A former NBA employee hacked the league's Facebook account and took the league to task for its employment conditions.
In the now-deleted post, the person wrote that the NBA demands a lot of its social media team for paltry salaries. The former employee called out commissioner Adam Silver, seemingly putting the perceived issues at his feet. Front Office Sports, among other outlets, posted a screenshot:
A former NBA employee posted this on the league’s official Facebook page this morning.
— Front Office Sports (@FOS) August 21, 2023
It was deleted after roughly 20 minutes. pic.twitter.com/RkLX2ZafOk
In subsequent posts, the former NBA employee promoted their own digital consulting business, as shown by screenshots from digital media professional Jordan Rab.
So it seems like the rogue ex-NBA social employee essentially made his diatribe to plug his new digital consulting business (h/t r/NBA). He urges potential clients to eradicate their in-house social - "Don’t be as silly as this flock of geese by paying a social media manager" https://t.co/bBXqRIswfJ pic.twitter.com/NiBbiJLIXS
— Jordan (@JordanRab) August 21, 2023
Over the years, the league routinely got high marks for employment diversity, has been praised for supporting ways to improve the mental health of its players, and continues to expand its community outreach throughout the globe. However, the deleted post appears to crack open a window into a fraught internal culture where being arguably the most social-media friendly league in sports could be pushing its employees to their limit, especially those in rank-and-file positions.
It's also not a good look because the league is in the midst of negotiating its next broadcasting rights contracts with media networks. These billion-dollar deals will continue to finance the salaries of its players, team and league operations while increasing the valuations of the individual franchises.
The people who come to work for these major sports leagues aren't in it only for the cool factor but in hopes of building their own careers in sports and/or elsewhere.
However, the aura of working for the world's premier basketball league isn't enough to make up for the seemingly low salary. This former employee may not be the only person who has issues with their pay versus their workload, and there's a good chance that people at the NBA's headquarters are going to have long discussions about perceived pay disparities going forward.
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