After 14 years, Sheryl Sandberg is stepping down as COO of Meta.
Since 2008, Sandberg has been Mark Zuckerberg’s right-hand lady and largely accountable for constructing Meta (the corporate previously often known as Fb) into the revenue-generating social media behemoth it’s at present. As Zuckerberg famous in a touch upon Sandberg’s farewell post, it marks “The top of an period.”
From its humble beginnings as a snarky social media platform created in a Harvard dorm room to its modern-day incarnation because the conglomerate that now contains Fb, Instagram, and WhatsApp, Meta has typically been on the middle of controversies that embrace main privateness violations, dissemination and propagation of misinformation and hate speech, and coercive algorithms.
In her publish, Sandberg addressed these controversies with the tone of a valedictorian on graduation day. “The talk round social media has modified past recognition since these early days. To say it hasn’t at all times been straightforward is an understatement. However it needs to be arduous. The merchandise we make have a huge effect, so we’ve got the duty to construct them in a approach that protects privateness and retains folks protected.” What an extended unusual journey it has been. Have a very good summer time!
Sandberg reminisced within the publish about her time at Meta. When she joined the crew, Sandberg and Zuck had been the Silicon Valley odd couple: She was the 38-year-old advert exec from Google, he was the 23-year-old sweatshirt-wearing wunderkind. However it proved to be a fortuitous match. Tasked with monetizing the social media platform, Sandberg made Facebook profitable via promoting, they usually each grew to become billionaires when Meta went public in 2014.
When Sandberg first joined Meta, she was additionally a mom of two younger youngsters and used her energy and affect on the firm to talk up in regards to the challenges that girls face within the office. Sandberg is a vocal advocate of girls’s initiatives and has revealed a number of books and based a non-profit on the topic, though her strategy has additionally been criticized for being inflexible and elitist.
Talking of parenting, Sandberg has actually been a mentor to Zuckerberg over the previous 14 years. Not included in Sandberg’s announcement had been the democracy-threatening crises that she has helped Zuckerberg navigate over time. There was Russia’s use of Meta and different social media platforms to disseminate pretend information within the 2016 presidential election, the Cambridge Analytica scandal that collected information from Meta customers with out their information, and the newer whistleblower leaks and subsequent congressional hearings.
Sandberg did not specify what she can be doing subsequent however stated that she would proceed to serve on Meta’s board of administrators, and focus extra on her basis and philanthropic work. Sandberg will stay in her function as COO till the autumn.
UPDATE: Jun. 2, 2022, 9:39 a.m. EDT Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg says Javier Olivan, the corporate’s chief progress officer, shall be Sandberg’s successor.
