Terrible work/life balance and no career growth or leadership support - TOXIC WORK CULTURE. - Product Manager TikTok Employee Review

1.0
Mar 17, 2022
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

- A large tech company name on your resume and experience

Cons

- "Work is life and life is work" screwed up mentality (not just in this office, but globally) - HR team was not supportive/helpful at all - Horrid leadership, stemming from higher leadership down to your direct leaders (most things fall on deaf ears when concerns are voiced) - No personal career growth or development, just more stress (instead, too much focus on numbers and everything being for the sake of the business) - Too much focus on growth and scaling = meetings always felt like everyone was trying to one-up each other and clamour for attention - Didn't feel like we were supported at all when it came to "flex" working announcements, despite them trying to brand it this way. Newsflash: Being forced to work in the office for specified days of the week is NOT flex working. - The one "mental health day" that we got during lockdown was a joke, since some in HR openly noted that they still worked that same day. DO NOT BELIEVE the "Great Place to Work" awards that the U.S., UK, SG offices have "won," because LinkedIn tells a different story of some of the most amazing, insightful leaders who have left for personal reasons OR professional development. The average tenure of someone at TikTok, regardless of the location in the world, is 6 months - 1 year, and the high turnover rate is clearly indicative of the work culture. Highly advise anyone to look up videos by Chloe Shih, Jamie Lim Yin Yin, etc. (or just Google "why I left TikTok"), since they're highly accurate depictions, not just of my negative experience, but for countless others. Remember that you deserve better, so take your talents to any other tech company that doesn't work you to the core (996 culture). You deserve a company that doesn't make excuses about promotions AND that also values your contributions - so if you don't care about any of this, then sure, take a job here.

Explore other reviews about TikTok

5.0
Mar 31, 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Fine, high stress, high pressure, long working hours.

Cons

Frequent meetings with Asia. Basically no work life balance

2.0
Jun 15, 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Pay is level with industry and actual work is somewhat interesting depending on the team you're on

Cons

In my experience, career growth can feel very limited if you are not part of the dominant internal language and cultural network. A significant amount of important context, communication, and decision-making happens in Chinese, which can make non-Chinese-speaking employees feel excluded from key conversations and promotion opportunities. The environment did not feel as inclusive as it should be for a global company. Advancement often felt less tied to performance and more tied to whether you were connected to the right groups or able to operate fluently within the Chinese-speaking side of the organization. Over time, it felt like non-Chinese-speaking employees had fewer long-term career paths and were at risk of being replaced by people who could better fit that internal operating model. Things also move very slowly because employees are often given access only to the bare minimum needed to do their jobs. There is a heavy push toward using AI tools, but in practice it can make it harder to get help from real people. Instead of getting quick support, you often have to spend time going through AI bots or internal tools before getting a useful answer.

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