Qu Jing stepped down on Thursday, in accordance to people today common with the make any difference, just after putting up at the very least four videos in which she talked about holding her mobile phone on 24-7 and warned subordinates to toe the line. “I’m not your mom-in-legislation,” she reported in a single of the clips she posted to Douyin, China’s model of TikTok.

The executive’s feedback reverberated throughout social media in China, in which a discussion has raged about the calls for that a then-intense tech industry positioned on its normally younger workforce. Dubbed “996” since of the inclination to desire employees function 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. 6 times a 7 days, the observe arrived less than scrutiny following the unexplained fatalities of numerous tech workers built headlines.

Beijing warned businesses off excessive perform through a broader crackdown on the strong sector that began in 2020, even though the exercise has endured — particularly as jobs dried up in an economic downturn. Qu afterwards apologized, expressing those people have been her personal sights and not Baidu’s.

A Baidu spokesperson did not react to textual content messages trying to find comment.

Whilst Qu drew a myriad of outraged responses, some commentators on social media stated she was merely talking the basic truth of the matter about an sector that’s now struggling to improve. The govt experienced deleted her videos as of Friday and her web site just carried her apology.