Former TikTok executive sues the company for alleged gender and age discrimination

Originally Published: 09 FEB 24 11:10 ET By Clare Duffy, CNN

New York (CNN) — A former TikTok senior executive is suing the company alleging that she experienced discrimination based on her age and gender during her three years working for the company.

Katie Puris, who worked in marketing at TikTok starting in 2019, says she faced uneven expectations as a woman, was retaliated against for raising concerns about the alleged treatment and was ultimately pushed out of the company in fall 2022, according to a complaint filed Thursday in the Southern District Court of New York.

Puris also alleges the company inadequately responded after she says she reported having been sexually harassed at an event she attended for work.

TikTok told Puris she had been fired for “performance reasons,” according to the complaint. TikTok did not respond to a request for comment about the lawsuit.

Puris’ lawsuit is not the first time the social media giant has come under fire for alleged discrimination.

Her claims come after two Black former US ByteDance employees filed a formal complaint with the US Equal Employment Opportunity Commission in September, asking the agency to investigate alleged racial discrimination and retaliation against Black workers at the company. At the time, a TikTok spokesperson told CNN that the company has “strong policies in place that prohibit discrimination, harassment, and retaliation in the workplace.”

In May 2023, Puris also filed a charge of discrimination and retaliation with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, prior to filing the lawsuit Thursday.

Puris most recently served as TikTok’s head of global brand and creative in the company’s New York office and previously worked in other senior marketing advertising and roles, including at Facebook and Google. One ad campaign she worked on while at TikTok was named to AdWeek’s list of “13 Campaigns That Made Ad Pros Jealous in 2021,” the complaint states.

After being invited to meet with a senior executive at TikTok parent company ByteDance starting in 2020, Puris “was subjected to disparate treatment” because senior leaders “determined that Ms. Puris lacked the docility and meekness specifically required of female employees,” the complaint states. It adds that “Ms. Puris, an accomplished executive who celebrated and advocated for her team’s successes, did not fit that stereotypical gender mold.”

According to the complaint, senior leaders at the company openly expressed a preference for hiring “young, less experienced employees who they believed to be more innovative and pliable.” When a separate manager later “implied that the Company did not want as many high-level employees … Ms. Puris understood this to reference her age,” the complaint states.

In early 2022, Puris raised concerns with human resources about her team’s “extreme workload” and the toll it was taking on their mental health and well-being, noting that “at least five members on the team have taken or are currently on medical leave this year due to the severe stress and pressure of the work,” the complaint states. It adds that Puris was informed that taking leave herself would impact her compensation.

Puris alleges that she faced various forms of retaliation after raising concerns with human resources and management that she was being discriminated against and that her health was suffering because of her workload, including receiving poor performance reviews and having the size of her team reduced. Puris was pressured by managers to give certain employees lower performance ratings, even when they didn’t deserve them, to justify their terminations, according to the complaint.

“In addition, after Ms. Puris’ protected complaints, TikTok began minimizing her in the Company and important decisions affecting her team were made without her input,” the complaint states.

While on a work trip with other TikTok marketing employees to the Cannes Lion event in June 2022, Puris says she was sexually harassed by an employee from one of the company’s business partners while at a work dinner. The individual was “slurring his speech, spilled an entire glass of wine on Ms. Puris’ plate, and began repeatedly touching Ms. Puris’ arm, asking her where to party after the dinner and where they could go dancing,” the complaint states, adding that a coworker eventually helped her exit the situation.

After reporting the incident to a manager the following day, Puris alleges it was nearly a week until she heard from TikTok’s ethics team and more than a month until she received confirmation that the business partner’s employee had been removed from the TikTok account.

The lawsuit may also add to the scrutiny TikTok was already facing in the United States over its connections to its Chinese parent company, ByteDance, which was again raised as an issue in a Senate hearing with social media leaders including TikTok CEO Shou Chew late last month.

Puris alleges that after Chew took over as TikTok’s chief executive in May 2021 in the face of scrutiny of China’s influence over the social media app, control of at least one key department remained with ByteDance leadership. The Global Business Solutions team, which Puris’ unit was a part of and which “controlled all of the advertising dollars generated by TikTok, and ultimately what, where and when ads ran,” continued to report up to a senior ByteDance executive in China, the complaint states.

Puris is seeking unspecified financial damages.

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