谢丽尔?桑德伯格：Facebook的女当家

2012-09-12

新东方英语 2012年9期

从2004年创立到2012年上市，Facebook在短短的八年间成为全球最大的社交网站。在这份荣耀的背后，Facebook首席运营官谢丽尔·桑德伯格功不可没。在Facebook，这位有着政界和商界职业背景的“女管家”就像一群孩子当中的成年人，将“家长督导”的模式发挥到极致，协助扎克伯格将Facebook推上了前所未有的高度。《纽约客》称她可能会改写硅谷由男人主导的文化；《彭博商业周刊》甚至揣测她有可能成为美国总统；而她的大学导师兰特·普利切特称，在他的印象中，桑德伯格的人生目标是领导整个世界。

Sheryl Sandberg was once in a meeting in New York, pitching a deal, when she needed a bathroom break. Embarrassed, the man to whom she was pitching had to admit he had no idea where the womens bathroom was. Sandberg wondered whether they had just moved in to the office. No, came the reply, they had been there for a year. “Are you telling me that I am the only woman to have pitched a deal in this office for a year?” Sandberg later recalled. “And he looked at me and said, ‘Yeah, or maybe youre the only one who had to go to the bathroom.”

Facebooks chief operating officer (COO) is used to being the only woman in the boardroom—but she doesnt like it. On Wednesday she joins some of the worlds biggest movers and shakers1) at the World Economic Forum2)s annual shindig3) in Davos, Switzerland, as one of the six co-chairs. The other five are, of course, men. There will be other powerful women in attendance4): German chancellor Angela Merkel will deliver the opening address; Christine Lagarde, the International Monetary Funds managing director5), is there too. But still the vast majority of those in attendance are men.

If Sandberg has anything to do with it, that is going to change. At last years Davos meeting, she held a breakfast to promote womens causes, a subject she is expected to take up there again, in between adding more of the worlds most powerful people as friends of Facebook.

Sandberg told her bathroom story in a speech at TED6), the tech worlds version of Davos. There too she was calling for more sex equality: “The numbers tell the story quite clearly,” she told the audience in Washington, DC. “One hundred and ninety heads of state; nine are women. Of all the people in parliament in the world, 13% are women. In the corporate sector, women at the top, C-level jobs7), board seats, tops out at 15%～16%. The numbers have not moved since 2002, and are going in the wrong direction.”

The same could not be said of Sandberg. This year Facebook is expected to go public, in an initial public offering8) (IPO) share sale that could value it at $100bn and hand its COO her second huge Silicon Valley payday. Her first came at Facebooks arch-rival: she had joined Google when the search company was in its profitless infancy, and left after its IPO with a fortune in stock options9). Google made Sandberg a multi-millionaire; Facebook could now make her a billionaire.

Mark Zuckerberg, Mr Social Network himself, poached10) Sandberg in 2008. When she joined Facebook, it had 70 million users worldwide and was losing money. Now it boasts 10 times as many users and makes money. Sam Hamadeh, chief executive of PrivCo11), a private company analyst, reckons Sandberg holds about 3% or 4% of Facebook, almost guaranteeing she will become a billionaire when the company goes public. Shes pretty much in charge of everything at Facebook apart from the product itself, and has proved a smooth and perfect foil12) to the geeky, spiky Zuckerberg.

“Shes the grownup in the room,” says Hamadeh. “Facebook is not just some 27-year-old, its also this wonderfully polished woman with amazing credentials—thats got to be very useful.”

Sandberg also appears to know how to toe the company line13). She isnt on the Facebook board—guess what: no women are—but, in public at least, seems unperturbed by this.

Sandberg seems to have been a grownup from a very early age. She was always at the top of her class, her mother Adele told the New Yorker last year. It had its consequences. “In public schools, for a girl to be smart was not good for your social life,” Adele said. Her mother could only recall one time when her daughter rebelled. “One day she came home from school and said, ‘Mom, we have a problem. Youre not ready to let me grow up. I said, ‘Youre right. The minute she said it, I knew she was right.”

Sandberg studied economics at Harvard, where she caught the eye of Lawrence Summers, the former US treasury secretary who, in one of historys neat coincidences, had been president of the college when Zuckerberg started Facebook. Summers volunteered to be her adviser in her senior year, when Sandberg decided to write her thesis on the role of economics in spousal abuse. He became her mentor and helped launched her stellar14) career.

In 1991, Summers became the chief economist at the World Bank, and recruited Sandberg as a research assistant. She then returned to Harvard, earning her MBA with the highest distinction15), and joined management consultancy McKinsey & Co16) before rejoining Summers, serving as his chief of staff when he became treasury secretary under Bill Clinton.

“Sheryl always believed that if there were 30 things on her to-do list at the beginning of the day, there would be 30 check marks at the end of the day,” Summers recalled. “If I was making a mistake, she told me. She was totally loyal, but totally in my face17).” She repaid that loyalty when Summers got into hot water18) for suggesting innate differences between men and women might be one reason that fewer women succeed in science- and maths-based careers. Sandberg wrote that Summers had been “a true advocate for women throughout his career.”

When the Democrats lost the 2000 presidential election, Sandberg joined Google. She helped broker the firms first big deal, providing search tools for then-dominant internet service provider AOL19), and was on her way to becoming one of the most powerful women in business.

At home she has two children—a son born in 2005 and a daughter two years later—with husband David Goldberg, the chief executive of online data firm SurveyMonkey. They juggle20) their schedules so one of them is always home to feed the children. “The most important career choice youll make is who you marry,” she said in a speech last year.

Its clear that Sandberg believes women, in part, have to take some of the blame for their under-representation at the top level. “Until women are as ambitious as men, theyre not going to achieve as much as men,” she told US talkshow host Charlie Rose last year.

But a career is easier to manage when you have the money to afford help. For most women its not quite so simple, says Sekai Farai, a cultural anthropologist at Colombia University who has been studying tech startups21). “The tech community is progressive and it is a meritocracy22),” she says.

“Everyone can come to the table, but its also all about who gets invited. Getting the right introductions, currying favour23) with people in power is all far more difficult for women. Sandberg had an incredibly powerful mentor; very few women are given that kind of opportunity.”

Men need to take their share of responsibility too, says Cindy Gallop, a fellow TED speaker, and founder of crowdsourcing site IfWeRanTheWorld. “I think Sheryl Sandberg is doing a great job of inspiring women to think differently about how they can progress in business. Id just like to see Sheryls male peers doing the same thing, so that we dont just inspire women to want to be the next Sheryl Sandberg; we also inspire them to want to be the next Mark Zuckerberg, and the next Steve Jobs.”

For Sucharita Mulpuru, a tech analyst at Forrester Research24), the problem goes back further than that. “Women dont pursue maths and sciences. If you dont have a technology background, you are not going to get a startup off the ground in Silicon Valley,” she says.

As Mulpuru points out, Sandberg isnt the founder; shes the manager. Like Meg Whitman, the former eBay boss to whom she is often compared, Sandberg is the adult supervisor brought in to manage the talented but temperamental25) boys.

Whitman turned eBay from a tech junk shop into a global phenomenon. Then she took her billions and started a second, less successful, career in politics. In 2010 Whitman spent $160m in an unsuccessful attempt to become governor of California, outspending the winner, Jerry Brown, six to one. And she is not the only tech leader to jump into politics—former Hewlett-Packard26) chief Carly Fiorina also made an unsuccessful bid for a California senate seat.

Perhaps one day Sandberg will prove more successful—though perhaps on a Democratic ticket27). She has strong Washington connections and a more winning personality than Whitman or Fiorina. Amid criticism of Facebooks practices she recently brokered28) a privacy agreement with the Federal Trade Commission that Hamadeh says was testimony to her political skills. “It should have been much worse for them,” he says.

Reciprocal29) altruism30) is her style. When the Sandbergs hosted Barack Obama for a Silicon Valley fundraiser31) last year, they brought in Lady Gaga too, whose sky-high heels and hair made the event a media sensation.

In interviews Sandberg, inevitably, says she is happy at Facebook, and not thinking about what she wants to do next. But whenever she makes up her mind, she will not be short of the power and influence—or money—to make her goal happen.

有一次，谢丽尔·桑德伯格在纽约参加一个会议，竭力促成一笔交易，期间她需要去下洗手间。和她谈交易的那位男士很是尴尬，坦承他不知道女洗手间在哪儿。桑德伯格很是纳闷：难道他们刚刚搬进这个办公室？这倒不是，他回答说，他们已经在那里办公一年了。“您是说，我是这一年以来在这里谈生意的唯一一位女性？”桑德伯格后来回忆道，“他看了看我，说：‘是的，不过也可能您是唯一一位需要上洗手间的女性。”

作为Facebook的首席运营官，桑德伯格是董事会会议室里的唯一一位女性，对此她已经习以为常。但她并不喜欢这样。本周三(编注：指2012年1月25日，本文刊发于2012年1月24日)，她和世界上最顶尖的风云人物一起，在瑞士达沃斯出席了世界经济论坛一年一度的盛大集会，她是六位共同主席中的一位，其他五位当然都是男性。出席会议的还有其他一些有权势的女性：德国总理安吉拉·默克尔致开幕词；国际货币基金组织总裁克里斯蒂娜·拉加德也出席了会议。但绝大多数与会者仍然是男性。

如果桑德伯格参与其中的话，这个局面将改变。去年的达沃斯会议上，她举办了一个早餐会来推动女性事业的发展。今年的会议上，在把更多全球范围内最有权力的人物发展成为Facebook好友的同时，预计她还会提及这一话题。

在一次TED大会(即技术界的达沃斯会议)的演讲中，桑德伯格讲述了她与洗手间的故事。在会上，她又一次为争取更多的男女平等权而呼吁。“数据本身已经很能说明问题了，”她在华盛顿特区对与会人员说，“在(美国的)190位国家首脑中，只有九位是女性。在全世界所有国家的议会成员中，只有13%是女性。在公司，顶尖的高级管理人员和董事会席位中，女性只占15%～16%。这些数字自2002年起就没有上升过，而且在朝着相反的方向发展。”

但这样的情况并未发生在桑德伯格身上。今年Facebook即将上市(编注：本文刊发时Facebook尚未上市)，预计首次公开募股价值一千亿美元，这同时也将是这位首席运营官在硅谷的第二个巨额发薪日。她的第一个巨额发薪日来自Facebook的主要对手Google：早在Google还处于毫无盈利的初创时期，她就加入了这家搜索引擎公司，并在Google首次公开募股之后离开了Google，离开时当然带着一大笔价值不菲的优先认股权。Google使桑德伯格变成了千万富翁；而Facebook则可能使她成为亿万富翁。

人称“社交网络先生”的马克·扎克伯格于2008年挖走了桑德伯格。她加入Facebook时，Facebook在全球有七千万用户，还在亏损运营。如今，Facebook拥有的用户数是之前的十倍，并且已开始赢利。据PrivCo首席执行官、私营公司分析师山姆·哈迈德估计，桑德伯格持有Facebook大约3%或4%的股份，公司一旦上市，这些股份几乎可以确保她成为亿万富翁。除了产品本身外，桑德伯格几乎管理着Facebook的一切事务。事实证明，对于难以应付的“极客一族”扎克伯格来说，温和的桑德伯格是他完美的搭档。

“她就像是一群孩子中的成年人，”哈迈德说。“Facebook并不仅仅属于某个27岁的年轻人(译注：扎克伯格今年27岁)，也属于这位历经磨练、处世老道的女士，她有着令人刮目的资历——这才是非常有用的。”

桑德伯格似乎也很懂得遵守公司的惯例。她并不是Facebook董事会的成员(编注：Facebook已于2012年6月22日宣布桑德伯格加入公司董事会)。你猜怎么着，从来没有女性进入过Facebook的董事会。但至少从公共场合来看，她似乎并未因此而受到困扰。

桑德伯格似乎很小的时候就显得很成熟了。去年，她母亲阿黛尔告诉《纽约客》杂志，她上学时成绩一直名列前茅。这对她是有影响的。“在公立学校，一个女孩子太聪明对她的社交生活没什么好处。”阿黛尔说。在她母亲的记忆中，女儿只有一次叛逆的时候。“有一天，她放学回来，对我说：‘妈妈，我们之间有一个问题。你总是不想让我长大。我说：‘你说的很对。她刚一说完，我就知道她是对的。”

桑德伯格在哈佛学习经济学时，引起了美国前财政部长劳伦斯·萨默斯的注意。纯粹出于历史的巧合，在扎克伯格创办Facebook时，萨默斯碰巧是哈佛大学校长。在大四撰写毕业论文时，桑德伯格决定要写关于经济学在虐待配偶中所起的作用，萨默斯主动提出要做她的指导老师。他成了她的良师益友，帮助她开启了卓越的职业生涯。

1991年，萨默斯成为世界银行首席经济学家，就聘用桑德伯格做他的研究助理。之后，桑德伯格又回到了哈佛，以最优异的成绩获得了工商管理学硕士学位，并加入了管理咨询企业麦肯锡公司。后来她又重新回到萨默斯身边，在他担任克林顿政府财政部长时做他的办公室主任。

“谢丽尔一直坚信，在她一天的工作清单中，如果开始时有30项待办事宜，那么在一天结束时，这30项前面都应该打上对勾，”萨默斯回忆说，“如果我犯了错，她会告诉我。她绝对忠于职守，但又全然不顾我的面子。”后来，她又一次表现出了对萨默斯的忠诚，那是因为萨默斯说女性在以科学和数学为基础的职业中鲜有成功者，其原因之一大概是男女与生俱来的差异，这句话立刻使萨默斯成为众矢之的。针对此，桑德伯格撰文说萨默斯其实“在整个职业生涯中一直是力挺女性的”。

民主党在2000年的总统大选中失利后，桑德伯格加入了Google。她帮助促成了Google公司的第一笔大生意，为当时占主导地位的互联网服务提供商“美国在线”提供搜索工具。由此，她开始朝着成为商界最强势女性的方向迈进。

在家里，她有两个孩子——儿子出生于2005年，两年后女儿诞生。她的丈夫是戴维·哥德堡，在线数据公司SurveyMonkey的首席执行官。他们要经常调整各自的时间安排，以确保总会有一个在家里照顾孩子。“你要作出的最重要的职业选择是和谁结婚。”她去年在一次演讲中说道。

显然，桑德伯格认为，针对顶级领导层中女性稀少的这一现象，女人本身是要负一部分责任的。“除非女人像男人一样有事业心，否则她们不会取得和男人一样大的成就。”去年她在接受美国脱口秀节目主持人查理·罗斯采访时说道。

但如果你有钱来为自己的事业开路，你的职业生涯会更容易掌控。对于大多数女性来说，要做到这一点并不容易，塞凯·法莱说。法莱是哥伦比亚大学的文化人类学家，一直致力于研究新兴科技公司。“科技界在不断进步，这里的一切都由精英来管理。”她说道。

“人人都有机会来分享盛宴，但关键是谁能够得到邀请。对于女性来说，要得到正确的引荐，赢得当权者的青睐，简直是难上加难。桑德伯格遇到了一个拥有惊人权势的导师，能拥有这种机遇的女性少之又少。” 塞凯说。

男人也需要负上一部分责任，辛迪·盖洛普说。辛迪也是TED会议的发言人，是大众外包网站IfWeRanTheWorld (如果我们统治世界)的创始人。“我认为桑德伯格有一点做得很棒，那就是激励女性转变思路，来思考如何才能在商业中取得进步。我希望看到谢丽尔的男性同事们也能做到这一点，这样我们就不必仅仅激励女性们成为下一个谢丽尔·桑德伯格；我们还要激励她们成为下一个马克·扎克伯格，成为下一个史蒂夫·乔布斯。”

在弗雷斯特研究公司的技术分析师苏查丽塔·穆普鲁看来，问题还不是那么简单。她说：“女性对数学和科学不感兴趣。如果你没有科技背景，就很难在硅谷启动创业公司。”

正如穆普鲁指出的那样，桑德伯格不是创始人，她只是管理者。人们常把她和eBay前总裁梅格·惠特曼相比，和梅格一样，桑德伯格也是一个成熟的监管者，负责管理那些才华横溢却又行事冲动的大男孩。

惠特曼把eBay从一个科技旧货店变成了一家全球性的公司。然后，她带着亿万财富准备在政治上开辟另一职业生涯，但却不那么成功。2010年，惠特曼花了1.6亿美元竞选加利福尼亚州州长，结果以失败告终，而她所花的经费是获胜者杰里·布朗的六倍。她并不是科技领袖中改行从政的唯一一位——惠普公司前总裁卡莉·费奥莉娜也曾想竞选加利福尼亚州参议员的席位，但也未成功。

也许有一天桑德伯格会取得更大的成功——不过或许她会代表民主党参选。她在华盛顿拥有强大的人际关系，而且比惠特曼和费奥莉娜更有人格魅力。在人们对Facebook做法的批评声中，她最近竭力促成了一项与联邦贸易委员会签署的隐私保护协议，哈迈德认为这件事足以证明她的政治手腕。他说：“Facebook的情况本来应该更糟。”

互惠利他主义是她一贯的行事作风。去年，桑德伯格夫妇在硅谷的一场募捐活动上款待了巴拉克·奥巴马，他们还特意邀请了Lady Gaga到场。Lady Gaga那空前绝后的高跟鞋和夸张怪异的发型把这一活动变成了轰动一时的新闻事件。

在接受采访时，桑德伯格总是说她在Facebook干得很愉快，没有去想下一步该做什么。但一旦她下定决心，不管任何时候，她都不会缺少所需的权力、影响力——甚或是财力——来实现自己的目标。

1. mover and shaker：〈美〉有权势的人

2. World Economic Forum：世界经济论坛，以研究和探讨世界经济领域存在的问题、促进国际经济合作与交流为宗旨的非官方国际性机构，总部设在瑞士日内瓦。论坛因每年年会都在达沃斯召开，故也被称为“达沃斯论坛”。

3. shindig [???nd?ɡ] n. 盛大聚会，狂欢会

4. in attendance：出席，当值

5. managing director：总裁，总经理

6. TED：指TED大会，TED分别代表technology、entertainment和design，即技术、娱乐与设计大会。每年3月，TED大会在美国召集众多科学、设计、文学、音乐等领域的杰出人物，分享他们关于技术、社会、人的思考和探索。

7. C-level jobs：指CEO、CFO (首席财务官)、CIO (首席信息官)、CMO (首席营销官)、CSO (首席安全官)、CTO (首席技术官)等以“C”开头的高级管理职位。

8. initial public offering：首次公开募股，指企业通过证券交易所首次公开向投资者增发股票，以期募集用于企业发展资金的过程。

9. stock option：(公司内部职工的)优先认股权，即普通股股东的优惠权，实际上是一种短期的看涨，拥有优先认股权的老股东可以按低于股票市价的特定价格购买公司新发行的一定数量的股票。一般来说，新股票的定价低于股票市价，从而使优先认股权具有价值。

10. poach [p??t?] vt. 挖(其他机构的成员或顾客)