Bischoff started working in the American Wrestling Association (AWA) in 1987. In 1989, Bischoff would become an on-air interviewer in and host of the AWA until the company folded in 1991.
In 1991, Bischoff joined World Championship Wrestling (WCW) as a C-show announcer, debuting at The Great American Bash. In 1993, Bischoff became the Executive Producer of WCW. In 1994, Bischoff was promoted from Executive Producer to Executive Vice President, putting him in charge of everything WCW.
In 1996, Bischoff signed Scott Hall. Two weeks later on Nitro, Hall was joined by Kevin Nash to become "The Outsiders". The Outsiders expanded and became the New World Order (nWo) when perennial fan-favorite Hulk Hogan aligned himself with the Outsiders in July 1996.
The nWo was depicted as a rival company engaging in a "hostile takeover" of WCW. Week to week, the angle grew more complex, with a mixture of main-eventers, mid-carders, executives, referees, managers, and announcers involved in various subplots related to the onscreen "WCW vs nWo" power-struggle. During this era, Bischoff moved from his role as commentator and joined the nWo as a manager. His television character, dubbed "Eazy E" by Hall, became a dictator and egomaniac as the nWo boss. In the summer of 1998, Bischoff hosted a segment on WCW programming with Miss Elizabeth.
On September 10, 1999, Bischoff was relieved of his management position with WCW.
In April 2000, Bischoff returned as an on-air character alongside Vince Russo to lead the heel faction The New Blood. Bischoff's last on-camera role in WCW was in July 2000 at the Bash at the Beach 2000 pay-per-view when Russo did a worked-shoot promo on Hulk Hogan.
In 2002, Bischoff was hired by World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE) to be the general manager of Raw. He debuted as the first Raw general manager on the July 15 episode of Raw. He resurrected his characteristic brand of smarminess with the general manager position, again playing the arrogant heel character he had employed as the nWo boss in WCW. During his debut on Raw he told the audience about how he was president of WCW, creator of the nWo and how he forced Vince McMahon to change the ways he does business. Bischoff's wrestling innovations in WWE included the "Raw Roulette" and the Elimination Chamber, as well as feuds with Stone Cold Steve Austin, Shane McMahon, John Cena, SmackDown General Manager Stephanie McMahon, and former Extreme Championship Wrestling owner Paul Heyman. At Taboo Tuesday 2004, Bischoff had his head shaved after failing to beat his nephew Eugene. Bischoff then began a face turn after his head got shaved. He favored face wrestlers such as Randy Orton, Chris Benoit and Chris Jericho. Bischoff subsequently took a vacation after allowing Randy Orton's Survivor Series team to become general managers for up to four weeks with every member being the general manager once a week.
Bischoff began favoring heels again after then-WWE Champion John Cena, who was drafted to Raw in June 2005, refused to participate in Bischoff's vendetta against an impending ECW revival. As a result, Bischoff "declared war" on Cena (citing disdain for Cena's rapping and "thug nature") and made wrestlers such as Chris Jericho and Christian try to take away the WWE Championship from Cena. In November, Bischoff aligned himself with Kurt Angle. Following several months of Raw and SmackDown Invasions, Bischoff lost to Smackdown general manager Theodore Long at Survivor Series 2005 after The Boogeyman helped Long beat Bischoff.
On the December 5 episode of Raw, Bischoff was "fired" as general manager, when Cena body slammed him and Vince McMahon tossed him into a garbage truck - following a "trial" where his history of unscrupulous actions were listed - and had him driven out of the arena.
On September 25, 2006, Bischoff appeared on WWE television for the first time in close to a year, and after being brought into the ring by Jonathan Coachman, he proceeded to promote his recently finished book. A few days later, John Bradshaw Layfield conducted a four-part interview with Bischoff, further discussing his book on WWE.com.
Bischoff was chosen as the special guest referee for the D-Generation X versus Rated-RKO match at Cyber Sunday on November 5, with 60% of the vote. He then cheated DX out of the win, leaving Orton and Edge the victors. The next night on Raw, Bischoff was reinstated as General Manager for one night only. During his time as the GM on Raw, he restarted matches if he did not like the outcome. He also got revenge on Maria for her statement made in his trial the year before by making her face Umaga, forced John Cena to "take the night off," and banned DX from the building. He restarted the match between Jeff Hardy and Johnny Nitro for the WWE Intercontinental Championship after Hardy won by disqualification. Bischoff restarted that match as a no disqualification match, and Nitro took advantage of that using Melina to distract Hardy and striking him with the title belt. At the end of the show, DX interfered in the main event when Bischoff tried to help Edge and Randy Orton win the tag team titles, and forced him to be humiliated by Big Dick Johnson as revenge for costing them their match the night before.
On March 5, 2007, Bischoff made a brief appearance on Raw in Phoenix, Arizona to give Vince McMahon his thoughts on the WrestleMania 23 match against Donald Trump. On December 10, 2007, Bischoff made his last contracted appearance with WWE on Raw for its 15th Anniversary Special, and was confronted by Chris Jericho, the man whom he fired on Raw on August 22, 2005.
On March 21, 2017, Bischoff was announced to induct Diamond Dallas Page into the WWE Hall of Fame on March 31. On the 25th Anniversary of Raw on January 22, 2018, Bischoff made a guest appearance on the show, during a segment with other former Raw general managers.
In June 2019, WWE announced that Bischoff would be the new executive director of SmackDown. On July 22, 2019, Bischoff appeared on the Raw Reunion episode and met along with Eve Torres and Mike and Maria Kanellis, and invited them to come to SmackDown. On October 15, 2019, it was announced that he had been released.