Pros
- The full-time work is good because it allows for a consistent paycheck and benefits. - They are willing to spend an inordinate amount of time training people (rather than just hiring competent people to begin with), which can be to the individual's benefit when they realize how poorly ESPN is treating them to perform skilled tasks that other companies value. - It can be a good place to start out and get some practical experience, but ESPN is definitely not a place anyone with a brain would want to work at for more than a few years.
Cons
- ESPN embarrassingly underpays its employees for making national television for the two most watched cable networks. By staggering pay with a bizarre, purely subjective process for performance reviews and promotions, no two people make the same amount of money for doing the same job. In the end everyone at ESPN is paid half to one-third the compensation they should receive for working skilled positions on national television shows. - While TV is a 24/7/365 job, ESPN does not respect its employees and forces them into inhumane night and weekend shifts for years with no change in sight. - ESPN only wants to do more with less. There is zero focus on actually creating a quality product. ESPN, or the Every Single Penny Network, only cares about its bottom line. As a result, productions are severely understaffed. Employees receive unreasonable expectations that jeopardize their ability to succeed and also create an unsafe and uncomfortable working environment. - ESPN has awful office politics. It is impossible to effect change and make anything better without kissing endless butt and going through numerous hoops that simply make it not worth the effort.