Sheryl Sandberg to step down as Facebook chief operating officer

theguardian.com:

Sheryl Sandberg, the chief operating officer of Facebook, has announced she will step down from her role, as the company continues to weather a financial storm and shifts away from social media into virtual reality.

Sandberg said she was not sure of what the future holds for her, but she plans to focus on her foundation and philanthropic work going forward.

She said she will leave the company this fall, but will continue to be on Meta’s board.

The billionaire executive has been one of Facebook’s most prominent public faces since joining in 2008, shaping its policies and overseeing responses to the myriad public controversies the company has battled.

Her departure comes after Facebook rebranded in October 2021 to Meta, attempting to move its primary business away from social media and into virtual reality after a series of difficult years.CEO Mark Zuckerberg has bet big on his hopes for the “metaverse”, an augmented and virtual reality space where people can interact through avatars in a shared world.

Meta has earmarked $10bn for the metaverse over the next year and plans to consistently spend more in coming years, Zuckerberg announced in a 2021 earnings report.

Sandberg’s departure also comes after billionaire tech investor Peter Thiel stepped down from Meta’s board, following the company’s worst-ever earnings report, suggesting some power players may be jumping ship as the company flounders.

Most recently Sandberg and Facebook had faced increased scrutiny after documents leaked by the whistleblower Frances Haugen were turned over to Congress and published by a number of news outlets.

The documents revealed the extent to which Meta knew about the aggressive spread of misinformation and hate speech on its platform, that it was