Advance provides financial and professional education tailored to the unique career journey of NBA officials. The following outlines the curriculum structure, workshop goals, and intended outcomes for both early-career and veteran referee tracks.
Designed for Every Stage of an Official's Career
Each Advance workshop begins with an anonymous pre-session survey to understand where participants are in their financial journey. Final content is shaped by that data — ensuring sessions are relevant, participant-driven, and immediately applicable. Early Career and Veteran tracks are distinct curricula, built to reflect the different financial realities at each stage.
Each module is available for both career tracks. Content, scenarios, and outcomes are tailored to reflect the distinct financial circumstances of early-career and veteran NBA officials.
Workshop Goals
- Define personal financial identity and create a foundational financial game plan
- Identify income, expenses, needs vs. wants and implement a budgeting tool
- Understand the tax implications of transitioning into the NBA
- Define saving and compounding interest and their impact on long-term wealth
- Analyze risk/reward considerations for investing
Participants develop a sustainable financial success strategy with actionable steps to implement a realistic budget and achieve long-term financial goals.
Workshop Goals
- Assess and update the current financial game plan — income, expenses, savings progress
- Create a transition-focused strategy aligned with anticipated post-NBA income changes
- Identify improvements for financial decision-making through real-life scenario analysis
- Evaluate the long-term impact of major income and expense changes
Late-career officials are equipped with the financial tools and strategies needed to transition from peak earning years into long-term financial stability.
Workshop Goals
- Define what it means to become an Athlete CEO
- Identify key areas for CEO-level decisions: money, advisors, future opportunities
- Establish how ownership, preparation and communication drive long-term success
- Connect the CEO mindset to professionalism, financial discipline and long-term growth
Early career referees begin to adopt the CEO mindset — taking greater ownership of decisions, systems and future with actionable steps to lead themselves more effectively.
Workshop Goals
- Assess current systems for managing money, advisors, health and next-chapter opportunities
- Create or refine a CEO strategy aligned with future goals and transition planning
- Analyze scenarios involving advisor leadership, major decisions and business opportunities
- Connect CEO mindset to legacy, leadership, protection and long-term independence
Veteran referees leave with a clearer strategy for leading their career, financial life and next chapter through systems review and practical leadership tools.
Workshop Goals
- Define intentional decision-making and its application to money, career and lifestyle
- Introduce R.E.A.P. — Recognize · Evaluate · Analyze · Produce
- Analyze real-life scenarios: large purchases, family requests, investment opportunities
- Identify ways to reduce reactive decision-making and build long-term habits
Participants establish a repeatable decision-making process to pause, evaluate options and make choices aligned with their long-term goals.
Workshop Goals
- Assess current decision-making habits: risk evaluation, opportunity assessment, advisor input
- Create or refine a strategy supporting long-term security and transition planning
- Apply R.E.A.P. to scenarios involving income changes, investments and post-career planning
- Identify adjustments needed when personal or financial circumstances change
Veteran referees are equipped with practical decision-making tools to evaluate major life and financial choices with greater clarity and structure.
Workshop Goals
- Define due diligence and the importance of selecting the right professional team
- Introduce S.I.F.T. — Sort · Inquire · Filter · Try
- Identify key questions to ask before hiring advisors, CPAs, attorneys and insurance professionals
- Define ways to monitor professionals once they have been engaged
Participants leave with a practical framework for evaluating service providers, including indicators to look for and questions to ask in every conversation.
Workshop Goals
- Assess whether current service providers match financial goals, performance and career stage
- Create a provider review process covering compensation, conflicts of interest and service gaps
- Analyze scenarios involving unclear advice, poor communication and misaligned incentives
- Strengthen advisor accountability and ensure ongoing alignment with long-term goals
Veteran referees are equipped with tools to review, manage and hold their professional team accountable in support of long-term financial stability.
The following modules are in development as part of Advance's expanding curriculum for NBA officials.
- Define estate planning in practical terms
- Identify key documents: wills, trusts, POA, healthcare directives
- Understand beneficiary designations and family protection
- Identify immediate next steps and professional support needed
- Assess whether current plan reflects updated assets and family
- Refine checklist for legacy, wealth transfer and charitable goals
- Identify gaps from outdated documents or unclear beneficiaries
- Analyze real-world scenarios: family disputes, incapacity, tax exposure
- Define private investments vs. public market investments
- Break down deal anatomy: structure, risk, return, liquidity, exit strategy
- Identify red flags: urgency, unclear compensation, unrealistic returns
- Understand when to slow down and consult the right professionals
- Assess current deal evaluation habits and process
- Create a structured deal review checklist
- Analyze scenarios: family deals, real estate, private funds
- Separate relationship pressure from objective investment analysis
- Define leadership as influence, not title
- Explain how accountability builds trust in elite environments
- Build credibility and contribute to culture without a formal title
- Connect on-court performance to off-court professionalism
- Assess leadership habits and influence within the referee environment
- Develop a mentorship and accountability strategy for younger officials
- Analyze adversity, peer accountability and difficult conversations
- Connect leadership to legacy, culture and long-term organizational impact
Data Before Content
Every workshop begins with a pre-session survey. Final content is determined only after participant data is compiled — ensuring each session reflects the real needs of the group, not assumptions.
Designed for Officials
Advance's curriculum is grounded in experience working with elite athletes and professionals. The material, scenarios and language are tailored to the specific financial circumstances of NBA officials.
Stage-Specific Content
Early Career and Veteran tracks are not variations of the same material — they are entirely distinct curricula built around the priorities and challenges relevant to that stage of a referee's career.