Ex-TikTok Employee Criticizes Company’s ‘996’ Workplace Culture
Decerry Donato is a reporter at dot.LA. Prior to that, she was an editorial fellow at the company. Decerry received her bachelor's degree in literary journalism from the University of California, Irvine. She continues to write stories to inform the community about issues or events that take place in the L.A. area. On the weekends, she can be found hiking in the Angeles National forest or sifting through racks at your local thrift store.
A former TikTok employee has criticized the social media firm’s workplace culture—claiming that managers would pressure employees to work long hours and weekends in a nod to China’s “996” culture.
Pabel Martinez, a former global account director at TikTok, told Business Insider that managers at the Culver City-based company—which is owned by Chinese parent company ByteDance—would encourage employees to work into the evening and ask them to attend meetings during the weekend.
“I do think that the culture of working too much or not having as much of the work-life balance does permeate throughout the organization, and it is often encouraged you work ‘after hours’,” Martinez said. “The 996 policy’s infamous.”
The “996 policy” in question stems from China, where companies are known to demand that employees work from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m., six days a week. While ByteDance has reportedly made attempts to counteract that culture, Martinez said he and other colleagues were pressured to attend weekend meetings—and that when he objected, he was told by a manager: “That’s not how we do business here.”
“I was made to feel like I was never doing enough,” Martinez told Business Insider. “At TikTok, no conversation started with ‘How are you?’ It was like, ‘How’s the revenue? What are we doing to drive more growth?'”
Representatives for TikTok declined a request for comment by dot.LA.
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Decerry Donato is a reporter at dot.LA. Prior to that, she was an editorial fellow at the company. Decerry received her bachelor's degree in literary journalism from the University of California, Irvine. She continues to write stories to inform the community about issues or events that take place in the L.A. area. On the weekends, she can be found hiking in the Angeles National forest or sifting through racks at your local thrift store.
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