Growing up in San Diego, California, Shea Dawson remembers going to her neighborhood YMCA every day after school to play basketball with her younger brother Malcolm. After joining the San Diego Cougars—an all-boys AAU team—, Shea discovered her true love for the game as well as her passion for serving as a support system to those around her. Little did she know, but this was only the beginning. During her time in high school, Shea was recognized as someone who was always genuinely interested in everyone’s well-being, was committed to empowering others to be their best selves, and would be there for anyone whenever they needed a shoulder to lean on. As her time in high school came to an end, she was excited for the next chapter in her life—college. After receiving an athletic scholarship to play basketball at the collegiate level, Shea was ecstatic. She was not only going to continue to play the game that she loved dearly, but she had the opportunity to do that while pursuing a postsecondary education. But suddenly, everything changed. In an instant, the years and years of hard work and sacrifice on the court seemed to have been in vain after she received the news that she had not passed her SAT exam, and thus could not attend her university. This was not going to stop her though.
She refused to allow this minor setback to become the last chapter to her story. It was then when Shea decided to attend a junior college in Orange County, and solidify her education. After graduating from JUCO, she went on to earn her Bachelor’s degree in Sports Management from Robert Morris University in Pittsburgh, and embarked on a series of internships that would lead her back to her ultimate goal of helping athletes navigate through their careers. From working in Basketball Operations with Five-Star Basketball to Game Operations with the NBA Summer League, Shea continued to work towards learning the ins and outs of the industry. She wanted to discover the best ways to serve as a support system for up-and-coming athletes. After just two seasons working in the NBA Summer League, Shea received the opportunity to be the Manager of Player Programs & Team Services for the Philadelphia 76ers. She hasn’t stopped leaving her mark in the industry since! Shea currently works with Overtime as the Director Of Athlete & Community Relations, and has also established her own brand in the industry through The Shea Dawson Experience—a platform that reflects her continuous commitment to providing the best possible human experience to others through her work, communication, and efforts.
Take us through that time where you immersed yourself in the behind-the-scenes side of the industry. How did you get started learning about the best ways to support young athletes in their transition from high school to college, or even from college into the league?
I ended up getting a really cool internship with Five Star Basketball, and they held their camps at my university—Robert Morris University in Pittsburgh. So I met the founders, Will and Leigh Alan Klein and Howard Garfinkel, who are legends in the New York basketball history books, and Tom Konchalski, Tony Bergeron, and all of these other guys. They taught me the game. They basically said, “This is how it works.” All of the coaches that coach in college now, worked with me at those camps. So I started to learn (about) what the pipeline looked like—how you get kids in there at a young age, the coaches are developing relationships with them so that when they go back to their respective states and schools they already had relationships with those coaches from camp, how they would get the kids in college, and then to the NBA, etc.—I just saw the whole cycle there. I was (working) behind-the-scenes. I was putting the rosters together, I was running to Kinkos, I was driving to the airport, I was scheduling one-on-one sessions with different coaches and players, I was picking up all of the stuff afterwards, I was just doing all of that stuff. I got to move into spaces and be in rooms that I probably would have never been invited in had I been a coach or somebody actually teaching the game. That is where it started. I learned basketball operations is what I wanted to do, so I did that for every camp across the nation, literally. I did the Pangos All-American Camp in Los Angeles—that is where I met a lot of the NBA kids that I know today—, and developed those relationships early on when they were figuring out their journey. I got to see who was advising them, what roles their parents played, I got to see how coming to those camps and getting exposure helped their college prospects, and then their draft shocks. Me moving in those spaces connected me to all those people, which was pretty dope.
Prior to working with Overtime, you worked with the NBA. What has this journey been like for you? How did you navigate through the industry and discover your interest in working for the NBA?
It has been a really beautiful process. I would have to say to anybody reading this, “Have patience.” You have to let the universe decide, and you have to let the universe push you in different directions. But my intentions, my intention for what I’ve always wanted to do was to help people—to service them and to get into the spaces and find out the information that is most helpful to them as they navigate those journeys. That has always been my intention, and that intention has let people know that I am not trying to get anything from them. I am trying to help. If I help them, they help me. (By) helping each other, and not taking advantage of them, that is kind of how I built my solid foundation, my solid network of friends—who are also shakers and movers in the industry. So I was coaching high school at the time, and I thought I wanted to coach college because that is the normal progression. That was just the conformed way—I coach high school, the next step is college. Although the camps in the summer were the most valuable, they didn’t pay me throughout the year so I had to figure out a way to help people—which was my intention—, and that was obviously (through) coaching. I was coaching girls, but because I (was) working in men’s basketball in the summer, I didn’t have any stake in the women’s basketball scene because I didn’t recruit. I wouldn’t be able to recruit girls because I didn’t know a lot of them. I knew my team and I knew the girls who played them, but I wasn’t in on that scene—I was on the boys side. That’s when I said, “Oh Shea, okay your connections are going to work for you on the men’s side. But also, your goal is to help these young men anyway because girls naturally, we figure it out. We know what we are doing, and we have more opportunities and more things to do once our basketball season is over.” I kind of felt like helping women become women—learning about their sexuality, learning about being a woman and what that means in the world, how you can use your voice, and all of that—that is what I loved about coaching. But, I loved (that) more on the mentor side. So I said, “I want to do that for the men’s (side), because that is where my connections are. This is what my intention is—to help these young, Black men figure it out.” I had a brother that I helped through the process as well. I saw what I did for my brother in terms of: he needed something, I was there. He needed me to research (something), I was researching it. He had that resource, and that helped him navigate those things. I knew a lot of people weren’t doing that. I knew they weren’t doing that because they see dollar signs—so that’s why I inserted myself into that space. Once I did that and I stopped trying to do the college thing, I got the NBA Summer League internship. Once I got the internship, I knew it was over from there. I was like, “I am in here. All I needed was an opportunity, and I got my opportunity.”
That's awesome! Could you share more with us about your “Year of Yes”? What was your inspiration behind embarking on that journey?