Pappas was TikTok’s most senior executive in the U.S. and was interim chief before the hiring of TikTok’s current chief, Shou Zi Chew. Chew, who is based in Singapore, said in an email to employees Thursday obtained by The Washington Post that Pappas had stepped down “to refocus on their entrepreneurial passions.”
Chew told employees Thursday that the executive changes were intended to “evolve” the company’s organizational structure, including the promotion of TikTok chief of staff Adam Presser to head of operations and the hiring of a Disney veteran, Zenia Mucha, to become the company’s chief brand and communications officer.
“This is a big moment for TikTok,” said Reuven Ashtar, chief executive of the creator management company Never Napping. “It signifies a shift that will get to the core of whether TikTok remains a creator hub and how it might move to embrace Hollywood and media.”
The move was also greeted with angst among TikTok employees, two of whom told The Post that recent reorganizations have contributed to a sense of doubt and disorganization inside the company. Eric Han, the U.S. head of trust and safety, left the company last month.
Pappas had once served as the face of the company on Capitol Hill, including during a fiery Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee hearing in September, where members of Congress grilled the executive over TikTok parent company ByteDance’s Chinese roots.
Pappas also built close relationships with the video makers and influencers that have become the lifeblood of modern social media. Pappas served on a formative team at YouTube, which Pappas left in 2018, that coined the term “creator” in its modern usage.
Pappas, who previously used the name Vanessa, came out as nonbinary in February and prefers they/them pronouns.
Pappas led TikTok through a rocky period after Kevin Mayer left as chief executive after a only few months in 2020, citing his frustrations over political acrimony between TikTok and the Trump administration.
Where Chew was reserved in public appearances, Pappas was known for a more candid approach. In March, Pappas told attendees at a Los Angeles summit that some of U.S. lawmakers’ suspicion of TikTok’s Chinese connection was predicated on “xenophobia.”
In a note to employees Thursday, Pappas said they’d take an advisory role at the company but offered no other indication of future work.
“I took a gamble on what was then a completely unknown company and product and followed my intuition,” Pappas wrote. “Five years later, we have grown to a global team of thousands. … I finally feel the time is right to move on.”
TikTok says it has more than 1 billion monthly active users, including more than 100 million in the U.S. But the company is facing an existential threat from U.S. lawmakers and government officials, who have expressed interest in heavily regulating or banning the company due to fears of Chinese-government involvement.
It’s unclear how Pappas’ move will affect the company’s ongoing negotiations with the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States, the federal agency that reviews corporate deals for national-security concerns.
The executive shift also comes as TikTok fights to ensure its dominance of the online market for quick, colorful videos, including competition from new entrants from American tech giants Facebook, Instagram and YouTube.
“There’s obviously a race to be the platform that’s monetizing short-form content enough for creators to care,” Jordan Matter, a family content creator in Los Angeles with more than 5 million TikTok followers. “YouTube so far is the closest to that, so for TikTok to maintain their position as the titan of short form, they’re going to have to find a way to monetize the content more significantly.”
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.
