TikTok Employees Face PIP or Severance Choice During Reviews

We’re stepping into the high-stake world of TikTok and its parent company, ByteDance, as they plunge into their performance review season for U.S. staff. It’s a bit cut-throat, I must say, with employees who don’t score blinkingly bright being thrust into a performance-improvement plan, otherwise known as a PIP, or nudged towards severance.

Now, this isn’t a rare event by any measure. TikTok takes its employees on this intense roller-coaster ride twice each year. What ups the ante, however, is this: last year, the powers-that-be instructed managers to not hold back on assigning those dreaded low scores, says Business Insider.

According to those living this reality, choosing a PIP over severance tends to be the road less traveled due to the high bar set for success under a PIP—that’s quite the steep climb! One employee dubbed this process a “meat grinder of performance reviews”—quite visual, don’t you think?

The employees shared that the value of severance offers varied, some even including a blissful month of “garden leave.” Now that’s a phrase I like! It’s when employees get to kick back and remain on the payroll without having to work. This was often followed by another month’s payout as part of a mutual separation agreement.

A TikTok spokesperson did confirm the use of PIPs as a practice. However, the question we should all be asking is—what impact do these practices have on underrepresented communities? That’s a conversation we all need to be part of!