Skilled Labor Series: Brittany Heller, Solar Professional

EnergyEnablement

Jan 9

*This episode is part of our new Skilled Labor Series hosted by MCJ partner, Yin Lu. This series is focused on amplifying the voices of folks from the skilled labor workforce, including electricians, farmers, ranchers, HVAC installers, and others who are on the front lines of rewiring our infrastructure.

Today's guest is Brittany Heller, Director of Program Management at HeatSpring.

Last year, we kicked off this series by hearing from a field technician working on the installation side of the solar industry. And while there are many facets to the PV space, we couldn’t just end there. Today’s guest is a fascinating follow-up from that initial episode because Brittany’s background and experience as a female in a male-dominated field highlight a different side of the spectrum. From doing door-to-door to back office sales, solar construction, and most recently workforce development and democratizing training access to get more people working in the solar industry, she has a wealth of knowledge for women who are looking to make the switch and are not sure where to start.

We met Brit through the Greenwork platform, and naturally invited our friend Sam Steyer to co-host the conversation. We find out how Brit felt a calling to work on something more meaningful in life and applied for a solar job on a whim, how solar policy shifts uprooted her and her now husband from Louisiana to Colorado, what it's like to transition from doing sales to doing solar construction projects, and the empathy she's built seeing both sides of the house, and ways to create a more inclusive future workforce in the skills trade arena. Enjoy!

Get connected:
Yin’s Twitter / LinkedIn
Brittany / Heatspring
MCJ Podcast / Collective

*You can also reach us via email at info@mcjcollective.com, where we encourage you to share your feedback on episodes and suggestions for future topics or guests.

Episode recorded on October 5, 2022.

In this episode, we cover:

[3:12] Britt's background and how she found her way into the solar industry
[6:47] Her experience with door-to-door sales
[8:06] Differences between outside vs inside sales
[10:23] The role of policy in Britt's career at Grid Alternatives
[14:24] Her experience working in construction
[17:00] An overview of Grid Alternatives and the org's revenue model
[20:02] Construction skills Britt gained that changed her life
[22:00] Learnings from working in both sales and construction
[25:48] Inspiring stories from Britt's workforce development chapter at Grid
[29:01] Tips for deciding on where people can focus on the skills trade side of climate
[30:37] The role of gender and diversity representation in the trades
[36:40] How Britt sees her career evolving in the future

Jason Jacobs (00:02):
Hello everyone, this is Jason Jacobs.
Cody Simms (00:04):
And I'm Cody Simms.
Jason Jacobs (00:06):
And welcome to My Climate Journey. This show is a growing body of knowledge focused on climate change and potential solutions.
Cody Simms (00:16):
In this podcast, we traverse disciplines, industries, and opinions to better understand and make sense of the formidable problem of climate change and all the ways people like you and I can help.
Jason Jacobs (00:27):
We appreciate you tuning in, sharing this episode, and if you feel like it leaving us a review to help more people find out about us so they can figure out where they fit in addressing the problem of climate change.
Yin Lu (00:41):
Today's guest is Brit Heller. She grew up in Atlanta, Georgia and was a traveling tire salesperson who got interested in solar and has made her way through the many facets within the PV industry, from doing door-to-door sales to back office sales to solar construction, and most recently working on workforce development and democratizing training access to get more people working in the solar industry.
(01:03):
As part of the Skilled Labor Workforce Series on the podcast, we met Brit through the Greenwork platform, and I've invited my friend Sam Steyer who runs Greenwork to co-host with me so we can ask Brit a bunch of questions and learn from her experience. We find out how Brit felt a calling to work on something more meaningful in life and applied for a solar job on a whim, how solar policy shifts uprooted her and her now husband from Louisiana to Colorado, what it's like to transition from doing sales to doing solar construction projects, and the empathy she's built seeing both sides of the house, and ways to build a more inclusive future workforce in the skills trade arena. With that, Sam and Brit, welcome to the show.
Sam Steyer (01:43):
Thanks, Yin.
Brittany Heller (01:43):
Hey.
Sam Steyer (01:46):
And hey [inaudible 00:01:47], I'm a member of the community, and for those of you who don't know me, I had a great time co-hosting with Yin and Andy Martinez from Sunrun, and I'm so excited for the second in our Skilled Trades Series with Brit Heller. I'm the CEO at Greenwork. We help clean energy companies build construction and maintenance functions. And I actually had the great privilege of working with Brit. We offered a Solar 101 online course in the past and Brit was the instructor and she was just an amazing teacher and just an amazing person to work with, and really glad to have her back on today.
Brittany Heller (02:20):
Thanks, Sam. And hey Yin, I'm happy to be here. Super excited to be on the My Climate Journey podcast. Since we spoke a couple of weeks ago, I've had the chance to check out a couple of the podcasts, and you guys have an impressive lineup of folks on here, and so I'm super humbled to be a part of it. Thank you.
Yin Lu (02:40):
Oh, thanks. That is beyond generous. Thanks for the feedback. And God, we're just so excited to learn from you today. I know we've had Andy Martinez on the show before who talked to us about his experiences as a PV technician climbing onto roofs, and we've seen him share pictures on our Slack channel about his day in the life, but you come from quite an interesting path to the solar industry. So we'd love to hear a bit more about yourself. Where did you grow up? How did you find your way to doing so many things in the solar field?
Brittany Heller (03:12):
Yeah, yeah, so I grew up in Atlanta, Georgia, and I didn't find my way into the solar industry until I was maybe like 26, and that was back in 2015. I was getting ready to move back to the United States after several years abroad, and I was just looking at this job board for New Orleans, which is where I was pretty sure I wanted to move back to. And I saw this job for a solar energy consultant, and I was previously doing sales in the United States, and so I wanted to do sales again, but I just knew I wasn't going to sell something unless I was 100% stoked on it. If I didn't believe in the thing I was talking about every day, I didn't want to do it.
(03:56):
When I saw that job posting, I was super unqualified based on what was called out there, and so had it in my back pocket. And then when I moved back to the States, I got a job with that same company as a door knocker, so knocking on doors and generating leads, and that was my first entry point into my long love story being in the solar industry where I still am working.
Yin Lu (04:24):
I want to backtrack and learn about, you mentioned you were abroad, tell us about that experience and tell us about how you developed this curiosity about solar that eventually led you to move back to the States and get a job knocking on doors to try to sell solar panels.
Brittany Heller (04:42):
Yeah, so when I was in the States, my job, I'm almost mortified to say this, but I was a traveling tire saleswoman. So talking about tires day in and day out, really that's what was my drive to say any future jobs just have to be not only good jobs, but I need to feel like I am making a difference in the world by my work.
(05:07):
We spend so many hours doing a job that at least for me, if it's not aligned with my values and what I want to do, then it ain't worth it. And so I was in Latin America for a few years. I was in Colombia at that time, really not doing anything related to solar, but when I saw it there was just something about how I felt when I saw it. I was just like, this is what I need to be working on. And then since then every step has been building my knowledge, building my skillset, building my experience to where I can keep moving where I want to go in the industry.
Yin Lu (05:43):
Was there a visceral moment in time where you saw a solar panel field or something that you were like, "Ooh, this is interesting"? What was the hook?
Brittany Heller (05:53):
I wish that there was the ray of sunshine shines on me as I'm in the field of solar panels, but nothing like that really happened. It was just reading that job description and being like, whoa, I can really help address climate change. I can do a sales job, which is really focused on revenue and producing, but all of that work would be centered around something that's also making a really positive change. It just felt right. So it was just in my really dumpy apartment in Bogota, checking a jobs board is when I had that moment.
Yin Lu (06:32):
Nice. And then tell us about this door knocking job. What was the company that you were working with at the time, and what was it like to do that? Going literally door to door instead of selling tires now convincing people to get solar panels.
Brittany Heller (06:47):
Door knocking is just tough, I mean, I think everybody just can immediately sense what's tough about knocking on people's doors and bothering them in their home. But it was interesting because people were still receptive. Once I was talking to people and doing a really quick qualification, is there shade on their roof, does the roof look like it's in good condition, those sorts of things. And so when I would talk to people and just really basically talk about it, I wasn't there to sell them a system, I was just there to ask them if they were interested, and that worked out well. But I did that job for two weeks and I luckily had gotten promoted. The company was Joule Energy who is still around, they're based in Louisiana, and they moved me into an inside sales role. So that's calling folks on the phone, reconfirming that they're interested in solar, and then scheduling appointments for somebody who's considered a consultant or an outside salesperson to go and seal the deal.
Yin Lu (07:46):
So you were doing outside sales and now you're doing inside sales. This is the first time I'm learning the differentiation of those functions. What did you like about doing outside sales versus inside sales or the other way around? And I'd love to hear more about just the role that policy played in your ability to be able to sell services and hardware to people.
Brittany Heller (08:06):
Yeah. Outside sales is definitely cooler to me. That is where I would be going to people's houses, sitting at their kitchen table, and answering all their questions about the tech, explaining the process, explaining the incentives that were at play at the time in Louisiana, which were really, really great incentives. And so it just was fun to go get a moment in people's world and then to talk about something that I was super hyped about. It was just fun. It was like getting to do something I love all the time with different people. So that was super cool. And then at the time the state of Louisiana had a tax credit that was essentially up to $10,000, and that was from the state in addition to the federal ITC or investment tax credit, which was 30%. So ultimately people could get a $20,000 solar system effectively for $4,000.
Sam Steyer (09:06):
And [inaudible 00:09:08] that was driving people's decisions, or how did you find individual people and individual families were making the decision to go solar?
Brittany Heller (09:15):
Yeah, I think it was varied. The decisions people chose to go solar were very varied. I think I was a little sad at that time how few people were like, "I'm fighting climate change and we're going to change everything." Not so much the energy there for folks. It was just a really smart investment. That is a really quick payback time on a system. And when you think about selling a system and payback time, people were basically paying $4,000 for a system. The energy or the electricity that that system produces month after month that they're not buying from their utility, those systems are paying themselves back in full in four to five years. So today those systems are paid back, and usually the warrantied life of a system is typically 20 years, maybe 25 years. That's just pure profit that that rooftop system is producing on their rooftop.
Yin Lu (10:13):
So after your role at Joule Energy, I know that you moved to an organization called Grid Alternatives, but that was in Colorado. Curious what prompted the move.
Brittany Heller (10:23):
Yes. So all good things come to an end, I suppose. And the tax credit didn't quite change immediately, but there was a lot of politics around it. And ultimately there was a lot of uncertainty around how people would get the tax credit. There was just really no way to know because they basically put a cap on it and people weren't sure if they would get it or they wouldn't. Knowing if you're going to get a $10,000 credit on a system or not is a pretty big, important part of the decision. So ultimately the solar industry, the residential solar industry evaporated overnight, if you will. And so my now husband and I, we met at Joule Energy, and we were both really wanting to keep doing what we were doing or some version of it. And so we were researching what states are supporting policy, where can we go and build our career? And Colorado is a really, really pro solar, pro climate action state.
Sam Steyer (11:26):
The idea of states passing good climate policies because cool people who want to work in renewable energy will move there I feel like I have not heard before, but is really awesome. I know you went to Colorado, enjoyed Grid Alternatives, and we're familiar and think Grid's an awesome organization. But for people listening who might not know what Grid Alternatives is yet, can you tell us a little bit about the organization you joined?
Brittany Heller (11:47):
Yes. I can't say enough great things about Grid Alternatives. They are a nonprofit, they're based in Oakland, California. They have several offices in California, Colorado, D.C., Nicaragua, and they also do work in Nepal and Mexico and also tribal lands, sovereign tribal nations as well. And they are all about clean energy access. So that is not only helping to provide the technology of solar panels on roofs to people who previously really didn't have access, they also really focus quite a bit on workforce development and job training. Because as we all know, clean energy jobs are really great jobs. They're quality jobs. And Grid focuses on helping more people get their foot in the door. And I guess one thing I don't know that I mentioned, but all their solar systems are typically for low income qualified households or nonprofits or other organizations like that.
Yin Lu (12:49):
Was your role a continuation of what you were doing at Joule Energy, doing a combination of inside and outside sales, or did your role change when you joined Grid?
Brittany Heller (12:58):
Yeah, so it was a total change. I went from a job where I was doing sales, making my own schedule, working anytime I wanted, to a construction role, and an entry level construction role at that. And I was really intentional about wanting to work and do an AmeriCorps construction fellowship with Grid Alternatives for a few reasons. One of them was I knew for me to grow in the way that I wanted to within the industry, I had to build it. I needed to know firsthand how to talk about building it. And for lack of a better word, I needed the street cred to have done it and can talk about it authoritatively. So I went into this entry level construction role.
(13:46):
And another reason I chose Grid was that they were super intentional about being a training ground. So many other companies, and I totally get it, they have to be, but they're really profit focused. And so it can be kind of pushed into working at a pace that I wasn't really prepared to work at. And I didn't know anything about construction, so I needed a company or an organization that was really willing to help me do this painstaking getting ready and prepared to do this work.
Sam Steyer (14:18):
And as you got into the construction work, what did you like about it? What did you like not so much about it?
Brittany Heller (14:24):
For me, construction was the most humbling job I have ever had. To choose to go to work every day, it's something that I didn't know how to do at all. Honestly it just felt a little icky and almost humiliating. I would just be like, oh my God, I'm so bad at this. It's embarrassing to not understand how to use a drill or something.
(14:49):
I remember we were in Steamboat Springs and we were building this cement box, building just a wooden box to pour cement in for a little transformer to sit on top. And I didn't even know how to hold the drill properly. And our construction manager was like, "Hey, here, let me show you. Just hold the back of the drill," but you only have to teach me that once and then I'm able to do it. So it's just oftentimes kind of hard to find those organizations that are really willing to take the time and invest. But for me with Grid, I feel like that really paid dividends because I was able to really keep moving and continuing.
Yin Lu (15:29):
We're going to take a quick break so you can hear me talk more about the MCJ membership option. Hey folks, Yin here, a partner at MCJ Collective. Want to take a quick minute to tell you about our MCJ membership community, which was born out of a collective thirst for peer-to-peer learning and doing that goes beyond just listening to the podcast.
(15:46):
We started in 2019, and since then grown to 2000 members globally. Each week we're inspired by people who join with differing backgrounds and perspectives. And while those perspectives are different, what we all share in common is a deep curiosity to learn and bias to action around ways to accelerate solutions to climate change.
(16:03):
Some awesome initiatives have come out of the community, a number of founding teams have met, nonprofits have been established, a bunch of hiring has been done, many early stage investments have been made, as well as ongoing events and programming like monthly Women in Climate meetups, Idea Jam sessions for early stage founders, Climate Book Club, art workshops and more. So whether you've been in climate for a while or just embarking on your journey, having a community to support you is important. If you want to learn more, head over to mcjcollective.com and then click on the members tab at the top. Thanks and enjoy the rest of the show. All right, let's get back to the show.
(16:38):
I have a question about just Grid and how they operate as a nonprofit, and then I want to deep dive into what you learned having been on the sales side and also the construction side. Because previously we've heard that those are two sides of the solar industry that sometimes there's some rub. But the first question with Grid, it's a nonprofit. How does this sustain itself? What's the revenue model there?
Brittany Heller (17:00):
Yes, Grid is a super scrappy organization in that like most nonprofits, they're always working on finding funding to achieve their mission. That looks like individual donors, foundation grants. A lot of our work was considered fee for service, so we were being paid to build the projects like any other company would. And then once we started to really focus more on workforce development, there's a lot more funding as well to support workforce development. So really diversified funding mix, and it was always a struggle to figure out how things were going to get covered. And hopefully in the future that'll get easier for them as we're seeing a bigger need for the solar labor workforce.
Yin Lu (17:44):
Got it. And then on the projects side of things, what were you all building? Was it residential, like you would go into tribal land and then help put solar panels on residential homes, or was it commercial? Tell us about the scope of those projects.
Brittany Heller (18:00):
Yeah, so most of the time there's a specific tribal team that does most of the work in partnership with different tribes. But when I was there we did just a handful of residences through some different city's community development block grants, which is essentially HUD money, or Housing and Urban Development I believe for the folks who don't know. But what we were mostly working on when I was there was Grid Alternatives Colorado had won a $1.2 million grant that was through the Colorado Energy Office, and it was a demonstration project so that all of these different rural electric co-ops could begin to have their own generation of solar. Because they're all having to buy from a wholesaler in the area, they don't have their own generation. And with renewable energy becoming more and more online, it was a really good option for them to try out. And so a few years ago a lot of those organizations were trying it out with Grid, and all those different community solar arrays that we built were all dedicated low income solar arrays.
(19:06):
And it was cool, it felt like every project we would work on would be like, "This is the biggest low income dedicated array in the country." But then the next project we did, it's like, "This one's actually the biggest one now." And then it ended up the last one we did that I worked on when I was on the construction team was a two megawatt project outside of Fort Collins. So it was fun. I love commercial community solar style projects. I prefer them more to residential just because I had to swallow my fear and be okay with heights, but I still don't love them. If I can work on the ground, much more happy working on the ground, but I will also climb up a ladder when I have to, but a little more chill on the ground.
Sam Steyer (19:50):
What do you think you got out of doing the construction work firsthand, and would you recommend the people who work in clean energy who maybe do a function like sales or training get some hands on construction experience?
Brittany Heller (20:02):
Yes. I tell people all the time that there is nothing that will take the place of building it. I just think generally if you want to be a project manager, people have a different disposition to you if you've been out there and you've built it. You understand what you're asking them to do. So I think it's just a really good thing for everybody if you're physically able to do it, to do it for a stint in your lifetime if you're going to be in the industry as a career.
(20:34):
But for me personally, the skills that I gained at Grid Alternatives, the construction skills were absolutely life changing. The doors that it opened for me, not only just with my career in solar, for sure I had a lot more things I was able to do because of it, but just personally as well, I build cool stuff all over my property all the time. And that's because the construction manager taught me how to hold a drill six years ago. So many doors open when you have those skills, and I could fix stuff if I wanted to. I could make really cool art pieces. I just think the doors, so much opens up if you have that skillset. And then not to mention the actual confidence boost of having that competency and feeling really fortified in my abilities, that also is an incalculable benefit.
Yin Lu (21:33):
Going back to Sam's question around the things that you learned, and last time when we talked to Andy, he had mentioned sales tends to focus more on the quantity of just selling, selling, selling, but not understanding just how long a project might take, an installation might take. So having been on both sides, Brit, what have you come to empathize/understand about both of those two very necessary spheres of the solar industry?
Brittany Heller (22:00):
Yeah, I know a lot of construction folks just across the board who feel really like these salespeople don't understand that this can't fit here. There's fire setbacks. I think there's a lot of stuff. I think I was pretty careful as a salesperson to not overpromise things, but I think a lot of times salespeople might want to really max out a roof or have the biggest system that they can, and that in turn kind of pushes some difficult decisions on operations and they have to tell a homeowner that it's not possible.
(22:36):
So it definitely helps to have that perspective of construction when you are a salesperson, because I think you tend to be a little bit more careful about what you get everybody else into. But generally speaking, at least in my viewpoint, I oftentimes feel like solar sales jobs can tend to be much higher paid than the construction side. I think that's a societal value sometimes, that construction isn't worth as much. And I'm really happy to say that I do think the scales are changing as we're having all these projects and pipelines, but they can't be built because there's not skilled trades people. So you're seeing that wage go up. So I'm really happy about that. But I think it says a lot about just our society that certain jobs are valued oftentimes much more than the jobs of the people actually building it, and I think that's a problem.
Sam Steyer (23:40):
And so you had done sales, you finished your AmeriCorps fellowship with Grid, and then you went into training and workforce development. Can you tell us a little bit about that decision, what that work was like?
Brittany Heller (23:51):
Yeah, let's see. So my AmeriCorps term, construction fellowship term ended at Grid, and for several months I actually didn't work at Grid, it's a small team, didn't have any openings. So I worked on building a house with somebody, so kept working on construction skills. But when the workforce manager who was the current manager was leaving and she called me and said, "Hey, I'm leaving. I think you'd be really good for my job if you want to apply." And I jumped at the chance because I think workforce development and developing people and increasing access to historically excluded groups into these really awesome living wage quality jobs that have a lot of longevity, especially now after the IRA's passage, it's exciting to be a part of that.
(24:42):
And so, yeah, I did that job for... All the years run together now past Covid, but I think I did that job for about three years or so, and I did a lot of training in that role. And then my team grew from just myself and a half of a person's time to five people by the time I was leaving. So I moved away from training and did a lot more program management and fundraising and relationship building and things like that. But it was awesome. That was probably some of the most stressful work, but also fulfilling work too. Just seeing people succeed made every bit of stress worth it.
Yin Lu (25:22):
I'm a huge, huge proponent of upskilling people so that they can gain economic ability. And to your point earlier about just needing to give people jobs where they can earn a good wage so that they can provide for their families and such. I'm curious if you have any examples from doing your workforce development chapter at Grid of some of the people that you helped train up in the solar field?
Brittany Heller (25:48):
Yes, there was a lot of people who are heroes of mine hearing about their journey and how they've continued on. Two people that come to mind. We worked a lot with people who are leaving incarceration, that is an incredibly undervalued group of workers, people that have paid their dues, so let's let them move on. And they're ready to work and make up for lost time and achieve dreams. And one person who was incarcerated for seven years and he joined our program, one of our training cohorts, and I remember in the beginning of the class he was a little bit of an older gentleman. He is like, "I'm not sure I'm trying to do this kind of work. I maybe don't want to do it." But he got out there and he loved it and was really good at it. And then at the end of the cohort got a job with a company, he had also applied for a scholarship to do advanced training and he was getting it done. He was nerding out on the technology. His company ended up paying for him to continue on to more classes afterward. He was a crew lead.
(27:08):
He wrote to tell us that he had bought a house, him and his wife bought a house within six months. That was like, you are a rockstar. So he's somebody who comes to mind. And then there was another, she was a woman who had a young daughter when she was joining our program and had been facing just a lot of different challenges in her life, but she was really looking for some stability and a path for her. She wasn't really sure what she wanted to do. I remember she said she went to the workforce center and they're like, "Oh, you can be a secretary or an admin." There's nothing at all wrong with those jobs, but she was like, "I want to do something different." And she didn't feel like they were hearing her.
(27:52):
But we had got connected on a social media network when I was promoting one of the cohorts, and she joined and one of her biggest goals was she wanted to be in a position in five years to purchase a home for her and her young daughter as a single mom. And I actually just heard from her a couple of days ago, I wrote her months ago, but I just heard back from her and she said she's in her final year of electrical apprenticeship, which is sick. She's almost a journey person. That's a 70K to an 85K a year job once you reach that level of electrical licensure, and I'm just thrilled by that. And the stories like that make every moment of the work in workforce development worth it, is when you see people rock their dreams.
Sam Steyer (28:42):
That's so amazing. And one of the things we think about is we need a lot more skilled tradespeople working on the energy transition. How do people make the decision to work on solar or work on another low carbon technology versus working somewhere else in the trades where there's also a lot of demand right now?
Brittany Heller (29:01):
Yeah, I mean I think that there's really no wrong way to go or to try to get people to come over here to the solar side. I think it's really what speaks to people's interest and what gets people excited. With solar, especially residential solar, there's certain things, do you like to work on roofs? Yes or no? And if the answer's no, then maybe that's not the right role for you. But there's so much commercial and utility scale solar. It's really I think just thinking about what you do every day, what really sounds the most exciting. And to be honest, getting more people in any of the trades I think is important. And so I think just people doing construction and trades work is valuable. Really worthwhile work.
Yin Lu (29:56):
I want to talk about workforce development and how to get more people into the skills trade. And one of the areas I want to focus on is diversity. In my work previously I worked at a foundation that looked at women and equality in the workplace, and there's a term that we often use to describe someone who is the only person that looked like themselves in a field and they were called the onlys. And you are the first female identifying person on the series that we're talking to. And I've had many interests to many people and there just is a dearth of female identifying folks in the trades. And I'm wondering if you can talk more about that based from a personal experience side of things. And also maybe if you can comment on just the general industry and how do we get more diversity?
Brittany Heller (30:37):
Yes, that's really real. Representation matters, and seeing people like you around you and where you aspire to be is really important. And when I was making the decision to go into solar construction, I had interviewed with another company, and I did a whole working interview, was working up on a roof with them all day, the company thought it was cool, got a job offer and I turned it down because I didn't see a single woman the whole day. At that point in my career, I was not prepared to be the only, as you call them. It was just too much of a personal growth stretch for me in general, but to also be the one lady, it was just too much. So I turned it down and then ended up later going to Grid. And yeah, I think it's a really huge opportunity for the solar industry to really work on that.
(31:37):
IREC comes out with something called the Solar Jobs Census, and they recently had their 2021 report come out and I believe that women in solar is at 24%, women are 24% of the solar workforce. And if you were to look at tradeswomen in the solar industry, that number is much, much smaller. And I don't know that there's even numbers on that that we've been able to find. And so I work with some other women who are really focused on it in the field, and there's a lot of women who are wanting to do work in this space who are actively solar trades people. There's a lot of layers to getting more gender diversity in the industry, as well as all other types of diversity as well. But speaking to gender right now, well, let's see, I guess I can just go into a couple of things that could possibly support more women.
(32:31):
I think straight away companies should be willing to do more training to help people get started. That should just be a requirement. I think just having a lot of training just provides the stage and opportunity for more people to feel comfortable in the space. I was listening to a talk, and Grid Alternatives' VP of Construction, her name's Anna Batista, she was talking about how they're working on doing an ally or bystander training for their construction team. I think things like that are kind of emerging in the industry, but really that's just teaching everybody else on the team how to be supportive of just diverse thoughts and being inclusive in a space that has not typically been regarded as such.
(33:19):
I think it's important to change what's considered acceptable in a work environment. I'm in some different Facebook groups and there's a group on solar installers that I'm in, and it is oftentimes a exhibit A of toxic masculinity. People will post a picture of their install, then everybody's just trashing them and just saying all this stuff. It's this weird energy about who's the most macho install done at the fastest, coolest.
(33:50):
And then on the other hand, somebody that I've gotten close with over the last several months, her name's Riley, she's working on initiative Women in Solar and she's got a group of women installers and technicians. And people post stuff and they're like, "Yeah, that's so awesome." Always really positive. So really just changing that stereotypical culture around construction, which is not the case in all places. So please take that with a grain of salt. I don't assume everybody is like that, but there is quite a few places like that.
(34:22):
I think it's also important that leadership is modeling that behavior and they're really showing people respect and leading by example there. Also related to that, having women in leadership roles, having other women on the construction team, all of that's really important. And a lot of that's rooted in recruitment too. Where are you finding the people that are working with you and what's on that job posting and how do you make it accessible for somebody who's maybe interested but maybe doesn't check every single box right now?
(34:55):
And another thing that I think is just important, and it just comes top of mind, I was just at a training in Boston for a youth empowerment farm because farming is my other love. But they were talking a lot about how their curriculum and their food justice farm and organization is really not only talking about things like oppression and all these isms and things that are wrong, but really helping everybody celebrate their identity and be really proud of who they are. And at Grid they used to say it as bringing your whole self to work. And so being in organizations that are like that, that can look like affinity groups, that can look like just being curious. If somebody tells you something about their life, you ask them more questions or you look it up and have something to say about it. It's just really hearing people and being there with them and really accepting them.
Yin Lu (35:48):
What you're saying really resonates and I think applies not just in the skills trades, but just generally good best practices to build more diverse teams. And early on, it reminds me of this analogy of what's the difference between diversity and inclusion. And diversity is like if you throw a party and you say everyone's welcome, and inclusion is like you make sure you buy vegetarian pizza, vegan pizza, meat eaters pizza, and you offer people rides to the party, really help bring them in, I think what you just touched on, just really important reminders to us all on how do you build a welcoming culture in a place or in a field that has predominantly been one way for a long, long time.
Brittany Heller (36:30):
Totally.
Sam Steyer (36:32):
Brit, where do you see your own career going? And actually we haven't asked you about your current job. So what are you doing right now and what do you see yourself doing over the next five years?
Brittany Heller (36:40):
Yes. So right now my role is director of program management at HeatSpring. And HeatSpring is an online training platform that specializes in technical training that addresses climate change. So solar is a huge component of that. We also have classes on geothermal, green building, a number of different topics. And in that role that I have currently, I do everything from working with students and making sure that they're having success with the platform. I also work a lot with instructors. Because it's a platform anybody can come there and teach a course, and so we have all sorts of different experts and I love trying to find more experts to bring their expertise to HeatSpring and to our community.
(37:32):
Probably my favorite thing that I do and wish I could do more of it is building curriculum. So working with folks and helping them map out logical ways to think about a course, or bringing free courses too, we've had everything from agro-voltaics to solar career pathways to a brown fields to green fields class or developing brown fields for solar development. So it's been pretty much the sky's the limit with HeatSpring. And so that's been really, really fun.
(38:02):
Where I see myself in five years is really probably twofold. We're at this really exciting inflection point within clean energy with the passage of the Inflation Reduction Act in August. I feel like we're all on the solar coaster and our arms are in the air and we're going on one of the down things, but we're still cranking up to it. And it's going to be exciting and it's going to be really challenging. I mean, I'm sure no one needs to hear from me, but there's a labor shortage and nobody can find enough people to do the jobs that we have. And so really it comes down to how do we really build quality into all the jobs in the solar industry so that these are the most exciting jobs and people feel really pumped about the energy transition in the United States.
(38:54):
And so I see a lot of my work at HeatSpring being rooted in that. There's a lot of new labor requirements as a part of the Inflation Reduction Act, so we're going to see a lot more registered apprenticeship programs and things like that, which I'm really excited about because that's just building quality as I see it into a lot of these jobs and training and development. And so now it's a little bit more focused, if you will, because of that.
(39:22):
And then on the other hand, I know I mentioned going to a farm training, but I also have a 17 acre property here in Georgia that I am turning into a full-on regenerative farm. And I hope to do a lot of training and education, particularly with youth out here, both as it relates to job training and employability skills, but also just getting your hands into the dirt and knowing how vegetables grow and building stuff out here. Basically all the things that I wish I knew as a kid and didn't I want to do here rooted in this land.
Yin Lu (39:59):
And have that farm be powered by solar panels that you'll install yourself, I'm sure.
Brittany Heller (40:04):
Oh yeah, you know it. Our last place was pretty farmed up and solared up. We've got a couple of infrastructure things to sort out, but you know we'll be doing solar storage the works soon enough.
Sam Steyer (40:17):
Well, Brit, that sounds like a really amazing farm and place to be. This was such an educational and frankly uplifting conversation. Thank you for taking the time to be with us today and to share with the MCJ community.
Brittany Heller (40:31):
Yeah, thank you guys so much for having me. I really appreciate it. And hey, if you're looking to get into the solar industry, welcome to hit me up on LinkedIn or wherever. I'm happy to do what I can to get you connected to these really great jobs.
Yin Lu (40:45):
All right, thanks Brit.
Jason Jacobs (40:48):
Thanks again for joining us on the My Climate Journey podcast.
Cody Simms (40:51):
At MCJ Collective, we're all about power and collective innovation for climate solutions by breaking down silos and unleashing problem solving capacity. To do this, we focus on three main pillars, content like this podcast and our weekly newsletter, capital to fund companies that are working to address climate change, and our member community to bring people together as Yin described earlier.
Jason Jacobs (41:14):
If you'd like to learn more about MCJ Collective, visit us at www.mcjcollective.com. And if you have guest suggestions, feel free to let us know on Twitter @mcjpod.
Cody Simms (41:28):
Thanks and see you next episode.