Atlanta’s John Marshall Law School (AJMLS) proudly shares the story of alumna Mariette Clardy (’13), Assistant Vice President and Assistant General Counsel, Securities Business, at Primerica, whose 20-year career in financial services has been defined by three qualities she calls her superpowers: building, curiosity, and relationships.
At Primerica, Clardy provides strategic legal oversight for the firm’s managed accounts and retail broker-dealer platform, supporting legal execution across regulatory program development, risk, compliance and innovation.
Clardy’s path to Primerica wound through 17 years building compliance programs for broker-dealers and investment advisers, and a law practice that took her into behavioral health facilities as a mental healthcare attorney, meeting clients on-site to advocate for them from the inside. Along the way, she advised a Web3-native consulting firm on governance and regulatory strategy and immersed herself in the space as a SheFi Cohort Fellow, a member of the Bankless DAO Writers Cohort, and a member of the Atlanta Blockchain Center. Before law school, she earned a BA in classical voice from the University of Puget Sound and an MA in arts administration from the University of New Orleans, a background that still surfaces in her love of public speaking and performance.
But Clardy’s journey to the law wasn’t a straight line, and she’s been candid about that with AJMLS:
“Plenty of people will tell you they wanted to be a lawyer since they were little. I am not one of those people. I went to law school because I felt lost in my sense of direction and purpose, and I unjustly required my law school experience to help me find my way. Instead, the opposite happened. After the first semester of my second year, I dropped out due to mental health challenges, with no intention of returning.”
What brought her back, she says, was community, classmates, and a CEO who encouraged her to finish what she started. She did, and the habits she built along the way became the foundation of her career:
“It showed me who I was in a classroom… I didn’t have the luxury of slacking off. I asked a ton of questions, and when that wasn’t enough, I spent countless hours outside my professors’ offices waiting to ask more.”
That same curiosity, she says, eventually turned closed doors into direction:
“[It] required me to ask ‘what if?’ I followed that curiosity and built a path in-house, where my skills, my years of consulting, and my strengths give me a unique advantage to add value.”
A lawyer living with bipolar depression, Clardy speaks openly about her mental health journey, building the representation she didn’t see for women of color in the legal profession. She serves on the boards of the Association of Corporate Counsel Georgia Chapter and NAMI Central Georgia, is a member of the State Bar of Georgia’s Center for Lawyer Wellbeing, and is a member of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Inc.
Reflecting on her time at AJMLS, Clardy put it simply:
“You did not make it easy, but you were always just an email or an office hour away when I needed it. You put me on a path toward the woman, the lawyer, and the advisor I am today, and most importantly, toward someone who is proud of who she is becoming in this profession. And I have you to thank for that.”
AJMLS congratulates Mariette Clardy on her continued growth and success, and celebrates the leadership, resilience, and mentorship she brings to the legal profession.