In this episode of 5 Minutes With Andy, Virtual, Inc. CEO Andy Freed shares why having fun at work is serious business—and a core part of his leadership strategy for building trust, inspiring creativity, and driving results.

Andy discusses:

• Why fun should be part of your company values and leadership approach.
• How prioritizing fun in the workplace can strengthen teams and spark innovation.
• Practical ways to weave fun into your culture—and create a place people want to be.

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Hi. Welcome to Five Minutes With Andy. My name is Andy Freed. I'm the CEO of Virtual, Incorporated. For the last 25 years, we've been helping organizations that are forming, growing and changing as they make their mark on the world.

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You know, we run this company with nine values that we have painted on the wall right outside my office. But for me, the one that is so important is the last one, which is have fun. And I think that for so many organizations, they think that it's all about business. It's all about making sure you get the job done and they forget the value of having some fun.

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I spend more time with my coworkers than just about anybody else on the planet. And when I think about work and think about the things that we've done, well, I used to think that work was going to be like it was on The Flintstones, that 5:00 would come around, I'd slide down the dinosaur, and I'd want to ride home as fast as I can.

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Now, I'll tell you, when I think about work, I think about things like the contests we've had here of seeing if we can throw stuffed animals off of our six story balcony, into a little target down on the first level.

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I think about chair spinning contests and how many times you can spin around in a chair without touching the ground. See, I'm still pretty good at that right now. But things like that are different. They're fun. My out-of-office messages every year have become a big part of our brand. I started putting these out many, many years ago as little jokes and poems and quizzes. Then eventually they became videos. Eventually they became really long videos.

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And all of those things, more than anything, they were all about fun, and they're all about just creating an environment where it wasn't just you were happy to be doing the work, but you were happy to be there and happy to be around different people because when you look at that, and in my experience, has shown that when people are loose, when people are enjoying each other's company, when they're smiling, they're more ready to go the extra mile for their clients. They're more ready to go the extra mile for their team. They're more likely to come up with creative ideas that can change things and help make that mark on the world.

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So fun isn't just something at Virtual that we do on the side. Fun is something we take very, very seriously. And it's something which I think is an important part of every workplace and something that everyone should be thinking about.

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And remember, just when you thought it was safe to go back to work again, you can check out a YouTube channel with all of my out-of-office messages. Make sure you check them out. I guarantee you’ll get a laugh.

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So, if you want to have some fun, come work with us. And if you want to have some more fun and learn about things, make sure you like or subscribe to this so you can see more Five minutes With Andy in the future. Thanks a lot.