Beth Good

For Beth Good, joining Resource Royalty in 2011 was a homecoming of sorts.

“My maternal great-grandparents owned property right in the middle of the East Texas oil boom back in the ’30s,” she said. The property was large enough to construct very small wooden homes to house oil field workers. At the end of the day, my great-grandmother regularly handed out metal buckets to feed everyone on the front porch steps.”

Growing up, Good heard many stories revolving around this time period, all with the same ending: “Never sell your minerals.”

But Good’s career took her in a different direction. After graduating Southern Methodist University with a degree in accounting, she worked for companies like KPMG and JPMorgan before a friend mentioned that he needed a CFO for an oil and gas venture he was putting together. She had found her home.

In late 2022, she was tapped to be Resource Royalty’s CEO.

“I’ve been very fortunate throughout my career to have been surrounded by a few people with great management skills,” Good said. “It’s one of those things that I didn’t appreciate at the time, but as I think back, I draw on my time and experience while working with them and try to emulate what I consider their best qualities. What made me enjoy working for them, what motivated me and what made me want to go that extra mile—I think these are the things that have helped me be successful.”

For a role model, she returns to family.

“I’m one of those people that adhere to the mantra, you’re in charge of your own life and career,” Good said. “I face challenges head on, don’t try to appease but get to the real issue and get it resolved. Probably credit my grandfather for that. He had several careers over the span of his life, the last one and the one I remember was a cattle breeder—think John Wayne. At the end of the day, I think my grandfather was my role model.”

For young professionals who want to be successful, Good imparts the same advice she gives to her daughters.

“Make sure the standard you measure yourself by is above what is perceived as the norm,” she said. “In other words, if you’re stack ranked, against men or women, always strive to be at the top of the ranking.”

Getting Resource Royalty to the top was a goal when she joined the startup.

“Resource Royalty was a new company,” Good said. “For me, it was important and still is to create a brand with credibility. We have clients that have never invested in an oil and gas program; therefore, they rely on us for education and execution. I’m proud of the fact that after 13 years in business, we have over 750 investors, many of whom have invested with us several different times.”

Though she entered the industry relatively late in her career, Good is unapologetically passionate about oil and gas.

“I’m going to step in it here a bit,” she said. “We all know that as a society we are dependent on fossil fuels, yet we have voices out there trying to tell us it’s over for the industry, for example, putting mandates on [electric vehicles] by 2030, etc. I have three grandsons and my wish is to leave the world a better place for them. If that means changing industry practices, supporting innovations in technology, then yes, count me in, I am passionate about it! What I don’t want to see is us as a society throwing the baby out with the bathwater.”

That enthusiasm translates into her take on what the industry needs to do to thrive in the future.

“2023 turned out to be an interesting year, specifically with regard to record-setting production numbers,” Good said. “The headlines are overwhelmingly pro-EV and anti-fossil fuels, yet somehow, we set a record. I credit that to the quiet tenacity of all phases of the industry. I say, keep on innovating.”

Check out the rest of Hart Energy's 2024 Women in Energy here.