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The dining room meeting
On the day it all started to shut down, Dana White gathered all of his employees in the downstairs dining room. He told them he did not understand what was going on, and that anyone who felt unsafe, or who had loved ones at home who might be, could go home. Nobody walked out.
Weekly calls
He promised they would get through it together and held weekly FaceTime calls with the whole staff. If anyone needed groceries or toilet paper, or a loved one got sick, they were to make him the first call. Only a couple of weeks later, he told them they were going to work, and men and women alike answered that they were with him.
No layoffs
Nobody was laid off. A CEO's job through the scariest stretch of a lifetime is to keep the business running and take care of the people who have missed their kids' first steps and games to help build it.
How did COVID first shut down live sports?
In March 2020 the NBA suspended its season on March 11 after a player tested positive, and other major leagues quickly followed. Arenas and stadiums across the country went dark within days. The UFC held UFC 249 in Jacksonville, Florida, on May 9, 2020, in an empty arena, which made it one of the first major live sports events in the United States to return.
Why did layoffs surge in spring 2020?
Restaurants, hotels, theaters, and many other businesses closed almost overnight when stay-at-home orders spread in March and April 2020. Congress responded with the CARES Act, which created forgivable loans for employers that kept workers on payroll. Even so, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported a US unemployment rate of 14.7 percent in April 2020, the highest since it began keeping monthly records in 1948.
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