Last week over a hundred UTRS employees, their partners, children, and one well-behaved canine met at Hedden County Park in Morris County, NJ. They didn’t come for the weather – the day was marked by bursts of thunderstorms interrupted by breaks of unrelenting overcast. They came for the annual UTRS Summer Picatinny Picnic. It’s a tradition going back over 20 of UTRS’s 40 years. It didn’t have the atmosphere of a work event; it had the atmosphere of a family reunion. Young and old came together to have fun and just enjoy good food and time with one another.
Although the weather didn’t cooperate for outdoor games, the reliably ample Hedden Reservoir Shelter kept everyone dry and the event was capped by a repeat visit from the vintage Good Humor Ice Cream truck.
It’s easy to say, “our company treats staff like family.” You hear it all the time if you speak with recruiters or HR departments from any industry. It’s more difficult to make it a reality once a firm has grown to be dispersed across multiple locations and divisions, with a staff count beyond which no single person in the corporation can genuinely know every other person in the enterprise.