Peter Kang

Towards the end of last year, we had a client engagement that did not go well. Without getting into details, here’s what happened: the matter got so serious that we needed to get professional liability (errors & omissions) insurance involved. The insurance company assigned us a lawyer and there was a date set for mediation, where, hopefully, we could settle on an amount and move on. This case hung over us like a dark cloud […]

We’ve been steadily plugging away with the business–cleaning up at-risk accounts, cutting costs, launching projects, and winning new work. As I mentioned last month, my focus is ensuring that we’re executing as a company and holding each other to high standards. I think we’re headed in the right direction. About Agency Journey: This is a monthly series detailing the happenings of my agency Barrel, founded in 2006. You can find previous episodes here. Highlights A Couple of Launches […]

It’s much easier to publicly share and write about business when things are going very well. I almost thought about skipping this month (or perhaps never writing this series again) because frankly, it’s been a very tough period for me as an agency owner. The business has struggled in various ways, and there’s a measure of shame and disappointment in talking about how things haven’t been going well. However, after much reflection, I’m convinced that […]

Every now and then, I’ll take screenshots of meeting agendas and notes from exactly 1 year, 2 years, and even 3 years ago and share it with my partners. Part of the exercise is to show how similar themes pop up over and over again, but the more important reason is to reflect on how our understanding of certain topics has evolved and deepened over time. We often cringe at the shallow, surface-level understanding of […]

The last month of the year really felt like an all-out sprint at Barrel. We launched websites for clients, began new engagements, and closed new deals–a mad dash to set ourselves up for a strong start in 2022. Thankfully, we have some time to rest up and recuperate before things pick up with full force in January. About Agency Journey: This is a monthly series detailing the happenings of my agency Barrel, founded in 2006. You can […]

The past month has been a whirlwind of activity at Barrel, not to mention a number of stressful happenings at home especially with our two young ones (e.g. sleep regressions, potty training mishaps, school challenges, getting sick, etc.). I’m so grateful for Thanksgiving and the chance to rest up and slow things down a little bit before one last push to end 2021. About Agency Journey: This is a monthly series detailing the happenings of my agency […]

Missing the Office Vibe I’ve started going into the office at least once a week. It’s been a great change of pace from being in my home office (bedroom) and a chance to serendipitously run into people I know and catch up with some folks face-to-face. We decided to keep our Manhattan Barrel office even as offers to fully sublease it were available. We’ve sublet some desks and also let friends and Barrel Venture Partners […]

The Unstoppable Force of Adaptation I sometimes find it frightening to realize how quickly we as humans adapt to new situations and take for granted or get used to situations that, just days or weeks ago, seemed out of reach or a very remote possibility. This goes for good things, unfortunate things, and everything in between. We are adaptation machines. We’ve been making a great deal of progress on many fronts at Barrel. We are […]