Building Atlanta Into a Cybersecurity Empire

Intro  0:01  

Welcome to the She Said Privacy/He Said Security podcast. Like any good marriage, we will debate, evaluate, and sometimes quarrel about how privacy and security impact business in the 21st century.

 

Jodi Daniels  0:21  

HI, Jodi Daniel here, I’m the founder and CEO of Red Clover Advisors, a certified women’s privacy consultancy. I’m a privacy consultant and certified informational privacy professional and provide practical privacy advice, overwhelmed company.

 

Justin Daniels  0:35  

Hi, Justin Daniels here and I’m still the admonished co host on this podcast. I am passionate about helping companies solve complex cyber and privacy challenges during the lifecycle of their business. I am the cyber quarterback helping clients design and implement cyber plans as well as help them manage and recover from data breaches.

 

Jodi Daniels  0:58  

And this episode is brought to you by Red Clover Advisors. We help companies comply with data privacy laws and establish customer trust so that they can grow and nurture integrity. We work with companies in a variety of fields, including technology, fast e commerce, media, and professional and financial services. In short, we use data privacy to transform the way companies do business. Together, we’re creating a future where there’s greater trust between companies and consumers. This episode is brought to you by where’s my terminal Red Clover Advisors, we help companies comply with data privacy laws, and establish customer trust so that they can grow and nurture integrity. We work with companies in a variety

 

Justin Daniels  1:44  

of fields. Today, it’s all about where we live, Atlanta and the region because today, our guest is Grant Wainscott, who is the vice president of ecosystems at the Metro Atlanta Chamber. Grant leads a team of professional global economic developers who retain, expand, and attract new jobs and investment to the metro Atlanta region. He is originally from Seattle and has lived all over the world, though. I personally want to welcome Grant as I have traveled all over the world with Grant from Israel to London, to San Francisco. And what he and his team have done in Atlanta is amazing. So Grant, welcome to our show with me in the Giggler.

 

Grant Wainscott  2:31  

Yeah, well, I’ll get giggling man. No, it’s a real pleasure. I’ve been wanting to come on the show ever since you started. And finally, after asking for the 500th time, I guess you’ve bumped another guest to get me in.

 

Jodi Daniels  2:44  

Was it? Were you traveling with Grant? When you were stuck in Amsterdam and thought it was a cyber attack? That was with Jorge I was I didn’t know if it was also part

 

Grant Wainscott  2:52  

of the fun, slightly older and shorter and definitely bald or young man than me, but but still with the Chamber.

 

Jodi Daniels  3:01  

Okay, well, Grant, we always like to start with how people got to where they are. So if you can share a little bit about your career journey, that would be really helpful.

 

Grant Wainscott  3:11  

Yeah, sure, who I don’t think anybody at least back when I was in school wakes up and thinks, you know what, I’m going to be an economic developer, I’m going to be a chamber, you know, a chamber leader. Usually, you’re in business. And in my case, I was I was with I have an international trade background and was with a technology company. And I was our chamber Rep. You know, everybody, every company, you know, who’s the one that’s go to the chamber lunches, and, you know, sit on the chamber committees, and that was me, you know, being a young leader and brewed actually love it. And, you know, from from being involved with the chamber for almost a decade, ended up really falling in love with economic development and, and after having had a couple of my own small, very small tech companies. I guess if I was all that good at being an entrepreneur, I’d still be doing it but really enjoyed the journey but didn’t realize just how much help was out there until I started to get into the chamber world. And so kind of transition into doing international economic development to help companies and communities, you know, connect and grow markets around the world. So, you know, college was a international trade, Major, speak a few languages and spent a lot of time and living in working around the world. And now Atlanta is home and I were never leaving. We absolutely love it.

 

Jodi Daniels  4:32  

We’ve been in Atlanta a long time that according to Atlantans, we would be native or not like a digitally native, but we’ve been here a long time. Well,

 

Justin Daniels  4:43  

I think you should start up the first question since it relates to a company you are very familiar

 

Jodi Daniels  4:49  

is true. So Atlanta based one trust that we literally drive by every single day and I use every single day for a variety of clients. is one of our Atlanta local unicorns. So what do you think has transpired to really allow Atlanta to be such a premier place for technology companies? And especially in the privacy space?

 

Grant Wainscott  5:15  

Right, that’s, that’s a huge question there. You know, this is one of those kind of 30 year overnight success stories, we’ve been a tech, you know, Center for a long time a, I think we we’ve been most known, of course, as being, you know, kind of a corporate headquarter, you know, town region, you know, third largest concentration of Fortune 500, and the world’s busiest airport, all the things that you need, really for a global market. But I think we’ve had some really fascinating tech successes over the years. So much of that funding, though, came from outside the region. And so we started to see a really significant shift, probably a decade or so ago, when when, when more funds were looking to park money in the region. And once you can get enough investment, you know, through a particular fund to justify having a you know, a partner and LP or some kind of an office here, it starts to really change the dynamic, it’s not just like the film industry, the screen, if you if a movie comes into town, and shoots, and then you know, goes away, and does all the post and everything else back somewhere else, when you can start to finally get that industry setting up shop here and doing the, you know, the scoring in the post production and investment and writers rooms. Well, that’s the same thing really, with with the technology industry for us, you know, we now have so much of that ecosystem. There are so many, you know, accelerator and incubator programs, there’s, you know, there’s local funds, family offices, and PE, you know, are finally, you know, really paying attention to things other than the commercial real estate industry and all that kind of, you know, the investments that were safe over the year building shopping centers and retirement homes, and that was awesome, you know, but this is, this is a massive global city and almost 7 million people in the MSA. And so that really, you know, tends to require a shift to kind of 2.0 you know, what is it that, you know, how are we going to start to really look at that growth. So, you know, if you grow all of this talent, and that’s a big thing for us, right? 65 colleges and universities, with almost 300,000 students, you get this talent pipeline, that then allows a company like one trust, to be able to hire locally, scale rapidly, you know, finding the right investment to help you take those next steps. But you’ve got to be in a market where you know, you have access to customers, right, you can get all the money you want in the valley, or in New York or Boston, you’re gonna blow through it three times faster than you are here. But you still have to have a customer, right? You can’t just you can’t just survive on on, on, you know, capital influx your entire time, you’ve got to have revenue, revenue means customers, and when you’re in a market like Atlanta, you’ve got customers. So I think there’s lots of things that went to the one trust success. But you know, the more unicorns we’re seeing, the more attention that drives. And then of course, you know, when there is a, when there is a, you know, a capital event, m&a activity, or sale, a lot of that money then goes back into the community, you know, those, those early, you know, the early team, you know, that’s to being able to cash out at that point, they’re starting their own companies, kind of like, you know, the PayPal mafia, or, you know, some of the other, you know, stories when you have a big liquidity event, and all of those founders and co founders, and, you know, VPS, they create their own companies. So that spillover effect is really helped us grow, I think, a lot of the available, you know, kind of entrepreneurial minds.

 

Justin Daniels  8:50  

So, Grant, where I want to drill into a little bit with you today is you and I have been all over the world talking about cybersecurity from San Francisco, London, Tel Aviv. And a lot of the origins of the industry and our town traced its way back to internet security system. And just love to get your perspective on some of the efforts that we’ve been doing over the last several years in cybersecurity and how that has been evolving from your

 

Grant Wainscott  9:18  

perspective. Great question, Justin. Well, you know, we’re certainly not the only city in the world, in our state in the world that that has an advanced economic development engine. I’d like to think we’re the best of course, I’m biased but you first of all, you can’t you can’t sell a region and you can’t grow a region without amazing partners. You know, you all this is it’s really important for us to be able to have, you know, the the legal and accounting and consulting thought leadership behind you. It’s not just the brands but it’s also it’s the market makers and the market movers and the people that can help tell that story. You know, where the, you know, the chambers and the economic develop people were You know, we can be seen as the happy smiley, you know, every day’s 72 and sunny, you know, Salesforce, but they really, you know, in order to grow a region, company wants to hear from people like you, or they want to hear from the experts, they want to hear, you know, the good, the bad and the ugly, and you’ve got to be honest and transparent. And so, you know, I think one of the unique things, you know, especially Justin, that you and I have been working on for so long, is how do you take that authentic story on the road to markets that really mirror what we see, you know, us being so if we’re going to be, you know, in Manchester, right, you know, at that point, you know, Atlanta is to New York, as Manchester is to London, right? We can relate to Manchester, UK, because, you know, they are, they’re working, you know, to, to, to create their own entity and their own brand and being the same met, you know, amazing standalone, you know, region, we’ve taken those markets around the world and found where we have commonalities where there’s trade, where there’s cultural understanding, you know, where, where there’s, you know, things that we have in common, we our ports are working together, our airports are working together, our cybersecurity, you know, communities are working together, and our national governments are working together, you know, how do you how do you find those connection points and, and the inflection points, frankly, that are going to open the door for much more than just companies doing business, but it’s really drawing those kinds of communities together. And that’s been a unique approach. I’ve worked in a lot of and represented a lot of regions around the country. That’s something unique that that I’ve only really found in Atlanta. And, you know, some people will say, at Southern hospitality, I don’t look at Atlanta as the South I look at Atlanta as being as this huge global city that just happens to be in the southeast us, you know, but we could, you know, we could, we could exist anywhere with the infrastructure that we have. But we are most successful because we are in the southeast us. And, you know, and Justin, you, you know this as well as anybody, you know, when you hit the road, it’s one thing to go to San Francisco or Boston people know Atlanta, you know, but when you are in Tel Aviv, or when you’re in Singapore, when you’re in you know, London, Atlanta isn’t always in Georgia may not always be the first thing people think of our company thinks of. So that makes our job even more important than we’re on the road telling that story, making sure people really understand, you know, why this is such a special area and why we’d like them to consider setting up shop here.

 

Justin Daniels  12:31  

I guess what I was also trying to say Grant is, when I listen to you talk about this, you’ve taken a longer term strategy, meaning it’s not just one trip to Manchester, but it’s constantly going back to Amsterdam, and, and fostering that relationship, because it’s almost like one day I was reading an article in Forbes about Atlanta and our tech ecosystem and how we become a top tier place. And then I thought about it. It’s from all of those trips that you would go on with me and all the other people and every one of those little successes is now positive torrent. Because, you know, we’ll talk a little bit but I had a recent referral to you about FinTech. He’s like, Oh, I know that Atlanta is the place to be, well, three or four years ago, we were still big in FinTech, but people didn’t know. And it’s like, we’ve had this big coming out party. But I guess all the work that you’ve done in your team and others behind the scenes is what it’s facilitated. Atlanta’s rise I mean, we’re really on par Now with anywhere you want to be in the country, and we have a lower cost of living although it is going up.

 

Grant Wainscott  13:34  

Well, scientists success, you know, you can’t you don’t want to be the cheapest market. Right? That’s, that’s, that’s not necessarily a good thing. You want to be a cost effective market where you can find priced right talent, but no, I mean, just you make a good point, it really is. It’s not a one and done. You can’t just you know, throw billboards up and say, Hey, we’re this, we’re this great tech place, or, you know, one article is nice, but it’s a, it’s a defined strategy. That is the long game. And and you have to have, it’s not a marketing slogan, you actually have to, you have to prove that you can do what you’re trying to sell other people that you can do, you know, if we didn’t have all those universities cranking out this amazing talent, we didn’t have the world’s busiest airport, we weren’t the, you know, third largest concentration of fortune five in the hemisphere, if we if we didn’t have this, this amazing ecosystem here to be able to sell. It’s a lot harder to convince people to take you seriously. And it is it’s the relationship building. I think that’s one thing communities and governments don’t think enough about is consistency, consistency of messaging consistency of, of being there, not just showing up and saying Yeah, we’d love to do business, you know, with all of your companies Amsterdam. Well, you’ve got to say, well, Amsterdam, how can we actually help you? Let’s make sure that our companies when they’re looking to come to Europe, you know that they get a foothold and we’ve got amazing partners with consulates and foreign trade offices, the Georgia Department of Economic Development, Georgia Power invest Atlanta, all these state, regional and local counties and chambers. You know, in in metro Atlanta you call one of us, you get all of us and that’s that’s a special sauce. Frankly.

 

Jodi Daniels  15:17  

I love the stat about the fortune 500 companies when I was at Emory, an undergrad student, I used to lead the admissions tours walking backwards. And I always used to comment about that, that.

 

Grant Wainscott  15:29  

You you. That job amazes me frankly, I’ve been on with a college, junior in college and a senior in high school about to go to college. I’ve been on more tours like it ever thought I wanted to go on. I don’t know how you figure out how to walk backwards, still make sense? Not trip over and keep people’s attention. So good on you.

 

Jodi Daniels  15:49  

I love that job. It was my favorite job. I loved doing the tours. I was really proud of Emory. I liked Atlanta, I wanted to welcome people I’ve always said, I’m your best or worse PR I really like something. I’m gonna help you and if I don’t, people are also going to think

 

Grant Wainscott  16:08  

there’s such a pretty campus and it is not a flat campus either. So to be able to, you know, to be able to do that to her backwards. My daughter, my both my kids went to Druid Hills High and and you know, right on the edge of of Emory’s campus. So we’ve got a special place in our heart for Emory. But yeah,

 

Jodi Daniels  16:23  

that’s a great campus. It’s like a college within a major city, which is part of what you mean, though, I came to Atlanta sight unseen. I had never set foot on campus. And until I got here, and also a new appreciation for how far north Atlanta really is in Georgia.

 

Grant Wainscott  16:39  

Where’d you grow up? Where did you come,

 

Jodi Daniels  16:41  

I went, I grew up in Connecticut. And in high school, my parents and I moved to South Florida. So I came from down there. And Atlanta was not nearly as cold as the north and it was much closer to them. And that’s kind of how I found it. Life is

 

Grant Wainscott  16:56  

awesome. Everybody has an Atlanta story. Like No, it’s it’s rare that you are in a room with more than you know, 10% natives, which, frankly, is one of the things I love the most about the city. And I think the reason this region, I think the reason that that we have open minds. And you know, we I live near Decatur, so kind of in town, and everybody in our neighborhood now 10 years ago was kind of homogenous, and, you know, now, everybody is from somewhere else in the world we hear, you know, I can hear saxophones at night, I can hear somebody singing opera, you know, there’s a Sopranos with the opera that lives near us. You know, we they’re in the film industry, or they’re in that, you know, they’re an engineer cybersecurity company. It’s just it’s a, it’s such a dynamic place. And all these, you know, thoughts and voices and opinions and cultures from around the world that really made us this awesome melting pot.

 

Jodi Daniels  17:46  

Why I remember when I was still an undergrad, and I was talking to someone who was an Emory graduate, and they had said they were here for 10 years, I thought that’s so long, 10 years. I mean, that’s just ancient, and I have loved more than double now. I’ve been in Atlanta, and now I’m now I’m that person. But, you know, as you were talking about the different ecosystems that were here, cybersecurity and privacy companies have had a variety of different success stories. Justin, you mentioned ISS, we’ve had one trust, we have secure works, we have, you know, a number of different companies that have kind of come through. And with cybersecurity as such an essential and important topic for CEOs. What do you see as the future for Atlanta, and that ecosystem?

 

Grant Wainscott  18:37  

Wow, I mean, sky’s the limit. I mean, it’s one of those industries where you hate to have to need it, but boy, do you need it, and you’re glad when you when you have a concentration? I you know, I think that what, what amazes me and what I think of the kind of the future for this, this region is, as I said before, you know, we were this massive fortune five, you know, headquarters community, global city, but but we’ve been we’ve kind of been corporate cyber, you know, for for a long time and, and, you know, let’s see, Justin God was it three years ago, almost four years ago, when when Cyber Command Center was was officially announced and and we we kind of relocated the militaries least the Army’s you know, principle, cybersecurity, you know, forces and efforts to the state and, you know, an hour and a half, only an hour and a half away from, you know, this massive major Metro, and I don’t think that was wasn’t just politics, right. There was there was a real reason for this. You know, we are the country’s financial, you know, backbone right there. We’re transactionality this is where 70% of the country’s you know, credit gift, gift card, credit and debit swipes. come through, you know, there’s that’s a huge piece of critical infrastructure. You know, we’re pipeline we’re power we’re airport reports. So To be part of the country’s, you know, critical infrastructure as big as Georgia is, you know, we really we needed that that military, you know, cyber mindset. And so to have that kind of cyber highway between, you know, the military, cyber, and this corporate cyber that we’ve seen in Atlanta, I think, brings a whole new realm of possibilities for our cyber companies as they grow. But, you know, just as you and I were talking about yesterday, with all these brands here, and everybody needing to be secure, and and, you know, everybody realizes, you know, we don’t know everything, and we need consultants, we need, you know, good solutions to be able to protect our companies and our IP, and our infrastructure. The more you know, the more companies that we have, like those that you mentioned, God that are growing here, it’s one thing to buy a software suite from a company that’s, you know, somewhere in the world, it’s something else as a CEO, when you know, the CEO of the company that you are, you know, that you’re that you’re, you know, Cisco or CIO is, is, you know, intimately engaged with, and it’s more like a partnership, not just a vendor relationship, that’s when you start to change a community’s resiliency, I think.

 

Justin Daniels  21:13  

No, so Grant, got a building on that idea. I guess one of the things I wanted to ask is, in our region with all the different industries we have, and that cyber and privacy overlay all of that, um, what do you think our region can do to build better proactive collaboration in the cyber and privacy space, because as a country, we are really starting to grapple with that, particularly in light of ransomware, to which our region is certainly no stranger.

 

Grant Wainscott  21:46  

I think every region around the world is struggling with that same question. If they aren’t, now, they will be in you know, six or 12 months. You know, I think, I think some of the secret sauce here that we that we continue to leverage and will need even rely more on is, is the fact that this is it’s a really big, small city or a small, you know, mega propolis, you know, depending on how you look at it, it this is, this is still a community as big as global as we are, where people will pick up the phone. And, and, and, and pick up the phone, right? for your call, or your email or your text. CEOs are working more closely together than they ever have. And, and learning from the challenges that, you know, brands have gone through as they, as they’ve, you know, had ransomware attacks or had other, you know, security issues, being able to, to not just share, you know, learning but really have that support network. And, you know, just when we were the early days of the efforts with Jorge and, and and, you know, well, you know, with your firm, to really bring cyber experts into the community to share military, corporate, you know, civilian cyber, to be able to share, and learn and bring in you’ll the FBI, and bring in Homeland Security and all these all these experts that that are there for when the worst happens, right, and having that network that that speed dial list that you were able to help bring our community, I think is critical. So you know, the work from the Chamber’s perspective, you know, the work that we’re trying to do is making sure that more of those connections are made that more companies not only understand, you know, what software is there, what solutions are there. And you do that by bringing some of the biggest conferences in the world here, if you can, or if we go on the road somewhere, we’re bringing our corporate community with us to make sure they’re staying abreast of what the latest offerings are. But it’s also making sure they have those one on one relationships and that the government feels like they have a support network in the in the corporate community. It can’t always be about just trying to get a government contract to provide a you know, cyber security for whatever government it has to be. And this is what I love about you know, metro Atlanta, it’s, it’s our company stepping up to protect ourselves, right. You know, City of Atlanta is us whether you live in any part of the state or not, right, this is this is the capital city. So what’s good for Atlanta is good for all of us. What’s good for you know, making in Columbus is good for all of us. So I love seeing that cooperation. There’s a lot more than we can be doing, though, of course, you know, so our work is our work is clear cut. And that’s that’s building bridges and making sure that that it’s taken seriously at all levels, frankly.

 

Jodi Daniels  24:36  

Well, Grant, thank you so much for sharing, though. All of your insights and helping us understand kind of how Atlanta grew from where we were and what we’re positioned to be able to do. I liked your comment before about how the sky’s the limit. We believe that here it seems like all of these little pieces across the city are all adding up the view what will be a catalyst for just the next decade. Last the cup?

 

Grant Wainscott  25:07  

We certainly hope so well, you know, we, we have challenges like any any region does, but if there’s any, any region that can step up and address them and be honest and open about it. And you know, we’ve seen that with our national dialogue on race and equity and inclusion, and on so many other fronts, you know, if anybody’s going to solve the problem and address it and get everybody at the table, it’s Atlanta. I mean, that’s what we were, that’s what we were built on and what we’re known for, and what’s going to be important that we continue to all be around the same table.

 

Jodi Daniels  25:35  

After spending so much time with Justin, all of these cybersecurity trip, what have you learned? What is your best cyber tip that you can offer? Our audience?

 

Grant Wainscott  25:44  

I thought you’re gonna say what have you learned about Justin, that we should?

 

Jodi Daniels  25:49  

cocktail conversation?

 

Grant Wainscott  25:50  

That’s the cocktail conversation? Oh, gosh, that’s a great question. You know, I, I would say, knowledge is knowledge is came Well, there’s two things, knowledge is king, understanding where the, that you are vulnerable, period, no matter how safe you think you are, that you are vulnerable, and be willing to admit that, you know, maybe without a bunch of lawyers in the room, but being able to admit that, but then also having people on your side who can solve that problem, right. And the time, the time to address it is not when a breach has happened, the time to address is now before the breach happens and making sure you know, you’ve got partners, like you all, you know, already established, you understand the business. And so if and when something does happen, that there’s a plan, right? And that you can, that you can address it quickly and responsibly and not be you know, not be caught off guard. And there’s just, there’s too much help. There’s too many smart people, there’s too many solutions for a company to step back and say, I just wasn’t aware. I didn’t know you know, you know, and if you don’t know, you need to find somebody else, you know, to be to be heading up that effort.

 

Jodi Daniels  27:02  

And love how you phrase that really great advice,

 

Justin Daniels  27:05  

though, Grant when you’re not out there, beating the economic drum for all of us in the region. What do you like to do for fun besides pro besides saute lobsters and they get over the fence and somehow I get blamed for having done

 

Grant Wainscott  27:23  

Oh, man, well, just you know, I love I love to cook I’m by no means a chef. But I I just adore cooking. We do it as part of our kind of signature sauce. When we entertain around the world as opposed to taking down a big, you know, restaurant or or, you know, conference center we’d much rather get a, you know, an Airbnb warehouse or, you know, we’ve entertained and oh my gosh, windmills and light houses and yachts and you know, you name it fields and we just we like to be authentic. But I just I love cooking. You know, we bring products with us. You know, Georgia, Georgia, Georgia products food and booze with us. So cooking is a big thing. I guess my my therapist couch answer to that would be Legos. I’m afraid I’m a I’m a 50 year old closet Lego hoarder and and that’s where I retreat at night with a glass of wine when I just need to, you know, not beat my economic development bongos anymore.

 

Jodi Daniels  28:22  

Well, thank you so much if they want to if people want to learn more about the great work that you do and connect with you as well, where should we send them?

 

Grant Wainscott  28:32  

Great question. So MetroAtlantaChamber.com is who I work for. That’s our principal site, I would also encourage you to check out Choose ATL, that’s really a fantastic resource for people wanting to learn more, whether you’re here in the region already, or whether you’re just thinking, you know, what’s the vibe in the city I get it might be great for business, but you know, what kind of neighborhood might I fit into? Or, you know, what do people do on the weekends? You know, where are the jobs, Choose ATL is a great site for that. And if you’re, if you’re really into because we talked about a bunch of different clusters, if you’re if you’re on the FinTech side and want to learn more about FinTech and financial privacy and security and all the great things going on in transactionality. FinTech atlanta.org is another fantastic resource. But you know, please reach out on LinkedIn. It’s just Grant Wainscott. Love to hear from everybody and see how we can help and keep everybody plugged in. And, you know, you guys just need to keep doing what you’re doing. This is a great podcast, and you got a great following and have had some great guests. So thank you for finally answering my 74 letters for being on.

 

Jodi Daniels  29:35  

We are we are delighted I’ll blame that I took 74 on this guy over here.

 

Grant Wainscott  29:42  

So well My pleasure.

 

Outro  29:48  

Thanks for listening to the She Said Privacy/He Said Security podcast. If you haven’t already, be sure to click subscribe to get future episodes and check us out on LinkedIn. See you next time.