Create to Inspire: How Our Employees Make Impact Happen

What happens when you combine working at TikTok with creative genius? You get Employee Creators! Over the last six months, our Employee Creators in Southeast Asia (SEA) had the unique opportunity to create videos for our TikTok account (@LifeAtTikTok) and share their passion for their work with thousands of TikTok users across the globe.

At TikTok, we're all about creating to inspire! We encourage employees to create content for themselves in order to understand and be grounded in the real user experience. With unique insights to TikTok as employees and content creators, Hanoi Hantrakul and Syifa Azzahra shared their employee creator experience and how they've developed themselves as creators who inspire creativity and bring joy!

Introducing the Employee Creator Program

Established in 2020, the Employee Creator Program expanded to SEA earlier this year. With 30 employees in the program, they offer different perspectives on what it's like to work at TikTok.

"In my job, I'm responsible for figuring out how to use modern Artificial Intelligence research to empower creators to make music and art!" exclaims Hanoi, a global AI Research Scientist in the Speech, Audio and Music Intelligence Team (SAMI) based in Thailand.

Meanwhile, Syifa is a Creator Operations Manager with TikTok Shop Indonesia. "I plan livestreaming content for TikTok Creators and manage internal and external partners to execute creative initiatives for daily events and campaigns," she explains.

For many employees like Syifa, the Employee Creator Program provided an opportunity to network with likeminded Employee Creators at TikTok while developing their own content creation skills.

For Hanoi, seeing many incredible creators on TikTok inspired him to improve his video creation skills for his own content. He adds, "Our leadership team encourages employees to be creators themselves, so I saw this as an opportunity to do just that!"

Creating to Inspire - One TikTok at a Time

As part of the program, our Employee Creators bring users a behind the scenes look at what life at TikTok is like - everything from office tours, tips for your first day at the office, and fun anecdotes about our workplace. To make that possible, they aim for the highest! Our Employee Creators actively participate in regular sharing sessions with experts to learn the newest methods and use the latest tools to create TikToks.

When asked about his favorite TikTok he made for the program , Hanoi excitedly shares what he learned from an online storytelling course while in quarantine and how he put it into practice, such as adding jump cuts timed to the beat of the music. "By tightly synchronizing visuals to musical beats and elements, the video automatically becomes a lot more interesting," he explains.

"The program has played a big part in making TikTok videos a normal part of my self-expression; both in creative and professional domains," Hanoi continues. "In the past, my main mediums of communication were largely through writing articles, writing music, interviews and giving invited talks on the themes of music, technology and culture. Now, a short TikTok video has become a key part of how I communicate complicated ideas in a fun and succinct manner."

As part of Syifa's work at TikTok Shop, being a creative and dynamic individual is key in taking e-commerce to the next level. "I was able to learn new content creation skills during the program," she says. "The e-commerce industry is always expanding and being able to create content opens up many new opportunities for creatives."

In her first video, Syifa took viewers through what she does as a content strategist by featuring scenes from livestreams and previewing our production studios. She explains, "In this video, I was able to show what my job looks like and how we are as a team at TikTok!"

Making Their Mark on TikTok

Apart from growing their own skills as content creators and gaining exposure on a global platform, the ability to experience TikTok as a user has deepened their understanding of how their work at TikTok creates to inspire and impact users.

"I've gained a lot of insight into how I could improve my persona and creativity skills, which greatly accelerated my passion for content creation," Syifa says. "This program has helped me to become a great creator." She adds that this has helped her to collaborate with other content creators in her role as well.

"Making TikTok videos is incredibly important to my work," Hanoi reiterates. "It keeps me rooted in the mindset of the creators we are trying to empower with cutting edge technology. Our team has kickstarted viral music trends precisely because we pay attention to how TikTok users are using music and sound to express themselves, and how our research can supercharge that creativity."

TikTok's Employee Creators embody our mission to inspire creativity and bring joy - for teammates and more than a billion users on our platform. Are you interested in making impact happen by embracing unique opportunities and developing your career all while being an employee creator? Join us! Check our open positions here!