Good Grief

In her new book, Option B: Facing Adversity, Building Resilience, and Finding Joy, Sheryl Sandberg talks about becoming a widow at 45, facing a future she’d never imagined and ‘leaning into the suck’.

- Liesl Robertson 

The name ‘Sheryl Sandberg’ might not immediately ring a bell, but her job title will:she is the COO of Facebook, Mark Zuckerberg’s right-hand woman. (He poached her from Google back in 2007.) In 2012, she was named one of the 100 Most Influential People in the World by Time magazine. And she’s been named one of the 50 Most Powerful Women in Business by Fortune magazine, moving steadily up the rankings from number 29 in 2007 to number six last year. Sheryl is also part of a small, elite group of women, rare as unicorns: the female billionaires.

But beyond that, she’s a feminist icon in a very male industry, and a fierce advocate for women finding their way in the workplace. In her 2013 book Lean In: Women, Work, and the Will to Lead, she wrote: ‘A truly equal world would be one where women ran half our countries and companies and men ran half our homes.’ In the book, Sheryl commended her husband, Dave, for his commitment to sharing childcare equally; it was because he was a hands-on dad to their two kids that she could put in the hours at work. In fact, an entire chapter in the book is dedicated to the topic of choosing the right partner, someone willing to share the workload at home. ‘The most important career choice you’ll make is who you marry,’ she said in a 2011 speech.