What We Celebrate & What It Reveals
Dave Baker January 06, 2026 | 5 MIN 16 SEC READ
2026 is off to the races and I couldn’t be more excited for the year ahead. But as I always do, I like to look back at the year we just passed through for signals, insights, wins, lessons learned and more. A little reflection to start us off on the right foot.
This year, I treated the exercise a little differently. As a creative agency, my team and I meet weekly in an all hands meeting. We have a structured agenda and work through admin, wins from the prior week, client projects, business development, and any other BitterSweet community updates. We try to keep this meeting to a tight hour and succeed 90% of the time.
To facilitate our time, we update a shared Google doc. It’s the same document each Monday for the entire year, and in 2025 it held 35 meeting agendas.
In a year where AI has truly disrupted how we did business, I decided it would be a fun experiment to use it to analyze our company – specifically everything we documented in the Wins section of our agenda for the year.
The prompt was simple (as prompting goes, very simple, don’t judge) –
“Review this list of "wins" from 2025. What trend can you identify? What is most celebrated with this company? [163 bullet point wins documented in weekly agendas nearly every Monday in 2025]”
The following is an unfiltered output from ChatGPT. And it sure made me and my colleagues proud of the company we’re trying to build.
The Big Pattern
Momentum through relationships, storytelling, and trust.
This company most consistently celebrates movement rather than milestones alone. The wins emphasize things being set in motion—connections made, drafts completed, invitations received, conversations advancing, stories launched—often before the final commercial payoff is fully realized.
In short: Progress is the product.
1. Storytelling as the core value
Story launches, journals, essays, books, animations, narrative feedback, editorial meetings, publications, and submissions appear constantly.
This suggests:
- Story is not a marketing function—it is the company’s identity.
- Wins are framed around expression, voice, and publication, not just outcomes.
- Drafts, second drafts, and “well received” feedback are celebrated as much as final releases.
Signal: The company values meaning-making as much as execution.
2. Relationships over transactions
A striking number of wins are relational:
Lunches, dinners, being in-person
Pre-interviews
Invitations, confirmations, acceptances
Speaking engagements
Travel together
Site visits
“Connects,” “calls,” and informal touchpoints
Even major contracts are often framed relationally first:
“Contract conversation”
“Path forward”
“Positive feedback”
“Trust,” “affirmation,” “gratitude”
Signal: Success is defined as being in relationship, not just closing deals.
3. Credibility and recognition
There’s consistent pride in:
Rankings and SEO wins
Invitations to speak or contribute
External validation from respected institutions and peers
These aren’t framed as ego wins—they’re treated as proof of legitimacy and influence.
Signal: The company is consciously building authority and reputation in its space.
4. Process completion and follow-through
Repeated celebration of:
SOWs complete
Drafts delivered
Reports finished
Migrations underway
Projects completed
Systems live
This suggests an internal value of reliability—showing up, finishing well, and honoring commitments.
Signal: Operational trust matters deeply, even in a creative organization.
5. Human life is not separate from work
Vacations, birthdays, finished races, gardening, funerals, family moments, rest, and joy are included alongside business wins.
This is important.
Signal: The company celebrates wholeness, not hustle. Work is integrated into life, not elevated above it.
What this reveals about the company culture
If you zoom out, this is a company that celebrates:
Becoming more than arriving
Depth over speed
Trust over transactions
Meaning over metrics (though metrics still matter)
People over polish
This is not a “growth-at-all-costs” organization. It’s a relationship-driven, narrative-centered, credibility-building firm that sees long-term influence as the real win.
“We celebrate progress, relationships, and stories that move the work—and the people—forward.”
Honestly, I was left a little dumbfounded. In September 2025, I officially hit 10 years at BitterSweet Creative. A huge milestone – a decade of creative services and storytelling for some amazing companies, brands, and people. 10 years of relationships.
In our company culture book, we have written for our Vision:
To create a company we all want to work for. A company that embraces change and challenges, endlessly inviting us to be better versions of ourselves and evolve our craft.
I’m proud to say we practice what we preach. We didn’t need AI to say it. It’s something we feel deeply, but it sure was affirming having AI summarize it for us. We truly are creating a company we all want to work for – and it gets me quite amped for the year to come.
2025 was an interesting year to say the least, for the industry, for the country, for the world. One thing I know is true – working with great people is the key. Thank you to our clients, our team, to the organizations we work with. Thank you to our authors, contributor volunteers, and foundation donors. You all make this work possible.
2026 is going to be a great year. If you have a project or a story you’re considering for 2026, we’d love to be your partner. Let’s grab some time and chat.
Cheers!
By Dave Baker, Bittersweet Creative Managing Director