SSP’s Director of Recruiting, Shana Perry, recently provided an update on our staffing efforts in her post SSP Fall Recruiting – Come Work with the Best! One thing she wrote stuck out to me: that SSP has a “fun environment”. Don’t all employers promote a fun environment? And what does fun really mean?

I’ve worked for a few companies over the last 25 years, and the definition of “fun” has differed. One company had a project manager who was so far over budget on his project that he asked his team to give up their per diem in order to try to help the bottom line.

His reasoning? It would be a “fun” challenge that would help all of us in the long run because, he said, the better the financials on his project, the better the chance for a bonus at the end of the year. (He was let go before the year was up. We didn’t get a bonus.)

Another company offered the promise of a “fun” company-wide Christmas Party, but then the financials didn’t work out there either. The company-wide Christmas Party was downsized to an executive-wide Christmas Party. I didn’t get to go, but I heard it was a lot of fun.

So isn’t fun a little … overrated? I mean, if recruiters were really honest, wouldn’t they say that “work hard, play hard” is only half-true? We work hard, then we work a little harder, then we go home exhausted. We don’t have enough energy for anything else.

SSP is a little different. Our Founder and President, Skye Perry, not only recognizes the importance of fun, he encourages it.

You may have heard about SSP’s famous ping-pong tournaments, or our quarterly team-building events, or the cruise we’re all going on later this week to celebrate SSP’s 10th anniversary.

All those are fun. Our fantasy football league is part of the fun as well.

In 2013, John Coleman and I founded the first-annual SSP Fantasy Football League. It was a fun diversion, and not overly competitive that first year. So John won the championship.

When it got quite a bit more competitive the second year, John was overwhelmed and I brought the championship trophy home with a 14-1 overall record.

In year three, I made an effort to give one of the new guys a chance. So Colton won. In the photo above, you can see me, Colton, and John holding on to the famed SSP trophy that goes to the winner.

In four seasons, we have grown to two leagues, 20 teams, a single winner-take-all championship, and a separate Slack channel that encourages trash-talk.

Below are the standings after Week 3. There’s no reason to show them, other than that my team (the mighty Napoleon Outlaws) is in first place. Note also that Skye (Empire of Heisenberg) is 0-3.

So, yes, it is absolutely possible to have fun at work. Join SSP before next fall and participate in our 5th season of fantasy football to find out just how much fun it is.