy Seitz 4:03
Yeah, so came in in 2009 under the world of lobbying, government relations, very critical to clean energy, and honestly, very critical to all sectors of everything. So I was doing lobbying work, and then kept sitting at the table, sitting at the table, took over as vice president when the company was considering moving into another state. That didn’t happen, but then, again, when you’re at the table and you learn more about the company, I was able to be more verse in different departments, from construction to engineering to procurement into sales. And so then the two business partners decided to separate, and one bought out the other. And so when that occurred, it was in a hard time for the industry and for the company specifically. And so I stepped in as CEO to help right size the company. Again, statistically, when companies or departments are going through hard times, if you tap a person of color or woman, statistically, we see the data shows that the change and the rising of that department or that company will increase dramatically, and the ROI will be there again. So I did what every great woman does. I stepped into hard and I right sized it, and so when I got that opportunity, the first things that I thought about was, again, everything that I’ve always had a conviction around, which is taking care of people and being good to my employees. And where I started with was my handbook. So if, as a small business, I have the best handbook possible to create equality then that’s what I do. I was really focused on, again, all the paid time off, all the work life balance. My project managers would always receive phone calls from customers on the weekends, etc., etc., and I was like, why are you even taking those phone calls, right? And, you know, teaching them, how do you set boundaries with your customers, right? How do we explain to them the construction process so that you don’t take those phone calls? Those conversations, early on is what helped me get my culture in the right place. I mean, still, to this day, I do not talk to anybody on the weekends. If there was an emergency, like a big haboob comes through, and I knew there was a roof or something that we need to okay, maybe, but nothing, you know, I leave, they leave. Nobody talks.
Rosaria Cain 6:37
Nothing that can’t wait.
Joy Seitz 6:38
Nothing that can’t wait. There’s just nothing that can’t wait. Hang out with your family. And so those were just my convictions, and I had them at a very young age, and I carry it through today. And in Business College, I just learned all of the you know, as we were speaking earlier, about the behaviors of folks like Jack Welch and GE and how employees were not treated as kindly as they needed to be, and how retirement accounts were being slashed so that shareholders could make more money. None of that makes sense. And I again believe that we’re in a reckoning, and workers and workers rights is going to be is more important than ever, and I want everyone to know that they that they should be voicing that opinion, and pushing their employer to do so.
Rosaria Cain 7:28
And you’re, you’re, you’re one of those companies leading the charge and doing well with it.
Joy Seitz 7:32
Yes.
Rosaria Cain 7:33
And there are similar issues with with renewable energy as well, and and it’s been, from what I’ve read, it’s been tested in the last year, in particular, how is that going? I know you have principles and ethics and all of those things with that as well, wanting to make the world a better place.
Joy Seitz 7:52
Yes. So yes, at the federal level, mass change happened late last year when the Big Beautiful Bill was signed into law. I knew it was going to happen about two months prior to the vote. I literally went on to all my social media crying.
Rosaria Cain 8:12
I saw that.
Joy Seitz 8:13
You did?
Rosaria Cain 8:13
I did see that.
Joy Seitz 8:14
And you know, it was my most vulnerable. No. I mean, I’m pretty vulnerable on social. If you follow me, you kind of know who I am.
Rosaria Cain 8:22
I see you on a lot of airplanes.
Joy Seitz 8:24
Yes, I travel all the time, but I knew it was going to happen, and I chose to lean in and accept that reality, because if you don’t accept your reality, how are you going to pivot out of it? Right? And so I’m lucky enough and educated enough and skilled enough to know honestly what I said, and people jumped down my throat about it I said, “Look, if they were willing to get rid of choice and Roe and nobody went to the streets, you think, then when they get rid of solar, people are going to go to the streets?” Like, that’s not happening, right? And again, you know, I live in a male dominated industry. So everybody I’m lobbying with, and everybody I’m talking to, and all the other CEOs, they’re all men. So they’re not clocking that rights can be— white men? They’re not clocking their rights can be stripped from them, right? I, as a female, was like, “Dude, my rights are stripped all the time.” And I was reading the writing on the wall. And so I was one of the first in the industry to be like, “Y’all, this is over, you know, we need to pivot our marketing. You need to lock it down. You need to save your cash. You need to think about how you’re going to sell. You need to think about how you’re going to tell your team,” because everything we knew was it would just got out, right? And so I was prepared, again, being a female, you know, you’re just always one step ahead. You’re you were trained as a child to be one step ahead. You were trained as a little girl to protect yourself. And so those skills work for me as being a. Legendary and a CEO, and so when I knew the writing was on the wall, I was preparing myself emotionally, I was grieving, I was sad, and I was going to my community and saying, “Hey, I might need to call on you.” I haven’t yet, knock on wood. Needed a call on them.
Rosaria Cain 10:14
We’ve got that community tour going on.
Joy Seitz 10:15
Yeah.
Rosaria Cain 10:16
I mean there’s some opportunity if you need.
Joy Seitz 10:17
So much, yeah, but that’s it, and going to the community tour. Thanks for bringing that up. When I knew that things were happening, what I didn’t want was my community, who I had served for the last 25 years, of my solar customers, to be at all concerned about the investment that they made into my company and into the technology in which they deployed in their home, and so that’s why, as the CEO, our 25th anniversary was January 3, so I’m going into community, and I’m putting myself out there, and I’m looking my customers in the face, and they’re loving it, right? And I’m bringing thought leaders into the conversation. I’m building a beautiful conversation where community members and solar homeowners and non solar homeowners are learning about energy. They’re learning about resiliency. They’re learning about the future of Arizona’s utility climate and so and I get to do that while appreciating the commitment that they have made to me for 25 years.
Rosaria Cain 11:21
And what is the temperature of Arizona right now?
Joy Seitz 11:23
Hot!
Rosaria Cain 11:24
How are you finding it? Well, I know it is. It’s way too hot, especially for March.
Joy Seitz 11:28
Climate change is real!
Rosaria Cain 11:29
No, really, right? 100 degrees in March?
Joy Seitz 11:32
Exactly.
Rosaria Cain 11:33
Over and over?
Joy Seitz 11:34
Over and over.
Rosaria Cain 11:35
Well, talk about the temperature in terms of what you’re seeing politically in Arizona, and how that might be bucking the trend, a little bit about what’s happening nationally, unlike the not so distant past.
Joy Seitz 11:48
Yeah, I mean clean energy as a whole is, I mean the the corporation commission just voted earlier this year to get rid of the Clean Energy Standard, so we now have no goals for the state to have clean energy. Turning Point is getting involved in massive money. Is getting involved in the SRP elections. That is a big deal, right?When large amounts of money, large, large, large amounts of money and political power get involved in a sleepy, what some would call a sleepy election, which is the SRP election. You know that there are bigger things at play, right? It’s just again, duh. And so energy, for the first time in my history, in this, is one of the most is the hottest topics because of data centers and because of the consumption in which data centers are taking. So, for example, like OpenAI, Sam Altman, he said he wants another 230 gigawatts of power by like, 2033 and mind you, that’s what we deployed in the solar industry over a decade, right? So that’s a ton of power that. Where are we going to get that? And then on top of that, gas is the cost to deploy natural gas as a peaker plant is four times more expensive than it was in 2020. Nuclear, you know, they’re like, “Oh, we’ll do small nuclear.” Well, I think even if you get rid of all the regulatory and, just, you know, ran with it, and nobody had to do any compliance work, and saguaro’s could be killed, and desert tortoises could be, you know, taken out of their habitat. I mean, I think you still have 10 years. And so solar and storage is the fastest, least expensive kilowatt hour available for homeowners. And so I think that the I think the time is right for those who have hated us for 25 years to come off the sidelines and say, “No, wait, let’s empower homeowners to bring more resiliency into their home and have solar be the catalyst to this modernized home, because data centers are going to need all the other fossil fuel,” like they don’t even they’re going to figure out like, “Oh no, we need you to power your own home. So we don’t have to give it to you, because we need to give it to the chip manufacturing plant. We need to give it to the data centers. We need to give it to these people.” And so I’m hopeful that soon, the rhetoric of citizen owned solar will dissolve, the last 25 years, again, a cycle, the last 25 years of hate will dissolve, and there will be a new, empowering conversation of citizen ownership and seeing why, actually people going solar on their home is best for the community and best for the grid as a whole.
Rosaria Cain 14:52
Well, you bring up an interesting point. Why do people hate solar? I mean, what is to hate? It’s clean. We have way too much sun. Have to do something with it, right? What is it about solar that makes people angry?
Joy Seitz 15:07
Yes. Well, you know, fossil fuel, but that’s the first start. But again, as I just said, like Charlie Munger, who was with Berkshire Hathaway before he passed, I mean, at one of his shareholder meetings, he was even like, “We need to save as much of our fossil fuel as possible,” right? Like That is a natural resource, still, in all that is that is limited.
Rosaria Cain 15:32
Finite
Joy Seitz 15:32
It’s finite. And so even a conservative human coming out of Berkshire was thinking that, right? And so when you rewind, solar was scary. I’m a visionary, right? I’m a visionary, and I’m like, “Meh, we’ll get through it. Meh, We’ll get through it,” but to the to the credit of the utilities that we have in Arizona, we have very reliable power, and I will give much grace for that, right? Like I’ve lived here my whole life. I’m very appreciative that I don’t have power outages. I joke and I’m like, you know, probably like, five times that I’ve had a power outage and the last two is when I went to a hotel because I don’t even want to waste my time waiting for the power to come back.
Rosaria Cain 15:57
It’s too hot.
Joy Seitz 15:58
It’s too hot. Yeah, it’s like, immediately. And so, you know, I will hold space for it’s scary to change for them, but I can no longer hold space for it’s scary to change because we’ve been doing it for 25 years. American Solar and Roofing was the first company to install solar on a home and connect it to the grid in the city of Phoenix, in the city of Scottsdale, we were the first to do a utility power plant for APS up at Emory riddle, the aeronautical Institute in Prescott. We have been a part of so many firsts that I’m like, come on. Like, we can’t say that solar is bad anymore. And now we surely can’t say it’s bad when we need so much power. Like, it’s insane how much, there has never been a time ever in which the utilities have been pushed so hard to figure out how they’re going to power a data center.
Rosaria Cain 17:11
So solar is no longer competing with fossil fuels.
Joy Seitz 17:14
It never was.
Rosaria Cain 17:16
Well, in some minds.
Joy Seitz 17:17
Yes.
Rosaria Cain 17:18
It’s really helping them with something incredibly finite, right and limited, right?
Joy Seitz 17:23
And utilities are going to have to start thinking very entrepreneurial, in a sense that, again, if all of these big off takers want all of the energy in which they have, then they have to think about, okay, then how do I bring a more resilient model to homes. And again, that’s solar and storage and energy efficiency. And right now, we’re at the bottom of the barrel, because all policies have been stripped out of the Corporation Commission, which would guide utilities to create programs. But, you know, I’m only 48 and we’ll just start, start it all over again. You know, I’m optimistic that we’ll be able to move quicker once a few more things change.
Rosaria Cain 18:06
Well, in the pendulum is sure to go both ways.
Joy Seitz 18:08
It will.
Rosaria Cain 18:08
It’s swung this way. It’ll go that way.
Joy Seitz 18:10
That’s all we can hope for. That’s what we know about history.
Rosaria Cain 18:13
Right?
Joy Seitz 18:13
I mean ponytails and like low rise jeans are coming back. So I’m like, Okay, I’m not going to go back to low rise jeans, but we all know everything comes back.
Rosaria Cain 18:23
It does, maybe with a little difference.
Joy Seitz 18:25
Yes.
Rosaria Cain 18:25
Now you’ve been quoted by NPR and others as bucking the trend in solar. How so?
Joy Seitz 18:33
Specifically on how solar is financed. So I came out of venture capital during the dot-com boom and bust.
Rosaria Cain 18:41
Boy, that’s an easy way to make a living.
Joy Seitz 18:43
I know. I didn’t make any money. I just watched how they made the money. And then I was like, I don’t want to make the money exactly like that, but it makes sense. I’m a West Side girl. I went to ASU West Campus. I lived at 35th Avenue in Peoria. And I would always go to golf and stuff on the weekends and chill out there. So my family is very humble, and I was lucky to take a position with a venture capital firm in Scottsdale, crossover Central, drive through Lincoln, see Piestewa Peak, and see money. Fly on their private jet, go to Desert Mountain, and see how the money world worked. So fast forward, because I had that opportunity, and I learned from them when I started seeing how leasing models behaved, it was very Silicon Valley, and it was very dot-com boom and bust, and it was all very mortgage backed security stuff, right? Like a shell game. And so, when I took over as CEO, one of the first decisions that I made was that I was not going to do leasing, and again, bucked the trend way early. Like I kind of joked that I was so early to the canary in the coal mine, I could have sold a lease, but I knew, again, my customers today would be very upset with me if I had and so it’s just it’s not a good business model for people to lease a solar system, because there’s escalators in it, and because the sales tactics are very predatory, and because those entities, which is private equity money, like all they want is that sale for shareholder value. And there are no stop gaps to protect the people that they were preying on, which is low income, English as a second language, and the elderly. And so they would sign these contracts, and now they’re in it forever, and they’re 30 year leases with escalators every year, and they were not sold that at all. And so that was me bucking the trend and saying no. And so with the Big Beautiful Bill, Congress and this administration kept the tax credits for those private equity people to steal money, literally, from homeowners for three plus years, and then they put some safe harbor stuff in it could go longer. And so now the entire solar industry throughout the United States is like, well, we’re going to have to just do leasing now. And that’s where I said, I’m not doing it. When I was speaking to the NPR a reporter. He was like, I literally cannot find anybody else who is so in the nation, who has such a conviction around it that I had to interview you, because there’s like nobody else with a conviction to that level.
Joy Seitz 19:36
That’s a compliment.
Joy Seitz 19:45
It is. And again, it was just because I could never do that to my people. I could never do that to my the my my neighbors, like people who I see in my community when I go to the grocery store. I want people to be like, I love your product and I love you that. Hello. That is the legacy as a business owner.
Rosaria Cain 20:15
I want that.
Joy Seitz 20:15
Yeah.
Rosaria Cain 20:15
Well, was there an inflection point that brought about that, you know, fighting the status quo that everybody else is doing? Did something happen that really made you think about it?
Joy Seitz 21:23
Yeah, just knowledge. I was like, this is the mortgage backed security game. All it was, or is still, is a way to commoditize tax credits to the federal government. And every sector in the United States plays that game, right? We know that there’s corruption, and so I’m not saying that solar is the only entity/sector in the world, who plays games with the federal government’s money, and which is basically our taxpayers money, but it’s my industry. This is the industry that I represent. And I carry that conviction, and I want to always be on the right side. When I see what the right side is, I’m going to stay on the right side. It was to the detriment of my company. My house went into foreclosure twice, like it was not an easy choice to make.
Rosaria Cain 22:51
That’s brave. No, that’s brave.
Joy Seitz 22:53
But I was not going to pay my mortgage on somebody else’s, literally them losing their home, because then they put a lien on it, and then it’s problematic to sell so somebody can lose their home. I was going to lose mine first.
Rosaria Cain 23:06
I think that’s very noble.
Joy Seitz 23:08
Thank you.
Rosaria Cain 23:09
Now, when talking about renewable energy, is there a perception problem with renewable energy, or is that changing?
Joy Seitz 23:17
Well, I want it to change. I think that again, I’m hoping that I’m in the bottom of the barrel of reception. We were in early adopter phase, right? And so 5-7% of Americans have solar. And so over probably 150,000/200,000 people in APS territory have, which is a million home or million customers, have solar, and so, like the tide is changing, and so we but there was a lot of fraught and a lot of fraudulent and a lot of door knocking and a lot of lies. Like, when I started in the industry, I’m like, “Oh my gosh, I’m in solar,” and everybody’s like, “Oh my God, that’s so great.” You know, now I say I’m in solar if I’m at a business convention that has nothing to do with clean energy, and somebody has a horror story about how bad it was, or how what the happened to their grandma, or what happened to their next door neighbor. When I lobbied on the Hill in Congress, you know, I was with big deal people, right? Developers who are developing hundreds of millions of dollars of projects in this Congress person’s district. And they were, you know, pounding their chest and saying how amazing they were. But then when I introduced myself, and I said, “Yeah, I’m here, and the thing that I’d like to talk to you about is consumer protection, and that we’re really fighting for consumer protection.” That’s what they locked eyes on with me. Like that, the staffer, the Congress person, the senator, they had a story that was like, “Oh yeah, I keep getting calls from my constituents about how bad that is. You’re sure you’re going to focus on consumer protection?” Yes, right? They didn’t care about the millions, hundreds of millions, that were going in their district. They understood fraud and protecting people, and that was brass tax and. So we do have that, but it’s we caused it ourselves. And so I take, again, I don’t take responsibility for them doing it, but I will take the responsibility of being the beacon and being the light to homeowners in Arizona and across the United States that there are installers like me who will install it correctly with the right product. And again, it’s going to be beneficial to your home, and it’s going to be beneficial to the grid, and it’s going to be beneficial to the energy conversation as a whole.
Rosaria Cain 25:28
That takes some kahunas to go in front of Congress and do that. How did you feel? Was it exhilarating?
Joy Seitz 25:34
Of course, yeah, because I came out of policy, right? So I’m hanging out at like, there’s a small town in Sahuarita, like my first issue that I had to deal with is Sahuarita wanted to have an engineering stamp for every single solar install, which is more expensive for the homeowner, that could cost you $500 to $700 more, because an engineering stamp is different and structural is different than other stamps that were required. And so I had to drive all the way down to Sahuarita to tell this person like, no, they were wrong. They didn’t understand how the weight on a roof worked and how solar balanced the weight. And so, you know, from a little Sahuarita conversation of point load and engineering issues all the way to the corporation commission, the legislature, the governor’s office, right? The federal government, for me, was the next step. So flying to DC, that was like, for me, like a little girl, a dream come true, to be able to walk the halls and see how that worked. And it’s very patriotic, right? If you love solar and you believe in clean energy, that was a very patriotic thing to do, and I am proud to do it.
Rosaria Cain 26:39
Was it overwhelming?
Joy Seitz 26:40
No.
Rosaria Cain 26:40
No?
Joy Seitz 26:41
Not for me again, I’m a visionary who’s like,
Rosaria Cain 26:43
There you go!
Joy Seitz 26:44
let’s go, right? It was baby steps, right? So it’s like, I guess if I went from sitting on my couch to the Super Bowl, maybe it would be overwhelming. But for me, I’ve been doing I got involved in politics in 2003 and got the high then on how amazing it is, and then I worked in a local lobbying firm here, and they were amazing to me and taught me the fundamentals, and I had great advisors along the way, so I was fully prepared for the Super Bowl.
Rosaria Cain 27:15
And it really validated everything you were doing.
Joy Seitz 27:17
Totally Yeah. And I honestly, I deserved to be there. I’ve been fighting for clean energy consistently in Arizona, not that others haven’t. But, you know, there’s only a handful of us, and so if I love it and I’m great at it, I deserve to be in those hallways and speaking my story.
Rosaria Cain 27:33
Absolutely, and it’s part of what makes you the leader and visionary you are
Joy Seitz 27:36
Yeah.
Rosaria Cain 27:36
So what makes a good leader?
Joy Seitz 27:38
Hmm, well, you might not have picked up on it, but I am humble.
Rosaria Cain 27:42
And resilient!
Joy Seitz 27:43
Yeah. Humility and resiliency a desire to constantly get better, a desire…
Rosaria Cain 27:50
Sense of ethics.
Joy Seitz 27:51
Yeah, yeah. When somebody says they don’t like what I do, or they don’t like how I communicate, I have to self reflect on that. And so I think I’m the third version of a CEO for myself, right? The CEO that the company needed, right when I joined is different than the CEO that it needed to build a team. And then the CEO that I am now is different because now my team is in place and I’m scaling. And with every phase of that I’ve had to reflect and spend an obscene amount of time listening to podcasts and talking to coaches and talking to counselors and therapists and friends and myself and journaling. And now I’m starting to take 30 minute silent breaks. Like, I mean, sitting for 30 minutes doing nothing is insane. I broke it like three tims.
Rosaria Cain 28:47
It’s thinking about the business.
Joy Seitz 28:49
Yes, it is.
Rosaria Cain 28:49
It’s not really doing nothing.
Joy Seitz 28:51
Yeah, you’re but you’re just in, you know, you’re just in thought. So anyways, evolution, again, and I can’t even believe I’m only 48 like I can’t believe how much evolution I’ve invested in myself to get here, and how much further I gonna go. So just always know you’re always gonna be different.
Rosaria Cain 28:51
What’s important to you now as a CEO, that you’re in that third phase.
Joy Seitz 29:17
Now it’s, I have a young leadership team, so I have a younger COO, Director of Operations, Construction and Sales and Marketing, another human, and now my job is to calm down, trust the process, and cheer them on, and have their blind side, because I’ve been through again, I almost lost my house, right? So I know the fear that they have, like, “Oh my gosh, what if this happens?” Like, I’ve already been through it. I’ve already been there, and so now, being a calm, resilient, “I’m gonna let you almost drown on the deep end, right? So you, so you feel the failure point,” but knowing when I can, knowing when I can step in and be like, “No, I would tweak that right there.” And then, boom, they’re off to the races. It’s that there’s just nothing greater, like, there’s just nothing greater than watching people who never thought that they would be able to run a company, run a company, because they’re not visionaries like me, right? I’m like, “I could do anything!” They do not tell themselves that, right? I wake up my to myself every day thinking I could do anything that that’s not their narrative. And so me injecting that self esteem and that confidence into them is just so, so that they can then take care of themselves and their family and live their life and go on their vacations. That’s just everything.
Rosaria Cain 30:33
It’s gratifying.
Joy Seitz 30:34
So great.
Rosaria Cain 30:36
But not every visionary can actually do the day to day CEO work.
Joy Seitz 30:40
No, I’m terrible.
Rosaria Cain 30:41
So sometimes that can be a whole different set of skills.
Joy Seitz 30:44
It’s 100% Yeah, I was lucky. I had a friend of mine, Sarah. She was running a different company. She was running her company, and she said, as soon as you can find $7,000 a quarter, you need to do EOS. And that was back in the day. And so I was lucky, again, that she was just there at the right time during Covid. She told me to do it. I said, “Aye Aye Captain,” you know, because when people you respect tell you to do something, you better do it like that’s silly. And so I did. And the first thing I did was read Rocket Fuel, and Rocket Fuel explains the difference between a visionary leader and an integrator leader. And that was the first time in which I felt less bad about myself, because everybody’s like, “Why can’t you just come in and, like, hold people accountable consistently?” And I’m like, “I don’t know why I can’t do that.” Well, the reason why I can’t do that is because I’m a visionary, and I am exhausted, exhausted by detail. I do not care about the detail I mean, and if I do, it’s like, Give me three points of detail, and that’s just to just to confirm that I know that you figured out the detail, you know? And so figuring out that I am an excellent CEO visionary, and figuring out that my integrator needs me to be an excellent CEO visionary to where I’m always bringing in new business ideas for them to think about, put processes to and scale the company on, and add more value to the customer and the end user, and add more value to my employees, bringing it into my community like now, I wouldn’t say, as well oiled, but him and I have been, my integrator, and I have been working together for a year, April, and it’s like the best thing since sliced bread, because again, he the company would go stagnant and go down without visionary energy, but without him, that company would also go down. Because I experienced it for almost 10 years, of just a little bit of a bump, and then it going down again, a little bit of a bump, and then going down again.
Rosaria Cain 32:42
So down again. So it keeps you on an upward trajectory.
Joy Seitz 32:44
It is, in a very organized, consistent way.
Rosaria Cain 32:48
That whole stone thing, and I’ve looked at this, I think it sounds amazing.
Joy Seitz 32:52
EOS?
Rosaria Cain 32:52
Yeah. And traction, yeah. And there’s a few different versions of it.
Joy Seitz 32:58
No, Traction is the book in EOS.
Rosaria Cain 33:00
Oh, okay, so it’s the same.
Joy Seitz 33:02
All the same.
Rosaria Cain 33:02
Okay, I read it. I read it.
Joy Seitz 33:04
Yeah? Gino Wickman, yeah.
Rosaria Cain 33:06
Gino Wickman.
Joy Seitz 33:07
Yes.
Rosaria Cain 33:08
It seems exhausting.
Joy Seitz 33:10
Being a visionary, running a company?
Rosaria Cain 33:11
Well, no.
Joy Seitz 33:12
Oh.
Rosaria Cain 33:12
Doing those meetings where you have stones and problems.
Joy Seitz 33:15
Rocks.
Rosaria Cain 33:15
Those are rocks?
Joy Seitz 33:16
Yes, yeah, no, it’s not exhausting. It’s exhilarating.
Rosaria Cain 33:19
So, it frees your mind?
Joy Seitz 33:20
It gets everybody in the right place doing what they’re great at. The stone is the rock and the rock is the project. So, for example, one of the rocks this last quarter was identifying all of the ancillary services that I could be offering customers that are outside of just a new roof or solar, right? And so it after going through that rock. And so it was, identify it, price it, put the labor hours to it and put a marketing strategy to it, right? It wasn’t deploy it, install it, or anything, right? It was for three months, figure out all of the issues, and figure out everything you need to do so that the next quarter you can start selling it. And so for the first time ever, I can’t even believe it dawned on me, but like, fixing, like, if somebody is like, “Well, I can’t afford solar, I can’t afford roofing,” but they have a skylight like, I, right now, my skylights broken, so I’m getting it replaced. But if that was the only thing that that person could afford to do, or wanted to do, fixing that skylight now is getting me into that home.
Rosaria Cain 34:06
Right.
Joy Seitz 34:06
That’s the this is going to be the first time ever.
Rosaria Cain 34:25
The entry point.
Joy Seitz 34:26
That I have, an entry point that is a low investment, high return for them, that gets them connected to my brand. They get to see who I am, and they get to start hearing why solar actually is a very good investment. And they can start planning for that. Without that rock, and without EOS, I never would have figured that out. What?
Rosaria Cain 34:26
How did your people receive it?
Joy Seitz 34:40
Well, EOS?
Rosaria Cain 34:42
Yes.
Joy Seitz 34:44
Pretty well.
Rosaria Cain 34:48
That’s good.
Joy Seitz 34:50
Yeah. I mean, what they say is, is the visionary has to believe in it, and the integrator has to implement it. And I was a very big believer. And most employees. Employees want to know what the heck is going on, right? Like they want to know. And so we do quarterly, you know, all staffs with them, where they’re the VTO is the executive summary. We go over what that is. Everybody has a number. They know what they’re doing. I think the thing that’s the best for the employees is that there’s a quarterly conversation that’s like an hour and a half with just their manager, where they get to ask any question they want, right? So you’re no longer walking around as an employee being like, I wonder about this. Why do they do it like that? And what about this? And what about that? Right? You get an hour and a half with your manager to ask all of those questions that have been burning in your mind, that you go home to your friends or your spouse or your dog and be like, “Why is this stupid company doing it like this?” you know? And so I love that for our employees and you have a an accountability chart where it’s built out for the future, so you can be like, are you looking for something else, and what do you want to do? So yeah, it’s everything. It changed my world. It gave me a life back. It’s the reason why I’m doing this with you.
Rosaria Cain 36:02
So it really made a difference. That’s something I’d really look at.
Joy Seitz 36:06
Yeah, I would never be sitting here with you doing this, because I would be knee deep trying to run my company, and that’s not where I need to be.
Rosaria Cain 36:15
So you’re feeling really good, like you’re hitting your stride right now. Now, when you were younger, what kind of advice would you give your younger self because think about all the things you’ve learned?
Joy Seitz 36:26
Okay, what would I tell myself now?
Rosaria Cain 36:27
Yes.
Joy Seitz 36:28
Okay, so if my little girl was sitting there, like things that I journal about today?
Rosaria Cain 36:34
Or things you might even tell your 13 year old.
Joy Seitz 36:37
Yeah, my I mean…
Rosaria Cain 36:40
She is kind of your younger self.
Joy Seitz 36:41
Yeah, my daughter?
Rosaria Cain 36:42
Yes.
Joy Seitz 36:42
Um, yeah. I mean, gosh, what would I tell I would think about my daughter?
Rosaria Cain 36:49
What do you wish you knew?
Joy Seitz 36:51
Yeah.
Rosaria Cain 36:52
20 years ago.
Joy Seitz 36:54
I mean, I just wish that self love was really going to be the thing that was going to make it happen, because I had a terrible support system. Both my parents died last year, and nobody told me so, like, it was not a good childhood. And I think many of us have it. And, you know, I joked, you know, how does a visionary become? And I’m like, “Yeah, trauma.” you know, like 100% it’s because of trauma, right? And fight or flight and survival and feeding myself is the reason why I’m a visionary. But I’m no longer in that fight or flight, and so I use the skills that I got to scale and to keep going, but through all the work that I’ve done, I am able to release the sadness of it or the anger around it, or, you know, around having to go through that journey because it sucked, so I don’t recommend it, but if it happens, you have to let go of it so you can be better.
Rosaria Cain 37:52
Has the journey been harder than you expected it to be?
Joy Seitz 37:56
I didn’t expect anything, probably because, again, I’m a visionary and I don’t think.
Rosaria Cain 38:00
And you’re optimistic. You’re a natural optimist.
Joy Seitz 38:02
Yeah, I don’t think too much about I was just saying to a friend of mine in rock climbing, I rock climb. In rock climbing, if you’re stuck and you don’t know how you’re gonna get up, what the first thing you do is always find the next foot. So you always find a next step up. And even if that step, whether that step is even an inch or two inches, even if, on the wall, if you step that two inches, and you rise two inches, it’s amazing how many more handholds are available to you. And so that’s like life. And so I never knew what I can tell you for sure, the only memory I have for myself is is at about 16 years old, I was sitting on the ground in the hallway where the mirror was doing my makeup, and I said to myself, I know that I’m going to be the breadwinner, and that’s the only thing I knew. There was nothing else that I clocked. I haven’t put anything into it. I didn’t even go to college until four years after I graduated from high school, and that was because I was with a bad boyfriend, and was like, instead of hanging out with you on Mondays and Thursdays I’m gonna go to college. Like that was my only reason why I went to college. And so it was just, again, I took that one step and more handholds came to me.
Rosaria Cain 39:09
What advice would you give someone starting out in their career?
Joy Seitz 39:14
Just believe in themselves. Do not hang out with anybody who doesn’t believe in you. If if an older person talks poorly about their spouse, they are not a trusted resource. Those are like the ones I just gave I just talked to an ASU student right before this podcast and like, just know people’s character. Trust them. Trust what they show you. There were a few people within the utilities over the years that when I was in hard and I saw the battles that I was in, that I could look them in the eyes, and I was like, “Okay. I knew that if they still stayed around, that it would be okay, that I would figure it out.” And I hooked on to that. Don’t believe the negative, and don’t read what they say about you. Glass Door was terrible early on for me. Everybody hated me when I took over as CEO.
Rosaria Cain 40:11
Everybody hates everybody.
Joy Seitz 40:12
Oh, it’s terrible.
Rosaria Cain 40:13
I’ve been the recipient of a couple reviews.
Joy Seitz 40:16
Yes, and then the branding companies like, we need to respond to that. I’m like, why? But, yeah, don’t listen to the good and don’t listen to the bad. And if in your heart and your soul, another thing I knew for sure is there was never my house going into foreclosure, the utilities destroying my business model. I mean, I woke up SRP did their rate case back in, like, 14/15, and this, they destroyed the solar industry as I knew it, half of my company dead, like overnight dead. But even through all of that, I never didn’t believe in myself. I always knew that the handhold would come, and if I kept stepping it would something would turn out.
Rosaria Cain 41:01
Last serious question.
Joy Seitz 41:03
Yeah.
Rosaria Cain 41:03
Do you think we’ll see a woman president?
Joy Seitz 41:06
Oh!
Rosaria Cain 41:09
We’ve had a couple almost.
Joy Seitz 41:10
Yeah, we’ve had a couple almost.
Rosaria Cain 41:12
In our lifetime.
Joy Seitz 41:15
What a great question. I mean, I would hope so. But look, man, this place is built on the patriarchy.
Rosaria Cain 41:26
But other countries you’re seeing women leadership.
Joy Seitz 41:29
Yeah, I think we’re built on the patriarchy. I think that white women hold the patriarchy more than anything. I think that’s what we saw from the data after the election, is is that white women voted against Kamala more than other demographics. So, until women stop voting to keep their sons and their husbands safe, and they start understanding that they have more power and they’re actually, I mean, I joke now, and I say the patriarchy actually hurts white men more than anybody. And so until we clock that, and we understand that women again make all boats rise, and that we are all going to be better when women can have more seats at the table and and make decisions for greater good, we will not, and I don’t know when I do not know when people will believe that. And that’s, again, a conviction which I carry and I speak about, and I push on, and I don’t have friends fanymore, because they refuse to believe that. And so, but that’s what has to happen.
Rosaria Cain 42:39
Well, you know, some of us are wrong some of the time. Let’s hope that might be one of those things, and we’ll both be surprised.
Joy Seitz 42:45
Correct.
Rosaria Cain 42:46
It could happen.
Joy Seitz 42:47
I want it to happen. Hopefully the youth get us there, you know?
Rosaria Cain 42:50
I mean, if it could happen in Italy, which is like…
Joy Seitz 42:53
I’ve never been but
Rosaria Cain 42:54
I mean, talk about patriarchal values, perhaps it could happen.
Joy Seitz 43:00
Who’s to say, yeah, yeah. I mean, we have a long way to get to an election this year
Rosaria Cain 43:07
We do. We do.
Joy Seitz 43:08
yeah, we have many executive orders that can happen, and militaries coming into our state that could happen before election.
Rosaria Cain 43:16
Yep. What about you would surprise people.
Joy Seitz 43:21
Um, oh, goodness again. I feel like my demeanor, because I cuss and I’m brazen, quote, unquote, right? And like I…
Rosaria Cain 43:38
And you’re frank with people, you’re straight.
Joy Seitz 43:40
Yeah, they think that it comes with being hard all the time, or, like, not caring and not loving, and really I am like, then, you know, again, I all boats will rise with me. You know, I think about all of the people in which I help, that I pay in, that I invest in, and then, and they’re better, right? Like I have high conviction around if you’re with me, I work to make you better in some way, shape or form, and I look to see how you can make me better. And so many people just think that I’m just this cold, brazen person, but really it’s because I have that conviction about rights and equality and love and support of the things that matter the most to being a human on this planet.
Rosaria Cain 44:31
And women visionaries, yeah, yeah. What the heck.
Joy Seitz 44:34
Yeah? What was that?
Rosaria Cain 44:36
Well, because, you know, women, strong women, often get a bad rap.
Joy Seitz 44:41
Well, yeah, because of the patriarchy, yeah, yeah, women get a bad rap. That’s how they hold us back. That’s their game. Their game is that she’s evil. Don’t let her in the room. That’s happened to me more than not. And that’s how they maintain power. And that’s the point. Right?
Rosaria Cain 45:00
Well, the world is changing.
Joy Seitz 45:01
The world is changing, and I just keep talking about it. And that’s the that’s the gift too, of being a CEO. I’m so blessed to be able to be CEO, because I can do and say however I want to do and say, and I have an entire team behind me that knows exactly that I’m going to do and say that, and that it’s to their betterment, and that that we will, that my company will rise because of that.
Rosaria Cain 45:22
And we will all rise together. And on that note, sadly, we have to end this podcast. It’s been fascinating.
Joy Seitz 45:29
Oh, good!
Rosaria Cain 45:30
Thank you for your time today.
Joy Seitz 45:31
Yes, thank you so much for all your questions. I really appreciate them.
Rosaria Cain 45:34
Me too.
Joy Seitz 45:35
Yes.
Rosaria Cain 45:35
Have a great day.
Joy Seitz 45:36
Yes, thank you too.
Rosaria Cain 45:37
Okay, bye, bye.