Nine years ago today, I took my very first Red Clover call, sitting at my kitchen table. I didn’t have a home office yet, just a laptop, my trusty mobile phone, and a kitchen table that was about to become a lot more than a place to eat breakfast.

That same morning was also my daughter’s first day at a new school. I remember trying to sound calm and confident on that call while another part of my brain was wondering whether she made a friend at lunch, did she like her teachers, and did we make the right decision moving schools. Not much has changed either – I’m constantly flipping between mom brain and work brain.

Nine years later, I’ve moved from the kitchen table to my home office, which means I share the bedroom that houses my beloved Peloton.

I also feel like I just wrote a similar post celebrating five years. That girl who started at her then new elementary school is now a junior in high school – time sure does keep flying by. To me, it seems like I still have little kids. I can’t possibly have TWO teenagers in my house – how did I get here? I digress …

Keeping a business alive for nine years is genuinely hard work, and while some problems and aspects of it get easier, as time marches on, they grow and change.

Sources: Bureau of Labor Statistics data, Census Bureau data released in November 2025; 2025 Wells Fargo report covered by Forbes

Since 2019, we’ve been a women-certified business with WBENC. The odds are really stacked against small businesses, especially women-owned ones. I’m truly proud of what Red Clover Advisors has grown into, and as I kept reflecting on this anniversary, I kept thinking about what I’ve learned along the journey. So here are the nine lessons that keep coming to my mind. I think these work if you serve clients externally or are part of a corporate team. Which resonates most with you?

1. Have a mission statement.

Mine has always been simple: simplify privacy. It’s infused in everything that we do, from our process and approach to projects to the reports we prepare and the language we use with clients.

Clients tell us regularly that we make privacy approachable instead of overwhelming (which is how many companies describe how they feel about privacy). This feedback is a direct result of making a mission statement more than just words – it’s about embodying it everywhere possible. I’ve had a theme word each year, and one of the very first ones was “simple.” 

Our mission to simplify privacy is critical because we’re at a time where privacy really matters.

Privacy shows up in the phones in our pockets, the cars we drive (hello, the Flock controversy that even had my home town in John Oliver’s Flock camera episode), every app and website we touch, and just about every interaction we have these days. It’s not getting simpler. It’s getting more complicated as more of daily life runs through data. This isn’t just a job that pays the bills, it’s critical work that impacts kids, families, friends, seniors, co-workers, and neighbors.

2. Values are not just words on a slide.

If you’ve been reading along the last 6 months, you’ve heard me say that my dad taught me how much values matter in work and that integrity is everything. We built official values that anyone can see. Bringing them to life is the hard part.

When clients don’t align with our values, we’ve turned the work down. Saying no to the wrong work is part of what lets us keep saying yes to the right work, consistently, for 9 years.

Integrity means having difficult conversations by phone, not email, because that’s how a person should be treated even if it’s uncomfortable or hard. That’s how honesty and real relationships are formed.

I’m so grateful to my dad for teaching me these lessons, and I think about them often (including this morning, when the tears just kept coming thinking of him).

3. Trusting people is hard. Building a culture is harder.

I built this business as someone who is, by nature, pretty risk-averse. My CPA background didn’t exactly push me toward being a wild gambler. Yup, if you didn’t know this, I started my career working as a financial statement auditor at Deloitte. Once a CPA, always a CPA – I might have been a little TOO excited when I recently solved a math problem and it all “checked” … anyone relate??

Once I had a roommate change something just to see if I would notice it (and yes, I know you’re wondering – I noticed it right away!). I’m insanely detail-oriented and being able to hand things over to other people, trusting they’d care about the work the way I do (because I care SO much about every single client), took real effort. Mistakes have happened, and I’ve had to learn to be OK with that. While my dad taught us to do your best, he was also a perfectionist and that has carried on down. We’re all still learning right?

This was a challenge I’m glad I embraced … and you get to benefit from all the amazing services and content we produce. I’ve been asked often, who does all the content you produce?

I’m lucky to now have a team who helps put together our awesome 24+ downloadable guides and helps write some of our blogs. I do look at every single piece of content we produce, and this lovely newsletter you’re reading is written by yours truly. I’m the one who comes up with the crazy ideas – what about this topic? This webinar? This graphic?

It’s pretty cool to see others on the team getting just as obsessive about a client’s experience as I am or about whether we’ve labeled the terms properly in our documents. In fact, the benefit of the team is that each person brings a unique lens that collectively makes us stronger.

Building culture is one of those things that doesn’t sit on a piece of paper or a slide. We do have our values listed publicly. They come to life and culture is formed when people treat each other kindly, through the exceptional quality of our work, and the willingness to flex as the business keeps adjusting (and the laws keep shifting).

Check out this awesome collage of our Red Clover team collaborating and having fun together.

4. Priorities aren’t the same for every firm.

I’ve shared in previous newsletters that I started Red Clover Advisors for time, family, and freedom. AND of course, to help companies build and manage privacy programs. Yet all of this could have not been possible without my husband Justin at my side giving his unwavering support. He’s been my rock and deserves a special shout out. Check out this cute pic of us days before my very first Red Clover call 9 years ago!

It’s been hard to scroll on LinkedIn this past week and not see the oodles of INC 5000 posts. My goal has never been to be one of the fastest growing firms. Though I am super proud of winning a spot on the 2024 Atlanta Business Chronicle PaceSetters Fastest Growing Private Firm list.

My real focus for leading Red Clover Advisors has been on a team that can serve our clients, educate the community on privacy, and make a difference in the world, all while personally being the best mom I can be.

Each time I personally turned down participating in an event because I wanted to attend my daughter’s school function, volleyball game, or musical theatre show, it was a time I didn’t grow the business.

And I’m not going to lie, the super competitive girl in me has to constantly remind myself what my priorities are. I wouldn’t trade those in. I didn’t want to take on risks I didn’t feel comfortable with, hire someone who wasn’t the right fit, or trade what’s most important to me – my time and family.

The decisions get easier when it’s really clear what the priorities are.  

5. Know every role in your business before you outsource any of it.

A professional services firm founder wears a lot of hats. I’m basically the CFO, head of HR, marketing, sales, and also remain an active consultant. I think it’s important to actually do these activities and then figure out which ones “I don’t love” and “I’m actually bad at this and it’s draining me.”  Then I could outsource the ones that drained my energy and weren’t in my strengths, and keep the ones that are.

I know many professional services firms where the founder no longer does the very work they started the firm doing. For me, I actually like talking to clients, advising on privacy strategy, and training. I had a prospect this week ask, “Who would the team be?” This is a project my skills are perfectly suited for, so I responded, “me” and another senior consultant would help too.

I really believe continuing to consult keeps me relatable to clients instead of being removed from what they’re dealing with day to day. Since I’m hands-on doing the work, it also means I actually understand what a company needs during a prospect call and can right-size our services to what’s best for them.

6. Stay in your lane even when you could expand.

Over the years, people have asked us if we can do all kinds of work. I could have expanded into a lot of other lanes like accessibility, security, or serve as an outsourced GDPR DPO service (instead we do fractional privacy officer work, just not the very specific GDPR DPO requirement).

I feel strongly that we’re a data privacy consulting firm. This is what we do, and we do it very well.

Instead, we built relationships with people who do those things well, and we send that work their way. I LOVE sending work to other people. It fills my happy bucket to make these connections and help another person’s practice.

Just last week, I connected two privacy attorneys after I was first presented with an opportunity that I knew was a stretch for us. Instead, I’d rather make the connection and have that attorney do work best suited for them. It’s a win-win for everyone.

7. Be willing to try things, and be willing to let them flop.

We’ve tried a LOT of things that don’t always work. I built a quiz, a DIY template pack, and more marketing approaches than I could probably list from memory, and they were just OK.

She Said Privacy/He Said Security Podcast, people love!

My book, Data Reimagined Building Trust One Byte at a Time – it’s still read today!

Our annual checklist guide – people ask for it each year!

LinkedIn content – people stop me at IAPP events and say how much they appreciate how I’m making the content accessible and simple!

I’ll keep trying new things and sometimes they’ll work and other times they won’t.

Being nimble is the benefit of being a small firm.

8. Knowing how to actually take a break.

This one’s been hard for me, and honestly still is. There’s a voice in my head that says every free minute should be spent working or doing something productive.

I’ve always been “busy” ever since high school, when I was the kid working a part-time job, singing competitively, running the school newspaper, creating clubs, and studying.

The more I’ve forced myself to step back, actually step back, not just physically leave my desk while still thinking about the client email I haven’t sent, the more space my brain has had to think and be creative.

Some of my best ideas for the business have come when I’m not working like last weekend when I flew to California to meet one of my best friends from college. Walking alongside the beautiful beach is calming and a great place to think. 

I still have to talk myself into it. Rest doesn’t come naturally to me. But nine years in, I trust it more than I used to.

9. Build real, genuine relationships.

This is the one that’s hardest to explain. Since I started working, I’ve always been focused on building genuine relationships with people. I shared earlier that I love making referrals. I also like helping people, making connections, and just sharing knowledge so that they can succeed too. I’ve had so many conversations with people who have reached out, and I can tell it’s a one-way street – those never work.

The ones where we’ve learned about each other’s families, interests, and respect for knowledge are the best relationships.

I really believe that what you give will come back to you in the universe.  

The fast pace of change.

When I started Red Clover, GDPR was the thing everyone was just starting to talk about, and that’s what I focused on. CCPA didn’t exist yet. The idea of a state-by-state privacy law patchwork wasn’t even a real conversation.

9 years later, we have 144 global privacy laws, several AI regulations, and 23-plus signed state privacy laws, each with its own quirks, timelines, and definitions of things that sound like they should mean the same thing everywhere and absolutely do not.

Clients who once needed help with one framework now need someone tracking a moving map. That shift alone has reshaped what this business does, who we hire for, and what “expertise” even means in this field now.

Nine years ago I couldn’t have told you what a state attorney general’s privacy enforcement priorities looked like because it didn’t exist. Now I have the pages bookmarked, receive email alerts, and follow regulators on LinkedIn. 

The thread through all of it.

It’s REALLY hard to see that the challenges at the time eventually lead us to the path we’re meant to be on.

I couldn’t have predicted where this idea of starting a privacy consulting firm would lead.

If you made it this far, thank you. I’m genuinely appreciative of your support.

I’m grateful for the tens of thousands of connections I’ve made, the companies I’ve helped, the people I’ve trained, and for the bright future of helping companies untangle what continues to be an ever growing complex web of privacy requirements.

Happy anniversary to me and Red Clover Advisors!

Jodi

💡 When you’re ready, here’s how we can help:

⚙ Privacy Advisory & Implementation: We help companies navigate privacy requirements with confidence. Our advisory support covers strategy, operations, and real-world implementation.

⚙ Fractional Privacy Services: We provide fractional privacy leadership tailored to your needs and pace. From program development to day-to-day support, we help you build and sustain a strong privacy program.