Phoenix Suns owner/governor Mat Ishbia has brought a new sense of hope to the Valley after acquiring the team from Robert Sarver, ending a reign that still is feeling the impact of Sarver's toxic workplace environment that polluted the organization for years.
Ishbia - who runs United Wholesale Mortgage - acquired Kevin Durant at the trade deadline, less than 24 hours after officially being introduced at the Footprint Center. Hope for better performance on and off the court in Phoenix looks much more realistic, though there's now concern of problems within Ishbia's mortgage company.
Bloomberg is reporting that, "More than two dozen people who have worked at Ishbia’s United Wholesale Mortgage in recent years described a high-pressure locker-room environment at the company’s Pontiac, Michigan, offices. Several said some underwriting managers treated Black workers differently from White employees. Others said leering and sexually offensive remarks were common among sales staff. Most asked not to be named citing fear of reprisals."
Bloomberg did mention that Ishbia himself was not accused of personally using racist slurs or sexually harass employees, but rather his managers did. The workplace was described as "hostile" with heavy drug use.
"More than half a dozen sales employees said they encountered drugs on campus. One recalled arriving at 7 a.m. one day in 2019 to find a manager using cocaine in the bathroom. Another recalled seeing two or more employees enter the same stall on a handful of occasions, before he stopped taking notice," said the report.
"UWM’s lawyers said there are 667 cameras on the company’s campus, none of them in bathrooms, and that 'security has not observed or encountered drug sales.' The lawyers also said there have been no complaints filed with the company’s human resources department concerning cocaine use on campus."
A total of five Black employees spoke with Bloomberg and said they were held to a different standard than their White counterparts.
“I couldn’t count on both hands the amount of times my attitude came up," said one employee. “I was always ‘coached’ on making sure I wasn’t aggressive.”
There's a vastly deeper dive in the article (which is behind a paywall), but certainly not a good look on Ishbia nor his mortgage company, especially considering who he bought the team from.
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