Workplace

Meet the TikTokers shedding light on all the biggest workplace issues

Creators who work in corporate roles said their TikToks have allowed them to highlight issues that otherwise wouldn’t be discussed.

TikToks on four phone screens.

Several creators have emerged on TikTok over the past couple of years to show the realities of the working world, from anxiety as a young employee to awkward interactions over Zoom.

Image: TikTok; Protocol

You remember two years ago, right? For a while it seemed that everyone working from home was gliding through their workday while either baking bread, meditating or baking bread while meditating. But Corporate Natalie knew this was never the reality for most.

So Natalie decided to show TikTok her day working from home: She rolls out of bed, throws on a sweater, eats a slice of cheese for breakfast, then brushes her teeth just before her first meeting begins. “During this time I’ll pretend to be engaged with people on Zoom, respond to emails saying ‘please fix,’ and contemplate my overall purpose in life,” she said in the video.

The video is a slight exaggeration of what it’s like to work from home, but it resonated with her followers. It was one of the first to go viral on Natalie’s platform, which over 370,000 people now follow. She’s not necessarily catering to a more niche audience of HR professionals and new workers, and she’s not creating for everyone like Charli D’Amelio, but her sizable following makes her what the influencer biz calls a “macro-influencer.”

Natalie, who doesn’t reveal her last name or the company she works for on social media, told Protocol “I think that was a very realistic depiction of, ‘We're all going through this really terrifying cycle — and then we do it all over again,” she said.

Corporate Natalie is one of several creators who have emerged on TikTok over the past couple of years to show the realities of the working world, from anxiety as a young employee to awkward interactions over Zoom. During the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, creators said the videos gave people content to bond over. But they’ve since evolved as a way to explain how the workplace has changed since the onset of remote work and bring up workplace topics seldom discussed at work, like microaggressions and mental health.

“I was in a super traditional work setting before my current job," Natalie said. "And I'm trying to hold on to elements of that. I think what really plays is the super uptight coworker who was utterly unprepared when thrown into this new work-from-home world.”

Ekow Sanni-Thomas runs the TikTok account for the company he founded, inside voices, an online platform that helps job seekers understand how companies treat people of color. Sanni-Thomas started the account a few months ago to make people aware of inside voices, but it’s grown into a platform where he can help workers of color understand that their experiences with discrimination or bias at work aren’t uncommon. Sanni-Thomas said users also take to the comment sections of his videos to educate themselves on racism at work.

“It's really common for professionals of color to stray away from discussing anything to do with race,” he told Protocol. “Sensitive issues are pretty hard to bring up in the workplace as it is — race is obviously a really difficult one — and when it comes to microaggressions, I think people are often surprised to see some of the things in my videos that speak so closely to their experience.”


Sanni-Thomas said TikTok lends itself to these conversations in a way platforms like LinkedIn and Twitter can’t because users can use comical trends to speak to nuanced topics. He pointed to one video about his reaction to companies hiring a white head of diversity. He mouthed the viral sound, “That’ll do it. You don’t have to worry about me, you do not have to worry about me.” Sanni-Thomas picked up his briefcase and walked away from his desk in the TikTok.

“That was a very on-the-nose way to describe my reaction to that without having to go into the multilayered explanation of why I feel that way,” he said. “If I were to tweet randomly, if the company announced the white head of diversity, it would feel like an attack. But in the form of this comical trend, it's palatable and it's acceptable.”

Creator Jazmyn W. agreed that TikTok is a more comfortable medium to express frustrations in the workplace around racism. While her platform is not solely based on workplace issues, she creates videos around her previous experience as a Black woman working in HR. She’s created a whole series around “things white women say that just don’t make sense,” which has prompted conversations in the comment section of those videos.

“Black women are like, ‘Yes, I've had this said to me.’ Then women of color are like ‘Absolutely,’” she said. “Then white women who follow me are like, ‘I've said this, I didn't even know I shouldn't say this.’ And then the rest of the white women are like, ‘I didn't even know I shouldn't say that.’”

@jazmynjw This is based on a TRUE STORY & she probably gonna see this 😂 #blackatwork#corporatelife#tech#fyp♬ original sound - Jazmyn W

Jazmyn, who does not share her last name anywhere on social media, added that companies like Google have reached out in response to her videos to talk about her experiences while working a corporate job. “I talk about my experience and I do it in a funny way,” she said. “And then employees ask questions about my experience.”

DeAndre Brown, who refers to himself as “The Corporate Baddie” on TikTok, taps into Gen Z humor to explain what it’s like to work in a corporate job through his TikTok account. Over 240,000 people now follow Brown’s account, which includes a mix of advice and humor about the working world.

Brown said his videos are a slight exaggeration of what it’s like to work as a member of Gen Z. Younger workers aren’t necessarily emailing HR in an instant when a co-worker breaks a boundary, and they’re not always asking for more money the minute someone asks them to take on a new project. But Brown said younger workers are starting to discuss setting boundaries and ensuring they’re paid fairly, and his videos are a reflection of that.

“It's a joke, but honestly, it's also serious,” Brown said.

Fintech

Judge Zia Faruqui is trying to teach you crypto, one ‘SNL’ reference at a time

His decisions on major cryptocurrency cases have quoted "The Big Lebowski," "SNL," and "Dr. Strangelove." That’s because he wants you — yes, you — to read them.

The ways Zia Faruqui (right) has weighed on cases that have come before him can give lawyers clues as to what legal frameworks will pass muster.

Photo: Carolyn Van Houten/The Washington Post via Getty Images

“Cryptocurrency and related software analytics tools are ‘The wave of the future, Dude. One hundred percent electronic.’”

That’s not a quote from "The Big Lebowski" — at least, not directly. It’s a quote from a Washington, D.C., district court memorandum opinion on the role cryptocurrency analytics tools can play in government investigations. The author is Magistrate Judge Zia Faruqui.

Keep ReadingShow less
Veronica Irwin

Veronica Irwin (@vronirwin) is a San Francisco-based reporter at Protocol covering fintech. Previously she was at the San Francisco Examiner, covering tech from a hyper-local angle. Before that, her byline was featured in SF Weekly, The Nation, Techworker, Ms. Magazine and The Frisc.

The financial technology transformation is driving competition, creating consumer choice, and shaping the future of finance. Hear from seven fintech leaders who are reshaping the future of finance, and join the inaugural Financial Technology Association Fintech Summit to learn more.

Keep ReadingShow less
FTA
The Financial Technology Association (FTA) represents industry leaders shaping the future of finance. We champion the power of technology-centered financial services and advocate for the modernization of financial regulation to support inclusion and responsible innovation.
Enterprise

AWS CEO: The cloud isn’t just about technology

As AWS preps for its annual re:Invent conference, Adam Selipsky talks product strategy, support for hybrid environments, and the value of the cloud in uncertain economic times.

Photo: Noah Berger/Getty Images for Amazon Web Services

AWS is gearing up for re:Invent, its annual cloud computing conference where announcements this year are expected to focus on its end-to-end data strategy and delivering new industry-specific services.

It will be the second re:Invent with CEO Adam Selipsky as leader of the industry’s largest cloud provider after his return last year to AWS from data visualization company Tableau Software.

Keep ReadingShow less
Donna Goodison

Donna Goodison (@dgoodison) is Protocol's senior reporter focusing on enterprise infrastructure technology, from the 'Big 3' cloud computing providers to data centers. She previously covered the public cloud at CRN after 15 years as a business reporter for the Boston Herald. Based in Massachusetts, she also has worked as a Boston Globe freelancer, business reporter at the Boston Business Journal and real estate reporter at Banker & Tradesman after toiling at weekly newspapers.

Image: Protocol

We launched Protocol in February 2020 to cover the evolving power center of tech. It is with deep sadness that just under three years later, we are winding down the publication.

As of today, we will not publish any more stories. All of our newsletters, apart from our flagship, Source Code, will no longer be sent. Source Code will be published and sent for the next few weeks, but it will also close down in December.

Keep ReadingShow less
Bennett Richardson

Bennett Richardson ( @bennettrich) is the president of Protocol. Prior to joining Protocol in 2019, Bennett was executive director of global strategic partnerships at POLITICO, where he led strategic growth efforts including POLITICO's European expansion in Brussels and POLITICO's creative agency POLITICO Focus during his six years with the company. Prior to POLITICO, Bennett was co-founder and CMO of Hinge, the mobile dating company recently acquired by Match Group. Bennett began his career in digital and social brand marketing working with major brands across tech, energy, and health care at leading marketing and communications agencies including Edelman and GMMB. Bennett is originally from Portland, Maine, and received his bachelor's degree from Colgate University.

Enterprise

Why large enterprises struggle to find suitable platforms for MLops

As companies expand their use of AI beyond running just a few machine learning models, and as larger enterprises go from deploying hundreds of models to thousands and even millions of models, ML practitioners say that they have yet to find what they need from prepackaged MLops systems.

As companies expand their use of AI beyond running just a few machine learning models, ML practitioners say that they have yet to find what they need from prepackaged MLops systems.

Photo: artpartner-images via Getty Images

On any given day, Lily AI runs hundreds of machine learning models using computer vision and natural language processing that are customized for its retail and ecommerce clients to make website product recommendations, forecast demand, and plan merchandising. But this spring when the company was in the market for a machine learning operations platform to manage its expanding model roster, it wasn’t easy to find a suitable off-the-shelf system that could handle such a large number of models in deployment while also meeting other criteria.

Some MLops platforms are not well-suited for maintaining even more than 10 machine learning models when it comes to keeping track of data, navigating their user interfaces, or reporting capabilities, Matthew Nokleby, machine learning manager for Lily AI’s product intelligence team, told Protocol earlier this year. “The duct tape starts to show,” he said.

Keep ReadingShow less
Kate Kaye

Kate Kaye is an award-winning multimedia reporter digging deep and telling print, digital and audio stories. She covers AI and data for Protocol. Her reporting on AI and tech ethics issues has been published in OneZero, Fast Company, MIT Technology Review, CityLab, Ad Age and Digiday and heard on NPR. Kate is the creator of RedTailMedia.org and is the author of "Campaign '08: A Turning Point for Digital Media," a book about how the 2008 presidential campaigns used digital media and data.

Latest Stories
Bulletins