A former UFC executive who worked under Dana White during the UFC’s pre-pandemic golden era has claimed to have nothing but praise for the head honcho.
Eric Winter worked for the UFC as Senior Vice President and General Manager and was responsible for their digital streaming service, UFC Fight Pass. However, after a short 2-year stint at the company, Winter left the promotion to spend more time with his family.
But now he’s back, with a few more feathers on his cap, along with the unique experience of working as a consultant for Conor McGregor’s BKFC.
Developing a combat sport promotion in its infancy, Winter claims he’s using a lot of what he learnt from White and former UFC CEO Lorenzo Fertitta.
In an interview for Sports Business Unplugged, he called his experience with the combat sports leader a “fun time” and said, “Here’s something funny which a lot of bosses forget to do, it’s give the freedom to your staff. Give them the opportunity to be creative and don’t just force them to do whatever’s on the road map.”
Having learnt to do that from the UFC bosses, he urges all his employees to dedicate 10% of their day to being creative, apart from their job description.
“That’s what Dana and Lorenzo allowed us to do at the UFC. The UFC was a tremendous place to work with, creative, because you always had to be on your front foot”, Winter noted.
And even though not all of his creative ideas were taken into consideration, Winter claims his decision to leave the UFC was one of the toughest experiences of his life.
Winter sacrificed luxury for family
Winter went from being paid once every 2 weeks, with a stable job, and free food and coffee, to not knowing where his next paycheck would come from.
In fact, when he was in the UFC, he had access to the Exec kitchen and could get a meal whenever he wanted throughout the day. So what made him step away from this jet-setting lifestyle and become a consultant?
“I came home and my daughter had a sign… It was a picture of a mommy, holding the hand of a girl, holding the hand of a little boy”, he explained.
This image was essentially a drawing of his family, but the only person missing was Winter himself.
“And up in the corner was an airplane, and that was Daddy…That was my kids’ vision of who daddy was….It really hit me.,” Winter noted, getting a little emotional.
That’s when he realized how much he was missing out on his family life.
The BKFC consultant now claims that his new gig has allowed him to be a dad again. “I learned how to become a father and a parent”, he added.
Winter started doing more things with his family instead of focusing solely on his career, he would make breakfast for his children and post it on his social media, much to the amusement of his friends.
He did, however, admit that in this 7-8 year period, he probably missed out on a lot of money.
He doesn’t really regret the decision, though, since he is now working as the President of Triller, a livestreaming business with over 1,500 sporting events a year.
