A version of this story was originally published in Dallas Innovates: The [Tech] Talent Issue.

A company’s office is more than just space—it’s a reflection of its culture, and one of the most important tools for attracting and retaining top talent.

Amenities such as rock-climbing walls, full bars, gyms with floor-to-ceiling views of downtown Dallas, or even a treehouse reflect a company’s personality. The unique spaces that follow serve to underscore how a company presents itself to its employees and the world. Taking care of business is great, but taking care of people is even better.

Take a look inside the local companies, large and small, giving us office envy. 

And, if you have a tip about an inspiring space, drop us a note here.

Anna Caplan, Alex Edwards, and Quincy Preston contributed to this series.

rewardStyle

Dallas global tech firm rewardStyle, founded in 2011 by Amber Venz Box and Baxter Box, pioneered an entirely new industry of marketing. The launch of the first-ever influencer-driven consumer shopping app, LIKEtoKNOW.it, in 2017 gave users the ability to instantly purchase real products in fashion, beauty, home, and family that they viewed on high-profile accounts. Today, roughly 35,000 entrepreneurs use rewardStyle to power their businesses and 4,500 retailers to leverage the influencer marketing.

Read more about rewardStyle’s headquarters—and take a virtual tour—in our Innovative Spaces.

Amber Venz Box co-founded rewardStyle with her husband, Baxter Box. [Photo: Courtesy rewardStyle]

McKesson

McKesson, a Fortune 500 company based in Irving, recently moved its headquarters campus from San Francisco to Las Colinas, where it employs more than 1,500 people. They work in a variety of fields, from operations to information technology and project management.

The company, which distributes pharmaceuticals and provides health information technology, medical supplies, and care management tools, has been named a “Most Admired Company” in the healthcare wholesaler category by Fortune, a “Best Place to Work” by the Human Rights Campaign Foundation, and a top military-friendly company by Military Friendly.

Traci Dunn, vice president, Inclusion, Diversity & Culture, says the office is designed to offer flexibility in employees’ work. [Photo: Courtesy McKesson]

McKesson promotes an open and candid workplace, and partners with such organizations as Girls in Tech, Women in Technology, and Women Business Leaders to support their initiatives and events.

[Photo: Courtesy McKesson]

[Photo: Courtesy McKesson]

Simpli.fi

Advertisers looking to target the right demographic in the right place at the right time turn to Fort Worth-based Simpli.fi, a programmatic advertising agency with engines that make ads appear in the right geo-fenced area for maximum impact. Simpli.fi was founded in 2010.

Simpli.fi’s Fort Worth office is designed for collaboration inside and out. [Photo: Courtesy Simpli.fi]

Simpli.fi has seen continued increases in geofencing campaigns. The company is working on mobile ads, over-the-top ads (video ads that run on streaming services), and web ads. Simpli.fi has more than 130,000 active daily campaigns run by more than 30,000 advertisers.

[Photo: Courtesy Simpli.fi]

Amenities inside Simpli.fi’s offices include food-related perks. Snacks are available at any time in the Bistro, and food trucks are on-site Wednesdays and Fridays. [Photo: Courtesy Simpli.fi]

Arcosa

Arcosa moved from the Stemmons corridor in Dallas to downtown in late 2018, taking nearly 40,000 square feet in Ross Tower for its new corporate headquarters. The company, a manufacturer and producer of infrastructure-related products and service, has businesses “with leading positions in construction, energy, and transportation markets with annual revenues in excess of $1B,” according to a recent job post.

[Photo: Courtesy Arcosa]

Arcosa has three principal business segments: Construction Products Group, Energy Equipment Group, and the Transportation Products Group. The Trinity Industries spinoff, a manufacturer of infrastructure-related products and services in the construction, energy, and transportation industries, offers an “employee-focused culture.”

The new headquarters features a broad mix of materials and a chrome and black motif, all of which enhances public spaces. [Photo: Courtesy Arcosa]

The Richards Group

The Richards Group is the largest independently owned advertising agency in the nation. Stan Richards, who founded the company in 1976, firmly believes that a building’s architecture enhances company culture, and that’s why the focal point of the agency is its stairwell.

During the day, the firm says the stairwell is a beehive of activity where people have meetings—on, around, and under it. For company news, good or bad, forget email. The stairwell is where all employees are able to gather for staff meetings.

Read more about The Richards Group’s headquarters, which also feature an 18th-floor gym, open architecture, and brightly lit exterior and interior.

[Photo: Courtesy The Richards Group]

ACTIVE Network

Dallas-based ACTIVE Network, the world’s largest digital marketing agency dedicated to program and race management, began in 1999 as a company that marketed 5Ks, half-marathons, and other running events. Soon, it branched out into the business of registering participants for races and helping to compile the results.

Today, ACTIVE Network’s clients also include schools, churches, and youth sports leagues, all of which need help organizing different groups of people.

Read more about ACTIVE Network’s headquarters on Harwood Street in our Innovative Spaces.

[Photo: Courtesy Active Network]

Capital One

Capital One’s sprawling 1.2-million-square-foot regional headquarters campus in Plano offers its employees many amenities that go beyond such things as a gym, cafeteria, and cafe.

A treehouse and a slide make getting down to work fun at Capital One. There’s also a mini-golf course and orange bikes that are free for associates to use. [Photo: Courtesy Capital One]

A soaring atrium offers a bright respite, featuring primary-colored art and blond wood furnishings. [Photo: Courtesy Capital One]

There’s an on-site doctor’s office to address health concerns and unique spaces to offer a change of scenery, like The Treehouse and The Garage.

The Capital One Garage is considered the “crown jewel” of the campus. Founded in 2015, the innovation hub is named after a typical home garage where people have experienced groundbreaking inventions. It encourages associates to express creativity, tinker with gadgets, and create new products and services.

[Photo: Courtesy Capital One]

Capital One Financial Services now has nearly 5,000 associates on its eight-building campus. There’s a heavy dose of design inspiration to help employees do their best work—and convene others.

Last year, the campus hosted Capital One’s inaugural Corporate Startup Innovation Summit, a Dallas Startup Week event of around 10,000 leaders, founders, innovators, and investors who connected to brainstorm and spark change.

Hypergiant

Texas-based startup Hypergiant Industries is an artificial intelligence products and service company that says it’s on track to be one of the fastest tech companies to reach $100M in realized revenue. The startup, founded in 2018, aims to use emerging technologies to solve “humanity’s biggest challenges” and make it to easier to analyze data from space. Hypergiant—with a board that includes science advisor Bill Nye—has an office in Dallas, but don’t expect to stop by any time soon. 

CEO and Founder Ben Lamm says since most of Hypergiant’s work is “incredibly cutting-edge and highly confidential,” the locations aren’t marked and even require security to enter. R&D departments—home to projects like a full-blown algae farm with over 100 gallons of aquatic plant—aren’t open at all.

A sneak peek inside reveals a future-meets-past ’50s-era laboratory feel. [Photo: Courtesy Hypergiant]

Lamm believes in a “culture of innovation,” and it shows. “We use our own software in each of our offices in order to help train our models in terms of people movement, traffic flows and object detection,” Lamm says. “All space is open to everyone, that the floor plan is modular and that the flow can be easily changed based on team needs.”

There’s a pod structure for teams, ‘war rooms’ for projects, and holographic briefcases that share the brand story. It’s a space that “nods to your favorite hotel and the spaceship you want to live on,” he says.

[Photo: Courtesy Hypergiant]

Brand is key at Hypergiant. While any company can tell a story with PowerPoint, we believe an emerging tech company should actually use emerging tech, and holograms are the future, Lamm says.

“We tell our brand story through holograms,” Lamm notes. Throughout the offices, there are briefcases in each of our conference rooms: “When opened, they tell our story.”

“The most interesting things in our office manifest themselves based on the latest and greatest work that is coming out of our R&D group,” Benn Lamm says. [Photo: Courtesy Hypergiant]

900lbs

900lbs is a tech-driven, Dallas-based interactive design agency that was founded in 2008 by Chief Executive Officer Steve Deitz.

The agency helps its clients transition into the “Experience Age” via the production of scalable, interactive initiatives and immersive visual storytelling. Recent examples of its work include the custom interactive video touch wall highlighting the McKinney ISD “Hall of Honors” at its new 12,000-seat multi-use stadium.

Read more about 900lbs’ headquarters in our Innovative Spaces.

900lbs focuses on communicating complex messaging and technical information in a story-driven intuitive process. Its offices embrace the mission with open, collaborative spaces and the top in technology for its employees. [Photo: Erin Gilliatt]

IBM

Global technnology company International Business Machines operates The IBM Innovation Center in Coppell, where employees generate impactful results in a “rapid agile workplace.” IBM recently said it believes 100 percent of jobs eventually will change in how we work because of artificial intelligence, but that most won’t disappear.

Bright colors and ergonomic furniture enhances the “agile workplace” model at IBM. [Photo: Courtesy IBM]

TaskUs

Global outsourcing company TaskUs brings people, process, and technology together. The company, which calls itself a new age outsourcer, provides back-office support and customer-care solutions to some of the world’s most notable brands and disruptive companies, such as PayNearMe, Birchbox, MailChimp, SeatGeek, SpareFoot, Yext, Oscar, and more.

In 2009, co-founders Bryce Maddock and Jaspar Weir opened their first office in the Phillipines. The duo, business partners and high school buddies, quickly realized their virtual assistant model was transformational, per the company’s website.

Today the company offers employs some 17,000 folks in the Philippines, United States, Taiwan, Mexico and India. In 2017, the company grew its domestic footprint by expanding in Texas, including the company’s Dallas office. 

The company’s unique focus on transformation spreads to its space. TaskUs says that game rooms and a gorgeous office aren’t defining factors, they’re added bonuses. It’s got a people-first mindset to maximize one’s potential and performance, and it prioritizes innovation and communication across all of its operations.

Read more about the TaskUs Dallas offices here.

A lounge patio and a ping pong/conference table speaks to the playful, people-first vibe at TaskUs. [Photo: Courtesy TaskUs]

Toyota Motor North America

Toyota’s new $1-billion campus in Plano was designed to foster collaboration among its 4,000-plus employees. The company improved upon its former reliance on single-occupant workspaces, imbuing the 100-acre Plano headquarters with multiple opportunities for gathering. From open-plan areas to communal dining, the emphasis is on people, and it’s not unintentional.

Toyota offers a fitness center that includes amenities such as yoga, treadmills, an indoor track, and basketball courts. It also offers an on-site medical center for primary health care, physical therapy, and a full pharmacy. [Photo: Courtesy Toyota]

Toyota execs routinely say the company’s success is “driven by its workers.” Seven buildings are tied together by a leafy central courtyard, which features Texas’ native plants. The facility received LEED Platinum certification from the U.S. Green Building Council. With its more-than 20,000 solar panels, a rainwater harvesting system with up to 400,000 gallons to use in irrigation, and drought-resistant plants, no environmentally conscious detail was left unturned.

Toyota Motor North America, which says its success is driven by its workers, has a two-story climbing wall at its headquarters in Plano to help employees stay fit. [Photo: Courtesy Toyota]

NTT Data

NTT Data’s global headquarters are in Japan, but it conducts U.S. operations out of its North American base in Plano. The IT services giant places a high value on its office culture to attract and retain employees. Elizabeth Towson, the chief diversity & inclusion officer and SVP of human resources, says it’s an atmosphere that is inclusive, social, and productive.

[Photo: Courtesy NTT DATA]

“Most people want to feel that their company cares about them and provides a good work/life balance,” she says. “Word travels fast about the culture within a company, and the company’s image/brand can make a huge impact on whether someone chooses to join a company.”

Right now, the corporation is working to develop and advance women—and is building that into its succession planning model—through promotions in leadership roles. “We know that people tend to leave jobs because they either don’t like their boss, aren’t paid competitively, or don’t like their company’s culture,” Towson says. “While we can’t always control those factors, we can certainly cultivate an inclusive culture that is always learning and striving to improve.”

[Photo: Courtesy NTT DATA]

Sally Beauty

Sally Beauty Holdings Inc.’s corporate culture is based on providing its more than 27,000 employees worldwide with learning opportunities that reflect the company’s business goals. 

As the leading “global distributor and retailer of professional beauty products to both retail consumers and salon professionals,” Sally Beauty has invested in its corporate headquarters ever since its relocation to Denton in 1982. Its now sprawling headquarters mirrors the company’s culture and brand. The sleek, modern interior has an open layout that encourages collaboration and learning. 

Read more about the Sally Beauty headquarters in our Innovative spaces.

[Photo: Courtesy Sally Beauty]

[Photo: Courtesy Sally Beauty]

RagingWire

Like most businesses looking for the best spot to build a new facility, RagingWire wanted its new Dallas data center location to hit the mark on a list of prime considerations.

The 42-acre campus in Garland has space for five interconnected buildings, 1.5 million square feet of space, and a total of 80 megawatts of capacity with room to expand that capacity, if needed. The campus’ first building is the RagingWire Dallas TX1 Data Center, a wholesale private vault and retail colocation facility with 16 megawatts of critical IT power in 230,000 square feet of space that launched last spring.

Read more about RagingWire’s data center—and take a virtual tour—in our Innovative Spaces.

RagingWire found everything it was looking for in planning the Garland data center. [Image: Courtesy RagingWire]

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Dallas Innovates: The [Tech] Talent Issue, a special edition of the Dallas Innovates Magazine, looks at how companies in Dallas-Fort Worth are attracting and retaining the best talent. Startups, corporates, nonprofits, and organizations work hard to create a strong culture, promote diversity, and implement training programs that can help achieve success.

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