Staci Taruscio’s wealth of expertise led her to branch out on her own. In May 2015, she founded Tulsa, Okla.-based E&P Rebellion Energy LLC, backed by Natural Gas Partners, and serves as president and CEO. The company has a significant acreage position in the Scoop and Stack with development focus on the Scoop.

A native of Oklahoma, Taruscio grew up in Owasso, a suburb of Tulsa. She attended the University of Tulsa on a soccer scholarship and quickly decided to study what the school is best known for—petroleum engineering—where she earned her bachelor’s in 2004. She later earned an MBA from Oklahoma State University while working full time at Samson Resources.

Taruscio spent her early career at Samson building her skill-set in operations, production, reservoir and economics, in asset engineering and A&D positions. She gained additional experience as a reservoir engineer and strategic planner at SM Energy Co. She later transitioned into the private equity realm as a reservoir engineer at Rockford Energy Partners III and most recently, Mid?Con Energy Partners.

Taruscio is married with two young daughters.

Investor: What led you to start Rebellion Energy?

Taruscio: I left Samson originally to travel internationally for about a year. When I came back to Tulsa, I spent some time at both a public and a privately backed company. At that point I had a good taste for what kind of company I liked and those things I didn’t. I thought, if I’m going to spend all this time and effort with these companies, why wouldn’t I use those resources for myself?

I was particularly interested in different company cultures and how you can, from the top down, foster an environment of creativity and trust. I felt like those things gave certain companies an advantage, to be more nimble and aggressive and fun. Really, I was probably always going to do something like this-; it just took some time and experience to help me build up the courage to make the leap.

Investor: Where did the name Rebellion come from?

Taruscio: Thinking back, it probably stood for my own personal rebellion. I have things that I am individually rebelling against and I am sure we all do. I hope it empowers people to fight the good fight!

Investor: You started the company at the beginning of the downturn. Did you face any challenges?

Taruscio: Plenty of challenges but not with regard to timing. You know the old philosophy “buy low, sell high?” That was clearly a low. And at the beginning of any private equity-backed company like this, the crux of what you are trying to do in the first month, the first year, is acquire. [Our capital providers] understood that and pushed us to constantly “think bigger.” We just got lucky with the timing.

Investor What makes Rebellion different from other companies?

Taruscio: The biggest thing is ego. We haven’t been successful yet, so we really don’t know how good we are, we don’t have a terrible amount to be proud of at this point. We haven’t gotten to the point where we have an ego about us. That gives us some freedom to try new things and put ourselves out there. Nothing to lose.

For example, the Samson bankruptcy that we successfully transacted on, a lot of companies didn’t participate in that because it was really a tough process. We didn’t know it was going to be so difficult because we had never done it before. We’re not so constrained by what we think of ourselves.

Investor: What was the strategy behind Rebellion’s acquisitions?

Taruscio: With the first acquisition, the strategy was to get our foot in the door. It doesn’t have to be the perfect position, but you do have to have a place to start. The hardest part of painting is the first stroke.

Beyond that, let’s do some bolt-ons. Let’s core up and consolidate a position around that foothold. The Samson acquisition gave us a huge acreage count all the way through the Stack and Scoop [plays]. At that point, how can we pare that back into a core focus area?

Investor: What do you enjoy about your job?

Taruscio: I enjoy the people and the culture-building as well as the strategy, but those are also the most difficult. I suppose that makes it the most fulfilling and maybe that’s why I like it.

Investor: In a male-dominated industry, are you seeing more women joining?

Taruscio: I see more women joining and at the onset of their careers. Those numbers tend to decrease as you look up the chain of command though. I don’t know why that is, but I hope by the time my daughters are running companies, no one asks them this question. Maybe it comes down to mentors; when we get more people in leadership positions that make it a priority to push these young women to succeed in their career as well as their personal lives, we may see a shift.

I see a lot of people, men and women, very much on board with evening that playing field, and that feels like positive movement to me.

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