Why some tech workers are turning down jobs at TikTok | Hacker News Reader

Why some tech workers are turning down jobs at TikTok

cnbc.com

22 pointsmonsieurpng18 comments

Only 72 hours a week, that's adorable ... When the iPhone first released at Apple I was working 100ish hours a week ...

In all seriousness, I was in my 20s, Apple was the dream job, and I was foolish. When you work those kind of hours you are donating money to those own the company. If you are lucky like I was you'll get some of it back. Most do not.

At 100 hours a week you are also highly ineffective and are wasting company time.

The important thing to understand, it's not because of some important business deadline. It's not about business goal at all.

It's a very cultural thing, partially a work culture rooted in factory-style production instead of innovation, quality, and mastery, partially a status thing a symbol of control and "ownership" over the workforce. Welcome to China.

I went through an interview loop for their platform engineering team.

The technical depth that the interview went was not very deep. They were asking me questions about how I would replace a CPU in a server. Physical server. The whole interview was just one person after another asking basic questions, and then they said they wanted to extend me an offer. Not a very competitive one at that.

Culture also seems like an issue, as you have to use their internal translation apps to talk to mainland coworkers and I didn't get a good vibe about general skill on staff. And that is before the fact that it's China.

I wouldn't have taken the job even if they weren't chineese linked. It did not sound like a great environment to work in, nor one where you could shine.

996 is already the norm at places like Facebook and Amazon (stack ranking means you have to work the same number of hours to deliver similar results as your overworking colleagues).

There are far fewer tech companies that pay as well as ByteDance (aka TikTok) -- by that, I mean 95th percentile of market pay -- but DON'T have these kinds of working hours. Google is one of the rare exceptions.

If you want to actually be able to afford a house in the Bay Area, your options are limited.

I work at Facebook, your assertion that 996 is the norm is insanely unfounded.

I also worked at Facebook, and I agree with the other posters that 996 was not the norm or anywhere near it. My desk area would be deserted at 5:30. Most weekends 0% of people worked, occasionally you’d get an email Sunday night from someone.

I've worked at Amazon for 10 years on 3 AWS teams and 1 Retail team.

The most I ever worked was on a project a couple of months before re:invent when I did 60 hour weeks.

The rest of the time, it was mostly about 45-50 hours/week.

Facebook does not have stack ranking — de facto or otherwise. You mention that Google is somehow an exception, but I think you'll find that in terms of the PSC (review cycle), the attitude towards work and flexibility, and the expectations, the two are basically indistinguishable.

I also heard those rumors, though not all my FB friends are working on a 996 schedule. Would have been helpful if there is a survey for this.

You should take a look at https://www.levels.fyi/ to recalibrate your pay bands

I get bad vibes from the tik-tok/Bytedance recruiters who would contact me. It seemed obvious to me that they were going to expect 996 style work-ethic, and even for the "300-400k+" they were quoting, I don't think it's worth it at all.

> “Everyone there is utterly miserable, and life is too short,” the source said. “During my first year before the pandemic hit, I can count possibly four or five weekends during the year where I did not work.”

Just typical Mainland China company, checking HQ location should be enough to make the right decision.

Addition (from reply below):

"It's a very cultural thing, partially a work culture rooted in factory-style production instead of innovation, quality, and mastery, partially a status thing, a symbol of control and "ownership" over the workforce. Welcome to China."

@TikTok employees: any thoughts?

They don't have time to see this.

I work at tiktok in mountain view and this article seems exaggerated. I don't know about the UK office but while there are may be folks in the US working 996, most of my peers do not have that schedule. If I were to stereotype with my biases, I'd say the hours would be similar to a FB/Amazon (>=45 hrs/wk) than a Google (<=40hrs) but that some members of teams here may also have 1-2 nights a week with 7PM calls (10AM Shanghai). Although, if you're a team lead or manager, you may have more frequent alignment meetings.

I think certain teams and functions may have higher demands perhaps due to lack of resourcing, sudden business priorities, or a need to resolve ambiguities during the transition of a scope but it feels like it's getting better overall. From my experience, people will work overtime if needed but definitely not for the sake of a 996.

TL;DR: poor work life balance, location isn’t flexible

Another reason not to work at Tik Tok is that they are simply not to be trusted with their size and influence. They are very aggressive with their censorship. It’s surprising given that they are based in China, but I’ve seen them ban content that goes against American progressive views more aggressively than even Twitter or Reddit or Facebook. For moderates and conservatives, it means this giant network amplifies everyone else and suppresses them. In other markets they implement different policies that are similarly aggressive but with different biases. Their practices are unacceptable and tech workers shouldn’t help bolster such anti-free-speech organizations.

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