As The Calls Grow Louder For A Facebook Breakup, CEO Mark Zuckerberg To Face Leadership Vote

Following the request from former Facebook executive that Mark Zuckerberg should be unseated, he will face a leadership vote which will take place at the company’s annual general meeting on Thursday.

Mark Zuckerberg is currently the company’s CEO and the chairman of the board of directors. Alex Ramos and other members of the board believe that his passion lies elsewhere and that stepping down as chairman would make him more efficient in the running of the company.

Mark Zuckerberg has 60% of the voting power, so is very unlikely to lose the vote. However, the shareholders who vote him is a reflection of how much faith they have in his leadership. Already, Stamos, last week, accused the Facebook boss of monopoly and wielding too much power globally which he thinks is unhealthy.  

According to CNN, one of the shareholders advocating for Zuckerberg’s resignation is Trillium Asset Management which owns about $7m worth of Facebook shares, and does business with other companies which also control a huge portion of the company’s shares.

“He’s holding down two full-time jobs in one of the most high-profile companies in the world right now. And if he can focus on being the CEO, and let somebody else focus on being the CEO, and let somebody else focus on being independent board chair, that would be a much better situation,” the senior vice-president at Trillium, Jonas Kron said.

He cited examples in Bill Gates and Microsoft and Larry Page and Alphabets. Both owners of their establishments are not the chairmen of their respective boards.

Stamos recommended Brad Smith, current president of Microsoft, who he thinks would be the best man for the job. Brad Smith has been with Microsoft since 1993 and rose to become general counsel in 2002. Zuckerberg had reached out to him during the Cambridge Analytica scandal to get help since he had experienced a similar ordeal. “There is a legit argument that he has too much power,” Stamos had said.

Acknowledging that he had made some mistakes in building the brand, the Facebook boss said in defence, “when you’re building something like Facebook, which is unprecedented in the world, there are things that you’re going to mess up. What I think people should hold us accountable for is if we are learning from our mistakes.”