Mark Zuckerberg praises Sheryl Sandberg after a report said he blamed her for an inclusivity program at Facebook
- Mark Zuckerberg praised Sheryl Sandberg in a Threads post on Friday
- A NYT report said Zuckerberg blamed Sandberg for an inclusivity program at Facebook.
- Meta recently said it was rolling back its DEI initiatives.
Mark Zuckerberg praised former Meta COO Sheryl Sandberg on Friday after a report said he had blamed her for an inclusivity program at the company.
"Sheryl did amazing work at Meta and will forever be a legend in the industry. She built one of the greatest businesses of all time and taught me much of what I know," Zuckerberg said in a post on Threads.
The post was sent in response to another user who shared a Business Insider article from last year with the headline, "Mark Zuckerberg jokes that Sheryl Sandberg raised him 'like a parent.'" The user said it "didn't age well."
Sandberg responded in a Threads post: "Thank you, @zuck. I will always be grateful for the many years we spent building a great business together β and for your friendship that got me through some of the hardest times of my life and continues to this day."
Representatives for Sandberg declined to comment when reached by BI.
Meta told employees last week it was rolling back its DEI programs, BI previously reported. On Thursday, The New York Times reported Zuckerberg met with Stephen Miller, an advisor to President-elect Donald Trump, at Mar-a-Lago late last year.
The Times said Miller told Zuckerberg Trump would target DEI culture, including at companies like Meta. The Meta CEO assured Miller he would not stand in Trump's way, the Times reported, citing three unnamed sources.
The outlet also reported that one source said Zuckerberg blamed Sandberg for an inclusivity initiative at Facebook during the same meeting.
The reporting was met with some backlash online and support for Sandberg, who was sometimes referred to as the "adult in the room" at Facebook while she was there.
Sandberg has also pushed for women's empowerment in the workplace and wrote the book "Lean In: Women, Work, and the Will to Lead."
Zuckerberg appears to be reshaping Meta ahead of the incoming Trump administration. In addition to rolling back DEI, Meta also announced last week it would be ending the use of third-party fact-checkers in favor of a community notes system.
During an appearance on Joe Rogan's podcast last week, Zuckerberg said "masculine energy" was needed in the workplace.
"Masculine energy, I think, is good, and obviously society has plenty of that, but I think that corporate culture was really trying to get away from it," he said in an interview on the "Joe Rogan Experience" podcast. "It's like you want feminine energy; you want masculine energy."