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Dan Garcia had flunked out of community college and was in the middle of a month‑long stint as a shrimper—a job he’d signed up for on a whim, just before realizing he was prone to seasickness. He knew his life wasn’t going in a direction he wanted, but he also knew he had to step outside of his comfort zone if things were going to change. For those who are struggling (hopefully not with your head hanging over the side of a boat between shrimp hauls), he wants you to understand that while things may be tough now, you will find your path, just as he did. Have faith in the strength of that spirit you have in you.
Garcia found his way, and he wants you to know that you can find it, too.
Today, Garcia is of counsel at Steptoe & Johnson PLLC in Pittsburgh, where he brings more than a decade of energy regulatory experience to oil and gas producers, midstream companies, utilities, and other energy companies navigating complex state and federal regulatory oversight. From pipeline safety regulation to utility rate cases before public utility commissions, Garcia built a career in energy policy the old-fashioned way, by working in every conceivable part of the business. He has covered upstream, midstream, and downstream.
“I’ve been involved in every part of the journey, from the gas molecule coming out of the ground all the way until it becomes the blue flame on your abuelita’s stove,” Garcia says. “I don’t think many attorneys can make that claim. And if I haven’t done it as an attorney, I’ve done it in operations.”
Garcia’s path to where he is today is somehow underplayed in his introduction. He didn’t step off the shrimp boat and immediately head back to school. He enlisted in the Air Force, scoring high and getting himself sent to Washington, DC, to study Khmer as an Air Force linguist. In addition to Khmer and his native Spanish, he eventually added multiple languages to his toolkit serving in the Air Force Special Operations Command in Okinawa and later working with the Joint Special Operations Command after September 11, 2001.
When it came time to re-enlist, Garcia realized he would rather continue studying language (Arabic in this case) but knew that if he re-enlisted, he’d likely be ordered to learn “low-flow languages,” which are specialized dialects with a narrow strategic purpose and limited application in the civilian world.
So Garcia, who had dropped out of community college just ten years earlier, became an undergraduate at Texas A&M University. A decade older than most students, he left this time with a political science and history degree. A job with a state representative in College Station pushed him toward law school, which he ultimately pursued at University of Pittsburgh School of Law.
Unlike most new attorneys, Garcia did not march directly into a traditional law‑firm track after graduation. He deliberately stepped into business development roles for a global construction company and then a national engineering firm, both aiming to build a presence in the energy sector.
“My brand became helping these clients develop a strategic growth plan and grow into new spaces,” Garcia says. “My approach was to diversify the suite of services to cover the entire product ‘waterfront’ by covering upstream, midstream, and downstream markets.”
Garcia would continue to amass experience that would make him a trusted and well-rounded energy attorney. He learned the technical side in private practice, the regulatory side in compliance leadership roles, and eventually represented a major regional electric utility before state commissions in rate cases, formal complaints, and a corporate consolidation.
In all of these things, and in his advice to younger attorneys, Garcia encourages failing forward. Embrace the moments where you feel as if your career might be over, because it is in those very moments you discover things about yourself you never otherwise would. It’s in those moments of vulnerability where you can find the lessons and make a connection in the process.
“Try and resist the temptation to see law as a series of transactions,” he says. “Cultivate relationships with people and communities; that is what sustains a career and is more rewarding in the long run.”
For Garcia, that commitment to community extends beyond the office. He serves on the board of BiG Heroes in Brownsville, Texas (his adopted hometown despite having attended seven different elementary schools between Austin and Brownsville), supporting adults with special needs through job training and placement, and emphasizing that the resources he and his wife have are gifts meant to be shared with others.
“Every resource we’re given is not ours to keep. We are simply the conduits of those resources so we can feed others,” Garcia says. “That’s very much driven by our faith. There’s nothing that I have that I truly own. It’s a gift from God, and it’s a gift I need to share with others.”
In Pittsburgh, he supports ministries that feed and shelter vulnerable families and chaplaincy work with professional athletes, viewing it all as part of the same vocation of service that runs through his legal practice.
Garcia sounds happy. He sounds fulfilled. And he understands that the tough parts of his early journey were ultimately blessings. Try to recognize the lessons hidden in your most vulnerable moments and carry them forward into your life. Those moments hold real value and a powerful opportunity to strengthen your character. That is what Garcia hopes for you.
Take it from a community college dropout, a seasick laborer on a shrimp boat, a multilingual Air Force special operations veteran, a nontraditional undergrad, an energy lawyer with an incredibly diverse experience, and a faithful member of his community who believes strongly in giving back to the world around him.
You can be all of these things. And you can succeed.
