Internal Friction in TikTok Causing Staff Exodus After Maternity Leave Remarks

TikTok says investigations are currently underway after a senior executive of the company's European e-commerce division allegedly made remarks about how he does not believe that companies should offer maternity leave. Joshua Ma, the head of the European e-commerce division of TikTok is reportedly stepping back from his role as a senior executive. These reports came after he allegedly made claims disparaging the concept and importance of maternity leaves for firms.

According to a report in the Financial Times, Ma said that as a capitalist, he did not believe that corporations or companies should offer maternity leave. The said report also remarked that the UK-based executive will take some time off and will step back from his position.

A TikTok spokesperson said that they are currently investigating the alleged statements and actions of the e-commerce division head to determine whether or not there has been a breach of the policies of the company. A culture clash between the Chinese owners of TikTok and some of its London employees has resulted in friction and a significant staff exodus because the company's aggressive climate runs counter to the typical UK work environments.

Struggles in UK-based TikTok

The alleged statements were said to have been commented within the context of the turbulent launch of The TikTok Shop service which arrived in the UK-based company in October. Bloomberg has previously reported that TikTok Shop began testing early last year to try in-app shopping to challenge Facebook and work with brands to sell items to users. The main feature of the app service allows its creators to host a live-shopping experience to its followers and viewers. This QVC-style of live shopping has been successful on Douyin, which is TikTok's Chinese sister app. However, compared to the successful launch and leap in services on Douyin and other TikTok Shop in other Asian markets, the UK TikTok Shop has struggled to gain traction.

According to a report in The Guardian, hosts and brands are subsidized by TikTok regularly. Said subsidy results in great discounts in sales. However, the current strategies of the UK TikTok shop have failed to garner a stable returning audience. In addition, the platform is struggling because of potential counterfeiting problems. For example, sales that are subsidized may have too-good-to-be-true prices, but these are also undercut by other items that also have too-good-to-be-true prices. Such issues leave users wondering if the low prices are due to subsidies or a scam.

Internal Turbulence

According to a former employee from the London-based team, the culture is really toxic as relationships are built on fear and not cooperation. The company allegedly doesn't care about burnout as each one is replaceable. Employees have complained about unrealistic targets from sales from live streams and TikTok takes a 5% commission which is sometimes waived to entice brands and creators to use the service on the platform.

People who failed to meet targets or respond to work requests were reprimanded according to a former member of the leadership team.