Offices are often labeled as the employee’s second home for many comparable reasons. As Grandma Betty Crocker may be a staple in your family, our ping pong table is a staple here at SADA. You’re probably thinking, ‘ping pong at a tech company – groundbreaking’, but let me explain: While many offices purchase a ping pong table because it is the token tech-place furniture, our table is a story twelve years in the making.
Our CFO recalled that most of the team at the time didn’t even know how to play ping pong. They taught themselves and became quite good very quickly. So good, in fact, it got competitive. This spurred the birth of the SADA Systems Ping Pong Tournament. Our employees start asking about it months in advance and the tournament has turned into a two week battle between the best of the best at the office! Ping pong is the only talk around the office for the weeks surrounding the tournament.
You would think more people would be playing wii, xbox, or watching videos on our gigantic wall of TVs, but the ping pong table wins every time. This table serves as much more than just the games that are played on it. We gather around the ping pong table every day for lunch, we enjoy cake, celebrate employee milestones, enjoy beer tastings, and use it as a focal point for our monthly socials known to us SADAians as H2’s. Back in the day, it was even used as a projector screen for the much smaller team at the time!
When candidates come to our office to interview, we discuss the usual topics of competitive salaries, great health benefits, unlimited PTO, catered meals, 401K match, etc, which are the sparkle and dazzle that make up the plethora of benefits for working at SADA Systems. The one thing more often than not that candidates comment on is the ping pong table. It’s become a centerpiece for SADA Headquarters and a symbol of our company’s roots.
I don’t think the founders could have imagined the ROI this one table would bring when they ordered it twelve years ago. Of all the purchases, this is the one that has made the most impact on the daily life around the office. Some things may be cliche, but they still do work; at least for us here at SADA!
Sakura Tekeda
People Operations Coordinator
