Brendan Donohue remembers the buses. On Friday of the weekend  Hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans, Donohue was eating lunch when he noticed a steady stream of coaches traveling through downtown New Orleans.

The buses, Donohue thought to himself, were more than likely just a subtle reminder that if residents wanted to get out of town ahead of the impending storm, now was the time to make a move.

It was Friday, August 26, 2005. It is fair to say that nobody could have anticipated what would happen next. When Katrina hit landfall on Tuesday, the aftermath of the devastating Category 5 hurricane caused 1,836 fatalities and between $97.4 billion to $145.5 billion in damages. In the end, it was a mechanical failure that did the city in. The storm’s surge overpowered the levees and floodwalls, collapsing several concrete flood walls because of the way they were designed and eventually eroding the structures away.

At the time, Donohue was the Director of Ticket Sales for the New Orleans Hornets (now the Pelicans). He took the job after working in corporate and suite sales with the Detroit Pistons and Milwaukee Bucks, respectively. The Hornets job would be another step in his strategy to broaden his work acumen in the world of professional sports.

A little more than a year and half into the New Orleans’ job, Donohue received a call from two of his longtime mentors, Lou DePaoli and Bernie Mullin, inviting him to Atlanta to help run sales (VP of Ticket Sales and Services) for the Hawks.

The call would change everything.

“I mean, I left the office on a Friday in New Orleans and never returned. I went from waiting in line for 12 hours for gas to going to Atlanta five weeks after Katrina hit. Working in sports can be funny. I have never been about a franchise’s record or things like that; I am about opportunity. For me, I always loved going to a broken ship. I love the idea of taking a broken business and staff, and building and creating it into something special. Being able to put your fingerprints on something matters. We did that in Atlanta. It was one of those ‘one-door-closes-another-opens’ experiences. I was very lucky.”

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Atlanta pushed Donohue into a new direction. Eventually landing with the National Basketball Association (NBA), Donohue spent time as VP of Team Marketing and Business Operations and Senior VP of Team Marketing and Business Operations. He was instrumental in leading the strategic planning and management for every team across the NBA, WNBA and NBA G League, helping them innovate in sales, marketing, digital and analytical areas of their businesses. The job was an investment in his craft. Donohue knew he could be a team president someday. This role would help prepare him to be great when his chance came.

His big break came when he was named NBA 2K League President in 2017, where he went on to spearheaded the substantial growth of the esports league over its first six seasons. To launch an esports league and start up for the NBA allowed him to apply all of the things he learned, operate again and reinvent himself from a career perspective.

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The league, which was co-founded by the NBA and Take-Two Interactive, was the first official esports league operated by a U.S. professional sports league. With Donohue at the helm, NBA 2K expanded from 17 teams in its inaugural season to 25 teams, including 22 NBA-affiliated teams and international franchises in Australia, China and Mexico. This past season, the league delivered significant fan engagement thanks to its relationship with YouTube and Twitch.

The opportunity offered a wealth of new experiences in a time when the NBA was looking to expand its bounds. Donohue recalls the rush of the first NBA 2K draft, when staffers gathered in The Hulu Theater at Madison Square Garden to make history. Each of the league’s 17 teams were tabbed to select six players from a pool of 102 gamers. As Donohue looked on, the league he would oversee was set to become the competitive gaming league’s first professional organization. With NBA Commissioner Adam Silver announcing the pick, Mavs Gaming selected point guard and Cleveland native Artreyo Boyd (aka Dimez).

“I remember getting to know Dimez, trying to put myself into his shoes. They're very different than the players drafted into the NBA. Many of them didn't have the benefit of going to North Carolina or Duke for three or four years. They were thrust from their homes because they were great at playing a game. And then, all of a sudden, they’re the face of an organization going from zero to a thousand.”

Along with running the business, Donohue played the role of mentor for many of the young gamers. A typical day in the esports world might include taking a deep dive into sales and marketing, brokering a partnership between social media channels, finalizing a sponsorship, and then sitting up to 1 a.m. talking to a player who might be having an issue with a teammate. “Sometimes, it is about talking a player off the ledge. That was never in my job description, but when you are working with 20-something kids thrust into the spotlight, you have to wear some different hats.”

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To the future and beyond…

The mentoring aspect of his job is the part that Donohue carries with him the most. In a landscape where 25 people have to do the work of 2,000, Donohue discovered that the best path forward was to lead. That meant giving young people the opportunity and pathway to find their way through whatever obstacles presented themselves.

If you think that sounds hard, you’re right. Learning to drink from a firehose on more days than he wanted to, Donohue and his team pushed the NBA 2K beyond the expectations the league had set, establishing an esports blueprint that can be successfully emulated.

“There are right and wrong ways to lead people. I have always found that the right way is to not be the smartest person in the room making all decisions. You have to learn to empower people—give them the confidence they need to find their own way. I had to quickly empower people who might have been more junior than the task they were being asked to perform. I had to get them to where if they failed a little, I could help guide them back on track. You have an exponential impact.

If you spend more time on development and talent development—those moments when you are preparing the rest of your team to conquer the world—you exponentially increase your impact. Frankly, if you have a piece of time, it should be on developing your talent.”

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