Sheryl Sandberg is leaving her role as Chief Operating Officer of Meta, formerly known as Facebook. Javier Olivan, Chief Growth Officer of Meta, will take over the position this fall.
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Sandberg joined Facebook as CEO and co-founder Mark Zuckerberg’s No. 2 in early 2008. She helped to turn the company into an advertising giant and one of the most powerful corporations in the digital industry, with a market cap that once reached USD 1 trillion. Prior to Meta, Sandberg worked in the Clinton administration’s Treasury Department before joining Google in 2001 to assist expand the company’s advertising division.
“Looking forward, I don’t plan to replace Sheryl’s role in our existing structure. I’m not sure that would be possible since she’s a superstar who defined the COO role in her own unique way,” said Zuckerberg, founder of Meta, in a Facebook post.
“But even if it were possible, I think Meta has reached the point where it makes sense for our product and business groups to be more closely integrated, rather than having all the business and operations functions organised separately from our products,” he said.
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Sandberg claimed that stepping down will allow her to devote more time to her charity work. She said that the move was not motivated by the company’s regulatory burden or its current advertising slowness.