Do you have (or endorse) things like ping pong and foosball tables at the office?

Of course we all know the benefit of exercise, the need for an occasional break from the desk, the usefulness of fun bonding with colleagues at every level above or below our own, and even (especially?) the joy of finding in-the-moment focus and flow during sport.

But do you or your staff really need one more thing to distract you from, um, “work”?

Ping pong and foosball tables mushroomed into the workplace in the late-90s tech boom. ( In fact, I lost my subleased office when the primary leaseholder decided they needed my office for their ping pong table.)  I understand that companies needed every possible lure to get people to come draw a salary off their VC funds.

But I also remember what my friend Tom Pincince (then CEO of Brix Networks) once said about work at a startup: “When someone’s spouse calls the office looking for a husband or wife who has been working 80 hours a week and is never home for dinner or around for the kids’ soccer game, I don’t want to tell them, ‘Just a moment — I think he’s playing ping pong.’”