Facebook's COO Sheryl Sandberg Guides Growth & Public Face

Sheryl Sandberg, Facebook’s Chief Operating OfficerRedTracker| Today’s NYTimes profiles Sheryl Sandberg, 41, often considered Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg’s ‘better half’ but not in a wifely sense. Sandberg, a former Google executive, is the COO of Facebook, responsible for building FB internationally, cultivating relationships with large advertisers, communications and public policy. Her boss Zuckerberg retains control over the web platform and FB website. 

Google’s CEO Eric Schmidt calls Sheryl Sandberg a “superstar” but there is tension between the two companies. Facebook now owns the top Internet traffic spot, edging out Google, and FB has recruited over 200 Google staffers.

Before coming to Silicon Valley in 2001, Ms. Sandberg earned a degree in economics and then her M.B.A. from Harvard, did stints at the World Bank and at McKinsey & Company, and then worked as chief of staff for Lawrence H. Summers when he was Treasury secretary in the Clinton administration. via NYTimes

Among the many accolades that Sandberg wins for her work at Facebook is mentoring younger staff and especially women. The mother of two children herself, Sandberg makes a point of counseling young women not to make a choice between high-level corporate advancement and motherhood.

Sheryl Sandberg is committed to Bono’s debt relief in Africa project and other global philanthropy initiatives and was instrumental in helping Zuckerberg with his recent $100 million donation to the Newark school system.

Read on: Sandberg and Zuckerberg, Unlikely Facebook Friends.