Great agencies don’t grow in isolation

Published 14 days ago • 1 min read

As the New Year approaches, a lot of agency founders focus on what they’re going to change.

New goals. New strategies. New initiatives.

But before any of that, there’s a more foundational question worth asking:
Who are you learning from?

In this week’s AgencyHabits Podcast, Peter and Sei-Wook talk about why learning from other agency owners has been one of the biggest accelerators in their journey, and why perspective often matters more than playbooks.

Here’s what’s inside:

Why early isolation slows growth
How communities expose patterns you can’t see alone
Why “cargo cult thinking” (copying without understanding) often backfires
How to turn shared ideas into thoughtful experiments instead of reactive change

If you’re using the New Year as a reset, this episode is a strong reminder that who you learn from may matter more than what you plan to do next.

👉 Listen to the full episode here.

And if you haven’t subscribed yet, this is a good moment because the next chapter of AgencyHabits is focused on helping you build with more clarity, context, and confidence...within a community. Stay tuned.

Who are we?

Hi, we're Peter and Sei-Wook, co-founders of Barrel Holdings, a portfolio of agency businesses. We also run AgencyHabits, a resource for agency operators featuring lessons learned from our various agency businesses.

Thanks for being a subscriber. If you or anyone you know is interested in selling their agency business, please check out what types of agencies we're looking for and email hi@barrel-holdings.com.

Also: Peter posts a lot of agency content on LinkedIn, give him a follow!

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