Careless People

Content Warning: This section of the guide includes discussion of gender discrimination.

In April 2012, Schrage ordered Wynn-Williams to take Javier Olivan to Colombia to attend the Summit of the Americas, “a gathering of presidents and prime ministers” (61), and to convince him to stay at Facebook. A key person at Facebook, Olivan headed global growth, and his team developed the “People You May Know” tool (62). Facebook was obsessed with growth and not reluctant to do so recklessly.

While Olivan enjoyed the event, once again, Facebook representatives were ignored by others and not given seat assignments. On the second evening, they skipped the dinner and went to a salsa club where they saw Hillary Clinton dancing.

Facebook’s initial public offering was about to happen the next month, and Olivan told Wynn-Williams that he wanted to both leave and stay. To Wynn-Williams’s relief, he told her that he would stay at Facebook for the time being.

In October 2012, more than 1 billion people were using Facebook. This milestone caused management to panic, as the company needed growth to keep its stock rising. They were “running out of road” (69). As a result, the search was focused on increasing usage in foreign countries, and Wynn-Williams became relevant.