Speaker 1I don't care who I'm in a room with. If you think something I've said is stupid or dumb or I haven't thought about something or I have a blind spot, I don't care if you're a 25-year-old newbie out of an MBA program or somebody who's been with the company for 20 years. Push back and tell me what you think I'm missing. Hi, everybody. I'm
Speaker 2Nikolaj Tangen, the CEO of the Norwegian Southern Wealth Fund. And today, I'm joined by John Ketchum, CEO of NextEra Energy, the world's most valuable power company. We own 1.5% of the company, worth more than $2 billion. Now, AI needs electricity, more of it, faster than anyone expected. And NextEra is building the power to match and just agreed to the biggest merger in the industry and there is history to do it. So, how do you build the biggest power company on Earth? Let's figure it out. John, warm welcome. Well, great to be here. Thank you, Nikolaj. You started out as a regional Florida utility and now you've grown to something which is huge. So, in five sentences, what does NextEra do?
Speaker 1Well, we're a builder, number one, right? When you look across the United States, we're the only company that is fully diversified across the entire energy value chain, building in just about every state in the country. And what really separates us is our development capabilities and our approach to customers and affordability. We build cheaper, we buy cheaper, we operate cheaper, and we finance cheaper. And scale matters more than ever in our industry.
Speaker 2Absolutely. And what would you say is the biggest difference between you and an ordinary power company?
Speaker 1Well, the biggest difference, I think, is our scale. And our capabilities and our experience. You know, we've been doing this now for two to three decades. So, if you look at the last 20 years, for example, and you compare us versus our next 20 largest peers, we built more than the next 20 combined. Wow. Just to give you an example.
Speaker 2But until recently, being a power company was kind of pretty boring, right? I mean, it was steady, boring. And now, wow, exciting, huh?
Speaker 1Yeah. What happened? Well, it's never been boring at NextEra. Let me tell you, Nikolai, we've always had exciting opportunities. But you're right. Power demand has been static. Yeah. And it's expected to increase sixfold over the next 20 years. So, an enormous opportunity that we're looking at as we look to the future.
Speaker 2Absolutely. And we'll come back to the drivers behind that. Now, you also agreed to buy Dominion Energy, which is another very large U.S. utility. So, why Dominion?
Speaker 1Well, it's a really well-run company. We are in three terrific states in Virginia and South Carolina and North Carolina. Growth opportunities in all three states. Also, challenges where we have to make sure that we meet the customer requirements, which are affordability. Affordability is at the forefront of what we do at NextEra and what we do at Florida Power & Light. I'll give you an example of why scale matters and why having a large power company matters in our industry. It's scale. And there's no better example than Florida Power & Light. It's the largest rate-regulating utility in the United States that we own and operate. We have a bill today, right? A bill today that, if you look over the last 20 years, has actually gone down 20% in real dollars. We have a bill today that's 37% lower than the national average. And we haven't cut corners for customers. Do your clients benefit from this? They certainly do. Because in running a rate-regulated utility, you have to deliver for the customer. And if you can't deliver affordability and reliable electric energy, you're never going to succeed. And reliability, too, we're top decile, 60% better than the national average. And those are things that we think, those scale benefits, that we can bring to this merger, to Virginia, to North Carolina, to South Carolina. What can go wrong with this deal? Well, you know, this deal makes all the sense. It makes all the sense in the world. So when you look at what the priorities are that we've heard from stakeholders, number one, it's affordability. Two, it's job creation and economic development. And three, it's the ability to deliver effective energy solutions. And some of those energy solutions differ a little bit by state. But we don't think there's any company in America better positioned to be able to deliver on those three things. Affordability, we just talked about. Job creation is another one. We just came out with a set of revised commitments for Virginia where we're going to bring 1,000 new jobs to the state. 600 of those would be from NextEra, 400 from Letters of Intent that we already have from suppliers. We're going to build a new office tower there, which will serve as a dual headquarters facility for us and for our growth in Virginia. And we have the chance to develop a real ecosystem around Virginia that could position the state to become a global leader.
Speaker 2Now, the numbers are staggering. You talk about spending $60 billion a year on power plants between 27 and 32. So a billion dollars a week. That's incredible. Now, how is it possible to spend a billion dollars a week?
Speaker 1Well, these are large-scale facilities. So when you think about the amount of growth that we see, not only in the four states that we would serve if this merger closes, which would be Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Florida, and then all the investments that we're making through our NextEra energy resources business across the United States. So this is really a – you can think of it as a 50-state capital investment plan. What are the bottlenecks?
Speaker 2Well, I mean – Turbines, transformers, permits.
Speaker 1Yeah, and that's one of the big advantages that we have because of scale. But, yes, I mean getting your hands on equipment has been a headwind for this industry. But one of the things that we try to do strategically is turn headwinds into competitive advantages. And that's what scale does for you. So if you see a headwind in terms of turbine availability, transformers, solar panels, inverters, batteries, it doesn't matter what it might be. When you're buying in bulk and you're usually your supplier's number one customer in the world, you're going to get top flight service. You're going to get access to equipment faster than anybody else. And you're going to get it at a much lower price. And one of the things that we really pride ourselves on at NextEra is our world-class supply chain capability. And we plan ahead. We always think three steps ahead. We don't wait for – And three steps, that's how long in time? Well, for us on the supply chain side, I mean we're already buying through 2030.
Speaker 2One of the big changes here have been the electricity demand from AI. When did that start to dawn on you that, hey, there is something going on here?
Speaker 1Well, about two or three years ago. I mean we really saw that demand start to materialize. And how did it – where were you
Speaker 2when you first realized, wow, this is big?
Speaker 1Well, I was sitting in my chair in the same seat I sit in today. And from our standpoint, at that point, we were really focused more on renewables and battery storage. But we said, look, to accommodate the demand. And the power demand that's coming and the 24 by 7 need that a data center has, we've got to make sure that we are fully participating in all parts of the energy value chain. So we pivoted back to things that we've done in the past and have – we have probably more experience in the United States than anybody in building gas-fired generation. We have the largest gas-fired generation fleet in the U.S. We also have a substantial amount of experience in nuclear. One of the top operators in nuclear have one of the largest nuclear fleets in the country.
Speaker 2But what surprised you the most with this total change in trajectory for electricity to demand? What's been the biggest surprise for you? Just how quickly it's happened. Tell me how quickly.
Speaker 1Well, I mean it's happened really in the last 24 months overnight. And speed to power is critical. And we are the company that can meet speed to power demands of our customer. Because when you're in every part of the energy value chain, we can build wind in 12 months. We can build solar facilities in 18. We can get battery storage projects up and running in 15 months. It might take three or four years to get a gas plant running. But you can meet that front-end demand and need with other technologies that I just mentioned. Nuclear is a potential feasible solution as we get longer down the road.
Speaker 2But let's say two years ago, what did you expect? What was the demand in 2030 to be? And what do you expect it to be now? Just what is the magnitude of it?
Speaker 1Well, we were looking at this. I'd probably go back two to three years ago. You know, it was still we were anticipating stagnant demand. And then really 24 months ago, we looked at it and said, wow. I mean, when you looked at the pace at which AI was being adopted by customers and the amount of CapEx that was flowing into the sector, not only by the hyperscalers but the data center operators, you know, the domain. really exploded overnight and went to a projection of six-fold increase by the mid-2040s. And it's not just coming from data centers. I mean, it's also our trade policies where we are now re-domesticating manufacturing industrial bases back to the U.S. They're all consuming more electricity. It's LNG terminals, it's semiconductor chip facilities, it's transportation. Homes are using more electricity than they have in the past. So, the residential customer. So, it's coming from all parts of the economy, even though data centers get a big part of the focus.
Speaker 2Have you thought about buying and owning the data centers?
Speaker 1You know, back about three years ago, we started looking at building data centers ourselves. And we bought a couple just to learn how they operate smaller scale, just to learn the business model, and quickly realized that we'll leave that for somebody else. And why? The reason being that the footprint, the technology specifications, the chips that were being used, the type of customers that they were serving were different for all customers. And we wanted to stick to our knitting, what we were best at, which was, you know, our, we have a terrific land development, you know, capability. And we felt like we would be better off just buying the land for the power generation facility and buying the land together for the data center where it would be built, and then selling that land to a hyperscaler, which we've done a lot of power land sales, and then having the generation ready to interconnect to the data center. But focus on, you know, what we know best, which is building wind, solar, battery storage, gas fire generation, nuclear transmission, distribution, gas pipelines, doing all the marketing around power, because a lot of hyperscalers.
Speaker 2Do you think that's better business than owning the data center?
Speaker 1We do. And just why? Well, because the hyperscalers, when you talk to them and you sit down and you ask them what they really want, they want to own and control their own data centers, because they want the security, the cybersecurity that goes along with protecting their data for their customers. They know that chips may evolve over time and may need to be replenished. They want to have, have a lot of data. And so, you know, we've been working with them for a long time. And we've been working with them for a long time. They have their own control over their own destiny in those data centers. And so we've focused on, we think we can get more opportunities out of building the power generation while letting the hyperscalers build their data centers rather than cannibalizing demand by insisting on building both.
Speaker 2You built a company on the argument that renewables were cheaper and cleaner, right? And then all this demand comes along and you go back to doing gas.
Speaker 1Yeah, I mean, that's what the market demands today. I mean, when you look at what the needs are of a data center, they need round the clock generation. And so while storage has made a lot of advancements, we have today, you know, four hour storage capability, which we think we could stack at the eight hours together with our solar generation facilities as well. But it's just not enough 24 seven baseload generation. To be able to power these, you know, these AI, you know, training, training, training models that they have out there today, the agentic AI models as well. And so you need to have that, that 24 hour generation capability, which requires more baseload. And that baseload is coming from gas fire generation. It's coming from, it could potentially someday come from nuclear fire generation. I think battery storage is going to continue to make improvements where we can complete the work. Combine that together with what we see from solar.
Speaker 2And gas is roughly twice as expensive as solar, for instance?
Speaker 1Yeah, it's actually even more expensive than that. I'd say it's probably two to three times more expensive than what you can build a solar facility for.
Speaker 2Now, you do deals directly with, you know, the hyperscalers, right? With the Googles and the Metas of the world. Why do they want to contract directly with you rather than just buying electricity off the grid?
Speaker 1Well, I mean, a few reasons, but, you know, one of the most important reasons is, you know, first, first of all, they are looking to buy electricity off the grid, but a lot of that excess supply of electricity is gone, right? And second, the hyperscaler is very sensitive about taking electrons off the grid that could drive up prices for retail customers. They've all come out, they've all signed a, you know, the ratepayer protection pledge where they've said, we're going to buy electricity off the grid. Yeah. We're going to bring our own generation and match that generation with our data center. And so the hyperscalers that we deal with, that's their model. So they want to, if they say, hey, I'm going to build a data center in state X, I want to make sure I have generation that can power that so I'm not having to take away from capacity or energy that could otherwise go serve another customer and chase up their power prices. And so they're very sensitive to that today. They want to bring their own generation. They want to bring their own generation to make sure they're paying their own way. And we think our business model fits perfectly with that. And you see government policy shifting too. It doesn't matter what state you're in. Look at what the FERC is doing as they analyze PJM and MISO and SPP and all the different models that we have around the country. They're all based on the, and predicated on the same thing, which is if you're going to build a data center, you have to make sure you pay for the power that goes along with it to power that data center. How do you read the backlash against the data centers? Well, I think it's twofold, right? I mean, the first piece is community relations.
Speaker 2I saw some research. It's just like people so don't want to live next to a data center anymore. They think it's like super dangerous for whatever reason.
Speaker 1Well, I'll tell you what. I mean, I think the industry is really trying to improve its image and its approach to communities. And so the hyperscalers that we have. The hyperscalers that we work with are really responsible developers. So they're going in and saying, look, first of all, if we're going to come to your community, we're not going to use your water. We're going to use closed loop cooling. We're going to use water from water treatment facilities. We're going to pay our property taxes. We're going to observe noise and setback requirements. And we're going to find ways to get back to the community. You know, you look at some of the things that the hyperscalers have done. That I'll use as an example of what they've done in Louisiana, giving scalers. $50,000 scholarships back to the teachers, making sure they're helping first responders, making sure that they're investing back in the communities and also making sure that they're helping to create jobs, you know, in these communities. That's super important from a messaging standpoint. And the second piece is, you know, look, there's just, I think, some uncertainty today around the, you know, you know what these AI models. Ultimately could mean for folks jobs. But, you know, what I've seen that next era is, is as we have implemented artificial intelligence. It's actually created more work for our people. You know, it hasn't resulted in layoffs. Instead, it's resulted in us being able to work faster on Earth, better opportunities and be able to execute on more business than we ever have before. What could go wrong with the with the AI driver?
Speaker 2Well, you know,
Speaker 1when you when you step back and you look at it from through a couple of different lenses from a geopolitical standpoint, when when I look at AI, this is something we can't afford to lose in. Right. So when you think about China or India or other economies making substantial investments in AI, if we just said, hey, we're not going to do it right as a as a country, we will allow our, you know, our foreign competitors to bypass us economically. They would double down on AI. Their economies would shift around artificial intelligence. They would have economic opportunities that we wouldn't have here in the U.S. They'd be leaders in industries that were we would fall behind. It would actually result in a decrease in employment opportunities in the United States because we'd suffer economically because we're not keeping pace with where technology is. And the U.S. has always been able to prosper and be a global leader because we've been a technology leader. So to give that up would be it would have a substantial impact.
Speaker 2So given what you just said, what are your reflections on Europe?
Speaker 1Well, you know, when I when I look at Europe, I mean, we don't do business in Europe, so I'm not an expert in Europe. But you know where you know where it is. I know where it is. And I think Europe, you know, has to look through the lens of, hey, you know, they've got to make sure. That they keep up with technological advancement. If you don't keep up with technological advancement and where technology is heading, your economy is going to fall behind. I mean, it's that simple.
Speaker 2So you mentioned the geopolitical lens as one lens to look through. Any other ways of analyzing this?
Speaker 1Yeah, I mean, geopolitical is one way. The other way is what I said before. We have to make sure that, you know, number one, if you're building a data center and this is what we've done. And, you know, at Florida Power, Light, NextEra is we data centers have to. pay their fair share. They have to pay their own costs for generation and transmission, full stop, right? And so we've signed the ratepayer protection pledge saying that's what we're going to do. Dominion signed the ratepayer protection pledge saying that's what they're going to do. We have one of the most protective large load tariffs in the country for customers. It was just codified into a statute in Florida. Other states are doing the same thing right now. So you've got to make sure, number one, you're being responsible. If you're building a data center, make sure you're paying for your own power. And hyperscalers are doing that. And then the other piece of it from a community relations standpoint is what I said earlier. Make sure you're using closed loop cooling, using water from water treatment facilities, observing setback requirements, giving back to community. But I also think it's incumbent on folks to help retrain the workforce. We're also really short technical workers in this country.
Speaker 2But if five years from now you got the demand picture totally wrong, what would it be because of?
Speaker 1If we totally got the demand picture wrong, number one, I have a hard time seeing that. Just given where things are headed, you'd have to have some kind of a global recession where AI spending just decreased and investment in AI decreased. It just makes too much sense.
Speaker 2Five years ago, would you ever have thought that nuclear would make a comeback?
Speaker 1Not five years ago. But today, I think it looks promising.
Speaker 2Yeah. And you got quite a few of them. You got quite a few nuclear plants. And we're making investments in small
Speaker 1modular reactors as well. Absolutely. But let's do the big ones first.
Speaker 2Now you have a big one coming up and Google has made an agreement to buy the power for the next 25 years, right? That's right. Tell me, how difficult is it to restart a nuclear reactor?
Speaker 1Well, we shut down Dwayne Arnold. But fortunately, the site and the facility was really left in good shape, right? So we're going back in. I don't want to say it's harder than an outage, certainly. I'd call it a kind of a super outage, right, in terms of the restoration work. Yeah. The pieces are there. The nuts and bolts of the nuclear plant are already there. So what it really is, it's going back and refurbishing the equipment, reloading the core from a nuclear fuel standpoint, and getting it back up and running. But the nuts and bolts are already there. And the project's going terrifically for us. Tell me about the small ones, the small modular reactors. Small modular reactors. There's 96 OEMs in the world. There's 9,000 OEMs in the world. There's 9,000 OEMs that claim to manufacture SMRs. Probably more today. I always use the word, the 96 number. We've focused on that from a commercial and technical feasibility standpoint. We've culled that down to three or four that we think might be viable going forward. And we're taking a hard look at them. But here's the issue, Nikolai, on small modular reactors. Who's going to take the last dollar risk? We're not going to put that on our customers, right? Right. But if we can bring a number of different wallets together, our wallet, right, maybe we'll put a little bit at risk. Not much. It has to be capped. It has to be sensible for our shareholders. We're not going to take a lot of risk. Because we don't really know what they're going to cost. You don't know what the end cost is going to be. The hyperscaler, if that's your customer, would have to take some risk. The EPC contractor would have to take some risk. The OEM, right, whose technology it is, should ultimately take the risk. Many times they're undercapitalized and can't. And so there's a limit on how much they can actually take. And then the federal government. Having the federal government come in and help out is going to be an important part on who takes last dollar risk. When do you think we'll have these up and running? Well, I mean, right now, everybody's sort of, I want to say, kind of toying around with the technology. And whether it's Gen 3 or Gen 4, they're going to have to take some risk. And if we're talking about the Gen 4 technology, we're more focused on the Gen 3 because the Gen 4 has not only the technology risk, but the nuclear fuel risk that goes along with it. But we look at both. But to get past first of a kind, it's going to take, really, I think the federal government stepping up to some extent to help backstop these, to help get to an nth of a kind. But everybody's going to have to chip in a little bit. But again, you know, if you're a NextEra and you're a developer, there's only so much you're willing to put at risk. I'm not going to put my shareholders at risk for a technology that's never worked before. So you've got to find somebody to take that last dollar risk. Once we identify that, and we're working hard on that, and this administration's been extremely supportive, then you have a real chance, a viable chance, of getting to nth of a kind. But I still think you're looking at the middle of the next decade to later before you get to that point.
Speaker 2John, for you, what is good leadership?
Speaker 1Good leadership means, you know, number one, setting a good strategy, right, for your team. You've got to make sure that you have a vision for what it is you want to accomplish. And you have to make sure it's understandable and digestible. Two, you've got to have great values and great ethics, right, in terms of leading a team. A team has to trust you, and they have to believe in the leader that is in front of them to get behind them, right? And so that's extremely important. Three, and I tell my team this all the time, if you want to rise up to a leadership position, you've got to make sure that you surround yourself with great people. You have to really understand what you're good at and what you're not so great at. And some people-- Some people have a good understanding of that. Others don't. What are you particularly good at? Well, I think I'm good at handling a lot of things at once, right? I think I'm very good at allocating capital, right, for the benefit of shareholders, which is another key part of my job. Managing stakeholders. Yeah, I mean, when you're a CEO, you have a number of different stakeholder groups that you have to be able to manage effectively at once to drive a strategy. Fourth, I think I'm good at setting a good vision and a strategy that our company can follow. We came out with the 12 Ways to Grow last year. I think it's a very crisp strategy that we've been able to make a lot of headway on over the last 12 months that I'm very happy about. And I think that's gone quite, quite well.
Speaker 2What are you working to improve?
Speaker 1Oh, I'm working to improve things every day. I mean, if you don't think you're-- You've got it all nailed down in this world with as dynamic as it is today and as quickly as things are changing, I'll tell you what--
Speaker 2But if you have to point to one thing?
Speaker 1Well, look, I mean, it's just keeping up with the pace of change and all the information flow that continues to come at you. Do you like change? I do. I love change. I thrive in change. I thrive in environments that-- Because you know what? I think one of the greatest strengths of NextEra is our ability to find opportunities out of change and out of risk. Are you better at change than other utilities? Yes. Tell me. Well, I think it's because, one, we're never living in just today. We're always thinking about three to five years out. I force myself and my leadership team-- We do a 10-year forecast, for example, right? I can't think of another company in my industry that maybe does a five-year, let alone a 10-year forecast.
Speaker 2Do you think it's possible to do a 10-year forecast? Because I don't think-- Well, things will change, but
Speaker 1when you're in a long-life capital investment cycle, the bets I'm making today, some of those aren't even coming online until year five. And then you've got to think about, well, if I'm making an investment in year two, what does that look like in year six or seven or eight? We won't get it all right, but I'll tell you what, the thinking that we do around it positions us competitively to be successful year in and year out and to be able to take the steps we need to take today to be successful in year six, seven, eight, nine down the road. Because this is an industry where if you don't plan ahead, you'll get killed.
Speaker 2Have you had experiences during your life which have informed your leadership style?
Speaker 1Definitely. Definitely. What are the important ones? Well, I mean, for me, first of all, I started my career in finance, economics, banking, but then I shifted to law, got my master's in tax law. And I was fortunate enough to come to NextEra early in my career back in 2002. I've been at the company, what, 24 years now this last July. But one of the greatest things that I've been able to achieve at the company is being able to do a lot of different things, right? So coming into the company, one of the great things NextEra does, is it moves people around, you know, but it's been the ability to step out of my comfort zone and not be afraid to take on new challenges and new tasks. I've had 12 different jobs at the company as I rose from being a, you know, a line lawyer, when I first came in to running the company today.
Speaker 2I mean, tax lawyer, your brother is a pilot. That's right. Doesn't that sound like more fun?
Speaker 1Twin brother. Yeah, exactly. Twin brother is a pilot. So if you're flying Southwest and you look up front and you see a guy that looks like me, don't get concerned. The plane will land. Who do you call when you're stuck? You know, look, number one, I've got great people around me. You know, my team is just terrific, you know, and that's the key. What I said earlier, I think about leadership style is, you know, making sure you have great people around you that aren't afraid to push back. And we've been able to set a culture that I firmly believe in at NextEra, which is I don't care who I'm in a room with. If you think something I've said is stupid or dumb or I haven't thought about something or I have a blind spot, I don't care if you're a 25-year-old, you know, newbie out of an MBA program or somebody who's been with the company for 20 years, push back and, you know, tell me what you think I'm missing. Let's have that debate. Do you ask for help? Pardon me? Do you ask for help? I do ask for help. I ask for help from my team. I have a mentor network that I go to. Our former chairman and CEO, Jim Robo, you know, is a close friend. He's a friend of mine. Maury Dewhurst, our former CFO, who I came up, you know, behind, who helped train me into that role. Lou Hay, one of our former CEOs and chairman. We have a great tradition at NextEra of continuing to keep in touch with our past leaders. So if I need to bounce something off of somebody that, you know, I want a perspective that might be outside of the company, I can do that through those mentors. But I have great people around me as well.
Speaker 2How do you define the corporate culture?
Speaker 1Well, the culture is one of continuous improvement. We never settle. Never, ever settle. In this business, you can't. If you turn around with an industry that's growing as fast as it is, that's constantly being disrupted by technology, you can never afford to sit on your laurels. You have to constantly be challenging yourself to do better. And how do you do that?
Speaker 2Because, you know, typically you have bureaucracy building up. Things are slowing down.
Speaker 1Yeah, you know, one of the greatest things that we do, Nikolai, is we have a program that we run every year. We've been running it since 2013, 2014. It was called Accelerate Momentum and Velocity. This year we called it Rewire because it was built around rewiring the company around technology, like rethinking all of our business processes and how artificial intelligence could be utilized to drive efficiency and productivity and better thinking. And we've been doing that for a long time now. And we did a terrific job of getting a substantial amount of potential savings opportunities out of that. But here's what's different culturally about that. Those programs, which we run once a year that feed into our strategy session and our financial planning at the end of the year, we go to our employees and we say, look, this is not top-down. You do your job every single day. You know what we're doing well and you know what we're not doing so well. You bring the ideas to us. And so we challenge the team to open up their thinking about how to run the business better. It is amazing the ideas that we get out of that. Just absolutely phenomenal thinking. Do they send you emails?
Speaker 2So how do they communicate?
Speaker 1No, it's through a formal process. So every group is called in in front of an executive steering committee and they pitch to us all their ideas and they come in with hundreds of ideas. Hundreds of ideas by business unit, our power generation division, our transmission distribution division. And do you pick up on some of the ideas? Oh, absolutely. Right. Oh, we incorporate those ideas and we capture them because all of them come with capital savings, O&M savings, and they get folded into our financial plan and it's a go-do and a go-get by the business group. But you know what it does? Is it empowers our people to understand and believe they are a part of the financial system. They're part of the financial outcomes for our company. They're part of the customer outcomes. It establishes ownership and an entrepreneurial spirit that isn't forced, that grows and it's naturally there and naturally part of the culture of the company, which is unusual for a company the size of our business. We've never lost that entrepreneurial spirit and edge that we had when I first came to the company back in 2002. And I think that's a big part of it.
Speaker 2Yeah, very, very impressive. Now, people like to hear not only about successes, but also about failures. What would you say is your biggest personal failure?
Speaker 1Well, you know, I don't know if it's personal or company or what, but a lot of companies in our business have ventured outside of the United States, right? You mentioned Europe earlier. One of the ventures that we had was into Spain back in 2012. And we thought it was going to be a good idea to invest, but we didn't invest there. The country risk at the time was, I think the S&P Global rating was the seventh or eighth least risky country in the world. The United States at that time was 18th. Because Spain was really booming at the time, right? Spain was booming at the time, but then we went into a recession and particularly Europe felt that and there was a significant, a significant reduction to the feed-in tariff in Spain. And so it impacted a couple of the solar projects that we were building over there. And I was really the workout person on those projects. So I went there and we worked it out and things ended up in a fine place. But never investing more in Europe. Never investing more in Europe. And those are lessons that you learn as you go along. You're not always going to get everything perfectly. Right. One of the things that we've always done as a company, I think, well, is what Jim Robo, you know, my predecessor used to describe as a toe in the water approach. And so we will look at new industries. We will make bets if we think we need to establish a leadership position in an area because we see things gravitating towards one direction or another. But we won't overcommit. And so we'll make a little toe in the water investment, but if we get hurt, we can pull right back. And if you're going to fail, as the old saying goes, fail fast, right? Absolutely. And learn from your mistakes. And don't be afraid to admit that you were wrong and move on. What's something about you that most
Speaker 2people don't know?
Speaker 1Well, you know, one, I'm extremely close to my family. I am a family first person. And, you know, my children mean absolutely everything to me. And my wife and I. My wife is well, extremely, you know, close to my family. I have a twin and, you know, I grew up as a, as you said earlier, he's a pilot with Southwest. And so, you know, I've always been used to being growing up in a tight, you know, family network. So family means everything to me. It really impacts my leadership style and the way I approach the job. Because what I always tell folks that work for me is make sure you get your priorities right and you're number one. Number one priority should be your family. It is for me. And how do we see that? How do we see that from how you spend your time? Well, I mean, I'm a workaholic. I will admit that I've worked pretty much seven days a week, but I always try to carve out time over the weekend or some time at night to just be with my family, be with my kids. How did your day go? What's going on? Be a part of their lives. And I think I've done a good job of being able to balance that. But you have to be very deliberate and intentional about your week and how you plan your week out and making sure that you take some time out for yourself. If you don't, you're going to burn out. And if you burn out, you're not going to be doing anybody any justice. And I'm a big… What's the key not to burning out? Well, for me, it's exercise. I mean, you know, I don't exercise to lose weight. I exercise to manage stress. How often do you exercise? Every day. What do you do? I run. I bike. I am, you know, I work out with a personal trainer. When do you wake up? I'm up 5:30 every day. And you train in the morning? Every morning. If I don't get it done in the morning, boy, you don't want to be around me. That's my outlet. Do you read? You know, I read all the things that a lot of folks in my position read, right? I'm not a reader for enjoyment because I have… I'm constantly reading. There's things on the industry. I use AI now for a lot of it. I mean, a lot of us do. What kind of music do you play? I love music. What do you play? All kinds. I don't play music. But what I love to listen to is I'll listen to jazz, you know, I'll listen to soft rock, alternative music. I mean, you name it. I really like all different types of genres, and so I don't ever really get stuck on one thing. I mean, I listen to a lot of music, but I don't really get stuck on anything. I listen to music. I listen to a lot of music. I listen to music. People would have a hard time guessing how old I am. Some people may say, you know, late 60s. Others may say early 20s. I mean, it really is that kind of a variety. And the truth is, 57. 50, 50. 55, 56. Lastly, John, what's your advice to young people? My advice to young people is do everything that you can to expand your toolkit. And here's what I mean by that is, and I always tell new recruits this, like I'm just getting off of our, you know, talking to our intern class. When you're looking to pick where to work, you have a choice, right? You could pick a place to work because that's the job you want, or you could pick a place to work because you really want to build a career. I always encourage folks to don't worry too much about the first job that you take. Just make sure you're careful. Make sure you're careful to go to a place that will allow you to expand as your interest expands and take on new jobs. I was a real, real beneficiary of that at NextEra. And one of the things that attracted me to NextEra was we hire people in, rarely will you stay in the job you were hired to do for more than a year or two. You're going to get moved around the company and have all different types of challenges and experiences because that's how you round out leaders. That's how you round out folks that are thinkers. That can contribute to the strategic thinking of the business. Where are we heading? What are we doing right? What are we doing wrong? We want people that can think on their own two feet, that aren't afraid to push back. Culturally, that's the kind of culture that we've been able to establish at the company. But go to a place that's going to develop your career because I guarantee your interests are going to change. Had I gone to the NextEra and they would have forced me to be a lawyer my entire career, I would have left the company decades ago. But I stayed with it. Because I love working there, and I love the challenge it brings every day, and I love the fact that the company embraced change and embraced change in their employees and letting them do all different types of things.
Speaker 2Well, Jonas, shareholders, we are very happy you didn't remain a tax lawyer and that you instead became the CEO. Big thank you. Well, thank you, Nicola. Thanks a lot.
Speaker 1I really enjoyed it. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. you
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