Safety Support Team Lead - Customer Support

About the Team

The Safety Support Team Lead empowers a dedicated team of frontline Support Specialists delivering safe, high-quality, and user-centric support across the TikTok US ecosystem. The team resolves user safety inquiries, account integrity issues, policy enforcement appeals, and critical safety incidents at scale. This role is directly accountable for frontline operational excellence, daily performance metrics, and team coaching, transforming high-level support strategies into seamless execution while ensuring high SLA adherence and exceptional resolution quality.

Responsibilities

• Frontline Team Leadership & People Management
  • Direct Team Management: Lead, mentor, and foster a high-performing team of frontline Safety Support Specialists. Conduct regular 1:1s, performance reviews, and career development coaching.
  • Shift & Coverage Execution: Manage daily team roster, shift allocation, real-time queue management, and shrinkage to ensure robust around-the-clock coverage and SLA compliance across all assigned channels and queues.
  • Culture & Resilience: Build a resilient, support-oriented, and inclusive team culture, recognizing the unique emotional and operational demands of handling complex user safety and account issues.
• Operational Excellence & Scenario Metric Ownership
  • Metric Accountability: Own and drive end-to-end operational metrics for your team and specific support scenarios, including Customer Satisfaction (CSAT), Reply Rate, Average Handling Time (AHT), SLA Adherence, and Service Quality Scores.
  • Escalation Handling: Act as the primary operational point of contact for complex, high-stakes, or time-critical safety escalations, applying sound judgment and deep policy knowledge to ensure accurate resolution.
  • SOP & Quality Enforcement: Ensure frontline specialists strictly adhere to operational SOPs, safety policies, and compliance guidelines. Partner with QA and Training teams to identify skill gaps and deliver targeted refresher training.
• Process Improvement & Cross-Functional Collaboration
  • Root-Cause Feedback: Analyze daily queue trends, contact drivers, and agent feedback to identify systemic workflow friction, SOP ambiguity, or tool glitches.
  • Cross-Functional Synergy: Partner closely with internal Workflow & SOP, VoC Insight, and Quality/Training teams to continuously optimize support templates, knowledge base articles, and operational workflows.
  • Incident Response Support: Assist operations leadership and global partners during localized safety incidents, policy updates, or new product feature rollouts to ensure frontline readiness.

Qualifications

Minimum Qualifications:

• 3+ years of progressive experience in Customer Support, User Operations, or Trust & Safety, with 2+ years of direct people management experience leading frontline teams/agents.
• Proven track record of managing frontline team performance against strict operational KPIs (CSAT, SLA, AHT, QA) in a high-volume, fast-paced environment.
• Strong critical thinking and decision-making skills, with experience managing complex, high-risk user escalations with discretion and sound judgment.
• Exceptional interpersonal skills with a passion for developing talent, delivering constructive feedback, and coaching team members to high performance.
• Ability to remain composed, adapt quickly to changing platform policies, and manage shifting operational priorities.

Preferred Qualifications:

• Prior experience in Trust & Safety, Content Moderation, Account Integrity, or High-Risk Customer Support in digital platform or social media industries.
• Experience managing teams operating in an around-the-clock shift environment.
• Familiarity with ticketing systems and workforce management (WFM) concepts.
• Experience collaborating with BPO partners, internal Standards teams, or cross-functional Product/Policy stakeholders.

About USDS

TikTok USDS Joint Venture LLC is dedicated to the safety and security of millions of Americans who create, discover, and connect with what they love on the apps we operate. The Joint Venture complies with the Executive Order signed by President Trump on September 25, 2025, and operates under a comprehensive data privacy and cybersecurity program to protect national security and secure U.S. user data, apps, and the algorithm. USDS safeguards the U.S. content ecosystem, holding decision-making authority for trust and safety policies and moderation. The company ensures Americans can continue to express creativity, discover new interests, and build communities and businesses globally.

On-site presence across teams enables greater speed, alignment, and agility—especially in real-time decision-making, team development, and integrated execution. As such, the company is shifting to a fully in-person schedule up to 5 days a week.

Why Join Us

TikTok’s mission is to inspire creativity. Our innovative product helps people authentically express themselves, discover, and connect. We create value for our communities, inspire creativity, and bring joy. We strive to do great things with great people, leading with curiosity, humility, and a desire to make an impact in a rapidly growing tech company. Every challenge is an opportunity to learn and innovate as one team. We embrace resilience and an "Always Day 1" mindset to achieve meaningful breakthroughs for ourselves, our company, and our users. When we create and grow together, the possibilities are limitless.