Mark Cuban.Photo: Invision/AP/REX/Shutterstock
Mark Cuban is speaking out in the wake of news thatan NBA investigationinto his team, the Dallas Mavericks, foundmultiple employees sexually harassed female staffers for years— and that another former staff member committed two acts of domestic violence.
“I did request an investigation, I did ask for a police report,” Cuban responded. “I deferred to the CEO.”
Nichols pushed on, explaining that the employee ended up dating a female Mavericks staffer who once came to the office covered in bruises sustained during the relationship. Still, she said, the man was not fired.
“In hindsight I would’ve done it different,” Cuban said. “This was a young, African American man in 2014, and I had a decision to make. The decision was, do I just fire him? … And my fear was, ‘What’s he going to do next? What’s going to happen to the next person?’ … I set a series of rules for him. He had to be accompanied and he had to go to counseling.”
TheShark Tankjudge added, “If I had to do it all over again, I would’ve fired him and still gotten him counseling.”
Cuban told Nichols the message he sent to the office as a result of his treatment of the employee was “horrible … I had no excuse. I could’ve done better. I should’ve done better.”
Nichols then questioned Cuban over the alleged lack of representation of people of color and women among Mavericks employees, and also called out pay inequality.
Cuban answered, “Once [the environment] came to my attention, we immediately jumped in to fix it. It wasn’t one that was acceptable. It’s not something that’s going to happen going forward … It’s not right. It’s not even good business.”
TheHow to Win at the Sport of Businessauthor also spoke out aboutthe $10 million donation he announced he would maketo organizations that support domestic violence survivors and place women in leadership roles.
“More important than the money is the example we can set,” Cuban explained to Nichols. “There hasn’t been anybody who’s had to go through this and set the tone on what’s the right way to respond. … The goal … is for me to get out there and teach others from my experiences.”
Kevin Mazur/BBMA2017/Getty
Ussery left the organization in 2015 and had not been replaceduntil Cuban namedformer AT&T executiveCynthia Marshallas CEO just days afterSI’sarticle was published.
The NBA’s independent investigation involved 215 interviews with current and former Mavs employees, and a review of millions of documents.
“The findings of the independent investigation are disturbing and heartbreaking and no employee in the NBA, or any workplace for that matter, should be subject to the type of working environment described in the report,” Commissioner Adam Silver said in a statement on theNBA.comwebsite on Wednesday.
source: people.com
