BetMGM and FanDuel have been identified as two of the best 35 large workplaces in New York. Fortune ranked the betting and iGaming operators in 16th and 18th place respectively on its annual prestigious list.
The Fortune Best Companies to Work For organizations are selected by gathering and analyzing confidential staff survey responses and an assessment of the companies' own insight into their people leadership strategies and programs.
Rising 40 places compared with last year, BetMGM’s New York Metro region presence is within the Goldman Sachs Tower in New Jersey’s Exchange Place area. FanDuel, located in Park Avenue, Midtown Manhattan enters the list for the first time.
The Fortune Best Companies To Work For contest is considered a global authority on workplace culture and entry onto the list is highly competitive. The assessment is partly based on the Trust Index Survey whereby employees can share honest feedback about their experiences at work. Other measures focus on staff experience, work-life balance, employee retention, innovation and leadership
Among some of the top NY sportsbooks, FanDuel employs over 2,800 individuals in the United States while BetMGM’s workforce in the nation stands at 1,104. FanDuel is active in fifty states and by most estimates is the biggest sports betting operator in the nation. BetMGM is licensed in 23 states and has a market share of around 14% in the US.
For their part, 92% of BetMGM staff members rated the organization as a “great place to work”. 90% of FanDuel’s employees agreed with the same statement. That compares with just 57% of workers nationwide.
94% of BetMGM’s surveyed workforce agreed they were “proud to tell others I work here” compared with 92% for FanDuel. Both BetMGM and FanDuel’s highest rating came on the metric of “When you join the company, you are made to feel welcome.”
The Fortune list isn’t the only acknowledgement that FanDuel and BetMGM have received as being good companies to work for.
FanDuel was recognised for its approach to recruiting and nurturing new talent in the 2024 Campus Forward Awards.
BetMGM was honored in 2021 by Glassdoor for being a good place to work. The Glassdoor Employee Choice Awards recognise employers that cultivate a positive workplace culture based on staff feedback.
According to the American Gaming Association, legal sportsbooks contribute $41.2 billion to the economic output of the US. Further, sports betting companies support $11 billion worth of total labor income. The trade group estimates that 1.7 million people are employed in the US gambling industry.
The gambling industry remains somewhat controversial though. Working in the sector can also come with some stigmas that are proving hard to shake off, despite the recent proliferation of legalized gambling and the booming popularity of sports betting in the US.
According to a survey by international market research firm YouGov, 54% of people across 16 countries said they had a negative view of people working in the gambling industry. 11% viewed such employment in a positive light.
Consumers in the US are more likely to consider gambling industry employment as a good thing. The same survey found that 43% of Americans had a negative reaction to those employed by betting and iGaming firms whereas 13% framed it as a positive.
Those results are in contrast to those actually employed by gambling operators, however. The most recent survey of gaming industry employees by the American Gaming Association reported that 82% of them were satisfied in their role. The report concluded that:
“Respondents think highly of their jobs in many different ways, and when taken together, this positive thinking creates a critical mass of professionals who truly enjoy and are enthused by what they do.”
The gap between public perception of working in the gambling industry and those with direct experience perhaps demonstrates the relatively recent trend for ‘normalization’ of sports betting and iGaming in the wider consciousness of the US as the recent wave of legalization across the nation continues to drive acceptance.
