The Heart of Whiteboard Has a Seat at the Table

Some of the most important work at Whiteboard happens around a breakfast table.

Peg cooks for our team. People gather, eat, talk, and begin their day together. It is a familiar rhythm, and familiarity can make something extraordinary easy to take for granted.

But when I think about the heart of Whiteboard, I keep coming back to that table.

Eric and I have spent years thinking about what kind of creative agency we want to build. The work matters deeply to us. So do the people doing it, the people entrusting us with it, and the way we treat one another along the way. Over time, radical hospitality has become a way of naming how those things belong together.

For us, hospitality means making room for another person and taking responsibility for how they experience that room. It asks us to pay attention. To listen carefully. To consider what someone needs before we move too quickly toward what we want to accomplish.

Calling it radical raises the stakes. It means allowing care to shape the way we work, even when it requires time, attention, or effort that would be easier to spend elsewhere.

Peg gives that conviction a daily expression.

She joined Whiteboard after our acquisition of Widgets & Stone. In the years since, she has become someone many of our clients refer to as “our secret weapon.” I love that description because it recognizes something a portfolio can struggle to communicate…the way people feel in our company matters.

A meal prepared for you carries a simple message: you were considered before you arrived.

That is a powerful place to begin a working relationship.

Creative work asks a lot of people. A client brings an ambition they may have struggled to articulate, a problem they have been carrying, or a vision they need others to understand. A teammate offers an unfinished idea, knowing it could be misunderstood or rejected. Both are taking a risk.

Hospitality helps create the trust those moments require. When people feel welcome, there is more room for honesty. They can ask the question they were hesitant to ask. Admit what they do not know. Challenge an assumption. Offer an idea before it is polished enough to defend.

That is why I believe hospitality belongs at the heart of a creative agency. Our ability to understand people is central to our ability to create something meaningful for them. The way we welcome, listen, and care is part of the work itself.

In an increasingly remote-first working culture, that care requires intention.

We can collaborate across distances, and that flexibility has real value. Yet connection needs attention beyond the calendar invitation. A shared meal gives people time together that has no deliverable attached. It leaves room for a conversation to wander, for someone to be known beyond their role, for relationships to develop through ordinary repetition.

Some of our team members have moved to Chattanooga to participate in this everyday culture. That is a meaningful choice. It tells me there is something here people want to build their lives around, something they experience in the daily rhythm of being together.

It also gives us responsibility. Wherever someone works, we should be asking how they experience that same care. The table gives us a tangible example of the welcome we want to extend across every part of Whiteboard.

Peg helps us understand what that looks like in practice.

Her leadership takes the form of service, repeated day after day. Preparing breakfast is work. Sustaining a rhythm that helps people feel cared for is work. We owe her more than affection for the atmosphere she creates. We owe her recognition for the effort, consistency, and generosity that make it possible.

Eric and I can name hospitality as a conviction. Peg helps make it a lived experience.

So, Peg, thank you. Thank you for feeding our team, welcoming the people who come through our doors, and giving such steady expression to something we hold dear. Thank you for helping make Whiteboard a place people want to belong.

When clients call you our secret weapon, I hear gratitude for the care you bring to their experience of us.

I share that gratitude. You have helped us build a place where people can bring their ideas, their ambitions, and themselves to the table.

That is the kind of agency Eric and I want to keep building.

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