WSJ News Exclusive | TikTok Pares Pandemic-Era Perks in Return to Office Push

The company gave employees a little more than a month’s notice that they would be expected back in the office, said the people familiar with the situation. The Chinese-owned social-media company hired thousands of employees after exploding in popularity following Covid-19 lockdowns in early 2020, with most of them working remotely.

Many of those people weren’t working in places that corresponded with the locations of the offices where they were expected to be based. Those employees were advised that it is now time to begin moving to the location of their offices, a TikTok spokeswoman said.

Some employees said that as part of the return to work effort, they were told they would no longer be receiving reimbursement for Wi-Fi and gym bills. The spokeswoman said there hasn’t been a companywide change to those types of expenses.

For U.S. workers not tied to the company’s main hubs in Los Angeles and Mountain View, Calif., those employees are also losing a meal stipend of $45 a day, the people said. The company is working to bring food catering to its offices to make up for the loss of the meal stipend, the spokeswoman said.

“Our goal is to create a positive office environment for in-person collaboration that meets the needs of a global team while providing flexibility for employees to work remotely,” the spokeswoman said. The company “will continue to offer various benefits to help make our hybrid work approach as smooth as possible.”

TikTok’s changes follow a string of moves and pronouncements from tech executives warning of belt-tightening designed to reduce costs and boost productivity.

Sundar Pichai,

the chief executive officer of Google parent

Alphabet Inc.

told staff last month to work with “greater urgency, sharper focus and more hunger than we’ve shown on sunnier days.”

Meta Platforms Inc.

CEO

Mark Zuckerberg

said in late July that the Facebook owner must operate with greater intensity. “I expect us to get more done with fewer resources,” he said.

Some tech companies have also been scaling back the perks that have long been associated with the industry.

At some TikTok locations, the return of large numbers of employees has put a stress on some of the company’s offices because there are not enough work stations, meeting rooms and parking spaces to accommodate everyone, the people familiar with the situation said.

The TikTok spokeswoman said the company has instituted desk-booking software that employees can use to ensure they will have a desk when they come in. The demand for desks hasn’t exceeded supply on any day for any of the company’s locations, she said, adding that TikTok is actively seeking to expand real estate to accommodate its workforce at several locations better.

In Mountain View, there are more than 1,200 employees, while the facility was only intended for 600 people, one of the people said. The Austin, Texas, office, which is two floors at a WeWork facility, now holds more than 600 employees. Some Austin employees have complained about the price of parking, which can be as high as $50 a day. The spokeswoman said the company is offering a $150 a month parking stipend to employees at some of its locations.

TikTok has allowed employees to apply for 60-day deferrals related to the return to office policy. Employees can also apply for long-term remote work, but that requires several levels of approval from human resources and the head of their department. Some approvals are going to

Lidong Zhang,

the chairman of the Chinese parent company, ByteDance Ltd., one of the people said.

Employees who request long-term remote work must reapply every six months and provide documentation, such as a doctor’s note. Employees must apply if they are going to work remotely in a different state than the one that corresponds with their home office, the spokeswoman said.

Some employees have resigned from the company in the wake of the return to office policy, according to people familiar with the decisions. They said that the policy changes alone didn’t spur the resignations, but that the company’s demanding work culture was a factor as well.

Write to Salvador Rodriguez at [email protected]