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If you have spent more than a few hours on TikTok, you’ve likely run into an unlikely influencer who goes by The Job Doctor. In a world where teenage dancers prevail, she found a home as a serious career navigation coach, who doesn’t have to dance to get people’s attention.
Known as Tessa White outside of the familiar social media app, The Job Doctor is a human resources executive, having worked with many prominent Fortune 50 companies. Before her star-turning performance on TikTok, Tessa helped companies like United HealthGroup and Vivint Solar Team to build engaging and creative workforces. Thanks to her high-level work, Tessa has been a frequent contributor to platforms like Forbes, Apple News, Inc., and Entrepreneur.
Billing herself as a reformed human resources executive, Tessa White has spent the past several years dedicating her time and passion toward reaching the most unreachable of generations as she helps to prepare them for a rapidly changing workplace. For the Gen Z and millennials of the world, learning to become a leader has potentially never been easier.
Let’s take a moment to get to know Tessa White as well as her role in helping Gen Z and millennials become professionals in their targeted fields.
From Corporate Offices to TikTok’s FYP
After spending two decades in Fortune 50 companies as leading the people strategy for companies, Tessa found herself in Vivint Solar, a company made up almost exclusively of Gen Z and Millennial employees. Through her experience there, she realized an evolution was taking place in the workforce. Many of the company programs had to shift to address these new trends: moving from annual pay to variable pay that could immediately reward top performers, to changing the training strategy to short 5 minute clips, to ditching traditional recruiting to move into social media as a primary strategy .
Leaving her C-suite career to help individuals navigate the workforce was the next challenge. Meeting this generation of workers where they were spending time, was her first stop. TikTok as the fastest growing social application, with over xxxx downloads every day last year. Her Millennial daughter, fresh into her first career job in marketing, suggested TikTok.
One thing the career coach noted was that millennials had a very different outlook on the world as well as the expectations they had for the company that they worked for. She felt there was a lack of credible experts with the expertise she could bring to the platform. Not only did she have the she have decades of data watching careers rise or fall, but she also had hands-on experience seeing how the generational shift in mindset was creating additional disconnects in the workforce. This gave Tessa the forethought to establish The Job Doctor, a social media model long-overdue to reach a new generation of career builders.
Going Viral While Providing Employee Leadership
There are many different ways to reach the younger generation and providing honest, concise, and fast-paced guidance was the path chosen by the Job Doctor. It was 3 days after establishing her account in late October of 2020, amidst the COVID-19 pandemic, that JobDoctorTessa logged in to find more than 10,000 new followers. By the end of her first month, Tessa was averaging 1k new followers per day, and receiving over 200 messages per day. Something Tessa had to say was reaching her targeted audience and they were responding accordingly.
As the Job Doctor on TikTok and Instagram, Tessa began to develop content that delivered career and interviewing help in 30 second segments. Keeping with the needs of millennial and Gen Z employees, she covered pay negotiation, how to interview, dealing with workplace conflict, and how to become more promotable.
While much of her advice may seem too fast-paced for the average consumer, Tessa understands her target audience perfectly. The younger generation of business leaders and experts learns to advocate for themselves through social media, through targeted content, and concise advice. TikTok became the perfect platform for the work Tessa endeavored to do.
What surprised her the most with her instant influencer status, was the audience that she was attracting. Within months, she had been “discovered” by media across the nation. The Job Doctor was being featured on Forbes, CNN, Wall Street Journal, as well as nationally syndicated shows such as GMA and The Doctors. Her unique approach to business even caught the eye of Disruptors Magazine where she was listed as one the top business women to watch in 2021.
Empowering the Next Generation
From the COVID-19 pandemic to the general shift toward social media, Tessa was quick to understand that today’s generation of professionals will differ dramatically from those of yesteryear. Instant interaction through platforms like Clubhouse and TikTok requires the kind of content that can be consumed at any time, at any place, and by anyone.
Tessa suggests that today’s workforce wants “cliff notes” on anything so that they can tackle the process themselves and that is exactly what her bite-sized TikTok videos provide. Whether she’s guiding her clients through the 10 Career Commandments or she is teaching them about the 5 Lies of the Workforce, as well as their corresponding truths, people are gaining insights in a digestible and actionable format.
Tessa’s videos are often crafted in a fun “Do This, Not That!” format that keeps information flowing and attention sharp. Realizing that younger professionals both want and deserve fast results, Tessa began to lean into this style of content.
With millions of views every month on TikTok, and over 600,000 loyal followers on social media, it seems like The Job Doctor is only just getting started on her journey of transforming careers and re-engaging employees in the workforce.
With private rent-my-brain options and small group career mentoring, The Job Doctor hopes that her influence will be felt for decades, in the career success of the next generation.
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