Bunk Beds! There’s So Much Room for Activities!
"Can we turn our beds into bunk beds?!" After recently watching the movie “Step Brothers” again, it got me thinking about the fun environment we have at Egnyte.When I first interviewed at Egnyte, I saw many of the signs of a pre-IPO tech company in Silicon Valley - open, collaborative desk layouts, ping pong and foosball tables in the break room, and makeshift targets drawn on whiteboards peppered with Nerf darts. All the signs that in this office, we work hard AND play hard.
While the Nerf phase of Egnyte had its heyday - an arms race culminating in an office-wide, department-led (Engineering & Products v. Sales & Marketing) war that left no survivors, a more consistent form of entertainment has emerged in its stead. A group of us have started weekly sports getaways, where we get out of the office and make the long, arduous trek to the school two doors down to play soccer, ultimate frisbee, and basketball every Tuesday and Friday. And although everyone approaches it in their own way - be it exercise, competition, befriending colleagues, playing the game for the game's sake, or just having something to look forward to during the week - that variety is surpassed only by the consistent enthusiasm brought to the activity of choice, from both regulars and newbies alike.Over Mother's Day weekend this year, I mentioned to my mom that we started this. She said, "People in my generation built their lives around their work; people in your generation build their work around their lives."She pointed out a definite shift here; my parents grew up in a time where life revolved around the nine-to-five; from it came the routine that dictated the rest of their day to day. With the advent and expansion of computational technology, our generation can build our routine from the things we do outside the office.Where and when the work gets done does not matter quite as much if you have the tools to work from anywhere, anytime. Lucky for us, that is as simple as “eating our own dog food.” With this change of routine, what used to be a clear separation between work and play has merged into a venn diagram of sorts, still keeping some necessary boundaries between the two while opening up the common ground necessary to coexist. Work does not have to stop when leaving the office and play does not have to stop upon arrival.I get to come to work with the same playful spirit and competitive passion naturally brought to the soccer field, basketball court, bowling alley, and ping pong table, with the flexibility to apply them in a manner that best suits my work habits. And like switching to bunk beds, this leaves so much room for activities.
