The NBA sent players to Google, Facebook, and more to help answer one of the biggest questions of their careers — life after basketball
C.J. Watson's mom pushed him at a young age to get ready for the "real world," making him learn how to write checks, do mock job interviews, and accompany her to work.
Watson wasn't sure if he was going to keep playing basketball, much less make the NBA, and his mom wanted him to be prepared after his playing days ended.
"You never know with basketball — you can get hurt or get cut or something like that," Watson told Business Insider. "So, you always have to be prepared and keep it in the back of your mind and just always keep your options open."
That's why Watson, a 32-year-old guard in the second year of a three-year, $15 million deal with the Orlando Magic, took his mom's advice to heart and spent part of his summer job-shadowing at Google and Douglas-Elliman Real Estate in Miami, Florida.
He wasn't the only one. As part of the NBA's Career Crossover program, Watson was also joined at Google by Cleveland Cavaliers forward Dahntay Jones, Denver Nuggets forward Wilson Chandler, and former NBA Development League guard Moses Ehambe. Jones and several other players also spent days with Douglas-Elliman in New York, Miami, and Los Angeles.
The Career Crossover program, which NBA Senior Vice President of Player Development Greg Taylor estimates is in its sixth or seventh year, is meant to educate and expose players to fields outside of basketball. Alerted by the number of players looking only into basketball-related jobs after their playing days were over, Taylor and the NBA began to find corporate partners that players expressed interested in learning more about. In total, the NBA had 13 players take part in the corporate program (there are other programs for basketball-related jobs, from front-office work to refereeing), which also featured companies like Esquire and 2K Sports.
"I'm certainly not suggesting that basketball-related careers aren't important, but there’s a whole world out there," Taylor said. "So, the specific purpose of the Career Crossover program really was about exposure, exposing the guys to different career options and then letting them know what marketable skills they had to develop, what education they needed to have in order to be competitive in those new career endeavors that they expressed interest in."
Players dive into Silicon Valley and beyond
Wilson Chandler (left), C.J. Watson, Dahntay Jones, and Moses Ehambe (right) at Google. Courtesy of the NBA
The tech field, in particular, was a popular choice amongst players, which led Watson and Jones to Google.
"It’s the best company in the world right now, and I just wanted to see how it operated, what the culture was," said Jones, a 35-year-old forward in his 12th season in the NBA. "I just wanted to see the intricacies of what made it such a great company."
Jones, Watson, Chandler, and Ehambe spent the day touring the campus, sitting in on meetings, learning about YouTube's analytics, social media, the company's hiring process, and testing the self-driving cars. Watson enjoyed the self-driving car. Jones enjoyed learning more about YouTube and added, "Google Ventures was dope."
Watson was impressed with the company.
"It’s a fun environment" he said. "They’re not really strict on a dress code or certain ways they have meetings and stuff like that. They do things outside of the box, which is pretty cool."
Al-Farouq Aminu, a 26-year-old forward with the Portland Trail Blazers, visited Facebook for the day, after also expressing interest in tech. Though he enjoyed testing the Oculus Rift and touring the "beautiful" campus, he was ultimately looking for a more hands-on experience.
"In an internship, you kinda like push papers, you know, you do work sort of thing," Aminu said. "For what I was intending it to be, it was not." Still, Aminu came away with some valuable lessons, noting he's interested in further exploring "the design aspect of technology."
David Zalubowski/AP; Business Insider
Taylor said that up until the interest in tech companies this year, real estate was the most popular job-shadowing choices, and it continued to be in-demand this year, with six players accompanying Douglas-Elliman.
Watson spent his days with Douglas-Elliman looking at high-rises, condos, and multimillion-dollar homes while he picked the realtors' brains in Miami. Jones, who spent four days in New York, also saw some properties, ate lunch with the CEO, and had a meeting with the chairman. Jones said he's taking online classes to pursue his broker's license.
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