Marne Levine, Chief Business Officer, Meta 
Interviewer: Alyson Shontell, Editor-in-Chief, FORTUNE

Most Powerful Women 2022 - Going All-In On The Metaverse

perhaps at some point down the road we'll all be sharing a meal and having these conversations in the metaverse. Um but are you ready for it? Life in the in the immersive virtual world of the metaverse? Our next guest is one of the many people working to make the next generation of the internet a reality and that's despite facing some internal and external headwinds. Marni Levine is chief business officer at meta. Please welcome barney for a conversation with fortune editor Editor in chief Allison Chantelle. All right, good afternoon Marnie. Good afternoon everyone. I hope you're nice and full and ready for discussion. Um Marnie, you had a huge morning this morning. A lot of announcements that metal were made a lot that impact the business community and and maybe the future of work. Could you just give us the key updates? I'd be delighted. Thank you for asking. Yes for those of you who don't know, we just had our big conference this morning, it's called connect. And what we focused on there is about the future of the metaverse and we announced our new um VR device that's our most advanced one called Quest Pro. And uh what quest Pro does is will actually be able to, because of its advanced computing power will be able to help people collaborate better, be more productive at work. So I'm super super excited about what we announced there as part of that. We also announced a variety of partnerships. One was with Microsoft so that you can have access to all of your favorite productivity tools like can you imagine doing work without outlook or word? Um adobe which has, you know, these incredible creator tools um and then also I know you just heard from julie Sweet, we're working with julie Sweet who has been using this technology to train people at accenture and they're very, very well positioned to be able to help other companies who understand the power of this technology, which will change work. And I just wanted to say one other thing about it, because as you can hear, I'm pretty excited about it, which is that if you're sitting in this room and you're kind of wondering like is the metaverse for me, I really would encourage you to try it because it is going to be a game changer and it's particularly going to be a game changer for women, I think um because it levels up the technology and it also levels the playing field and what I mean by that is that it levels it up because the tools are so much better during Covid, we figured out ways to manage and to collaborate and to be productive. We definitely did that. But what this does is it makes you feel like wherever you are in the world you're in the same room together and you can make eye contact, you can get up at the white board and you can brainstorm like you would in an actual meeting room, you can lean back and whisper to the person and have that sidebar conversation like you would in an actual meeting and so you feel like you're in the same room together, the tools we have today, they're good, they get the job done, but this really is going to be a game changer. And the reason why I'm saying level that it will level the playing field is because we know based on lots of studies from McKenzie and others, that women have given, the choice will take a, you know, a more flexible job or a remote option that now eggs and so what this allows is for again, wherever you are in the world, if your home or your someplace else for people to be able to come together and have the same experience, so that will change that and I really believe, thank you for letting me go on about this. Okay, I really believe, I really believe because I know this is top of mind for people that with the right policies and the right social norms, combined with the right kinds of technologies like this, it can be a game changer for work and productivity, so it's a promising founding future, but the future is very hard to build and it's very hard to time. Um this is going to cost meta billions. The company is reorienting a lot of its teams around this efforts um there's skepticism that can work that it will be the future um that this will be what the future looks like even from within meta itself. So the VP of metaverse official Shah has recently admitted there's still no products. It yet, that's natural, it's a new product, that's fine, but the engineers who are building this aren't even quite using this enough um and Matthew Ball, who is a metaverse expert um was quoted as saying, you know, look, there's a risk that almost everything Mark has outlined here about the meta versus rights except that the timing could be farther out than he planned. So how do you weigh that? What if the timing is wrong? I mean, google X has made all these huge Moonshot bets, flying cars, autonomous vehicles are still not here yet, so much money is important, there's a lot at stake. How do you weigh that? Well, let me first explain why we're in this um since I joined the company 12 years ago, and even before that, what this company has been focused on has been about all about connection and community and what the metaverse is, it's a more immersive internet and when you have a more immersive internet, that means that it's inherently social and therefore connection and community is at the center of that, and the way that this will, the way that this will work is it will change many of the things that we do with our friends and family, it'll change the way we entertain, you can do that today, You can go to a concert in the metaverse with the chain smokers and it is fantastic. It can change the way you train doctors and pilots. We have a partnership with L. A. Children's hospital and their training doctors and um and administrators on tough procedures so they can do that not on a person, but like through a simulation in the metaverse and that means something big. It changes the way that we learn just friday night. I was dropping my youngest son off at tennis. Yes, that's what I do on friday night, it's very fun and his tennis coach pulled me aside and asked me whether my son was going to be signing up for this um app that helps you improve your ground strokes and also warm up before matches. Now that was a youth case that I had never thought about, but that is actually in our lives now, that's signing them up for it and that will be in our lives now. So the question is what are the use cases in the future and how will that develop and evolve and it's going to evolve over time, What I've seen so far is really exciting and frankly pretty mind blowing to me. Um and I think the future is going to be bright too, so we are always focused on the next big thing and we are all in and building for this, but we do recognize that it will take time to do it and we're not going to do it alone, we're gonna do in partnership with others, you know, I think another important question to ask is is this a future that's healthy and helpful for everybody? I think we can all agree that future work can definitely be improved. But um I was reading Kashmir Hill did a great review in the new york times of experiencing this metaverse through horizon, which is um your meta versus in the metaverse that meta um and you know, she was saying, you know, there's something here, but I'm legless, my avatar's legless, I'm floating around sometimes. I'm getting kind of accosted. I'm meeting people that have been plug and play for 12 hours a day laying in their bed. Um that is that the future that we want. I'm a little bit scared when I hear that. And um a U. S. Senator recently returned from Silicon Valley and said, you know, I spoke to a lot of people there, but I'm concerned that not enough leaders are seriously asking does innovation actually increased citizens happiness? And so is that a consideration that you're taking into account the company as you're building the future that we all might be using? Well let me talk about it from my personal experience and let me also talk about it from my work experience in my personal experience, what I see with my kids is that I have a 14 year old and a 17 year old is that they'll put on the quest headset, they'll do something like in supernatural or you know, beat favor or something, they'll do that for little while, then they go outside, they play some basketball, they come back in and they do their homework and that's kind of how it works now with my own, with my own kids. Sometimes it's hard to regulate technology and so it's an ongoing conversation that we have. Can anybody relate to that in this room? Yeah, I'm sure you can. Um but we think about that also all the time at work and the experience that we want people to have is that it's intentional and that it's positive and so some of the ways that we're going about helping others think about that is, for example, we launched a family center which gives you visibility transparency around how much time you're using, you know, the quest headset, it also gives you visibility into as parents and also kids into who your kids are connected with, who your teens are connected with. It gives visibility into um it provides visibility around control so that you can, you know, set budgets or limits or you know, mute notifications. That's the kind of world that we want is one where it's intentional and it's positive and so that technology is playing, you know, a fun and good role in people's lives. So the metaverse is going to be, you know, years in the future, you're still building Um there's a lot going on, but there's so much more to talk about meta. So I do wanna continue just in general, it seems to be wartime at meta, this is a company that has experienced pretty much nothing but growth growth, growth, growth growth for 18 years and then all of a sudden that growth is slowing the stock price is down about 60%. Um Since last year there are new threats like Tiktok is uh seems to be the company, everybody's talking about Silicon Valley is taking time and attention away from the traditional tech platforms. The core business needs to shift in advertising which you oversee a lot of because of privacy is now paramount in advertising. That's a shift to um how how do you lead during war time? You joined during growth time have been there through a heck of a ride, but now the winds of change have come in. How are you, how are you navigating that? Well, you just outlined a lot of stuff that's going on, which is, which is true, It's a challenging macroeconomic environment. They're out there for all businesses um including ours there, the digital advertising industry has most definitely been changing for the reasons that you mentioned, Apple made a bunch of changes on their platform and it changed the way businesses big and small are able to find new customers. Um and um and then as you said that there's also competition out there. I mean the advertising industry is one that is always been competitive, it is always changing and it's actually one of the things that I really love about it because it means that what we need to do is that we need to earn every dollar every minute that is spent on the platform And we need to make sure that we have the best solutions available for businesses. So I'm doing what we've always done which is working on making sure that we're working with the 200 million businesses that are on our platform, businesses that are big, but the vast majority of them are small businesses who have very few resources at the disposal, who are looking for profitability and growth, strong return on investment and doing that and making sure that they understand how to use the tools and solutions that we have on our platform in order to be able to grow. But what about your team? Like it's hard to lead a team when they're saying we're hiring, they're hiring freeze is coming, this is gonna be a really hard year were um you know, this is a difficult time of the company and it's such a great question. And over the last few years in Covid uncertainty, I've been able to hone these skills as a leader of the company and you know, one of the things that I learned, I think especially during Covid was that was the importance of communication and really bringing people along on the journey, Things were changing quickly during, during Covid, people felt disconnected during Covid and so really trying to communicate with them regularly through um some of the different tools whether it was video or having Q. And A. In their lives or different ways of connecting and bringing people together and the same is true here now I think that the people at meta, one thing that they understand is that they generally have this mindset which is that there's sort of an acceptance that things are gonna change and evolve. Like if you're, if you're not, if you don't, if you're not comfortable with that it's probably not the right place for you. They are also used to anticipating what kinds of changes are coming along and then adapting to those things and so with my teams, I try to help them along in that journey and understand where we are and where we're going and how best that they can play a role in making that transformation. Um Marnie, one question I wanted to ask too is there's been so much restructuring at the company. I mean Cheryl left, she built the business from nothing to what it was. Um she brought you into the company I believe and and was mentor even in politics before you went to Silicon Valley and joined meta. Um what is the restructuring meant for you? How have you thought about your career, what changes have come for you at meta? Well there have been changes and um Cheryl was an unbelievable leader at the company. I mean there's no question about it, she had just an incredible impact on the company and the culture on the business and I would argue not just on meta but on companies, organizations and institutions around the world. She is incredible. She also is incredibly thoughtful and intentional about making sure that she leaves organizations in a better place than what the way she found them. And she in particular something that I learned from her was the way in which she really focused on finding and developing really great leaders at the company and making sure that we had deep, deep bench at the company and so I sort of look around, you heard from Susan lee are incoming CFO, yesterday I look at other women who, you know, Cheryl has really helped develop, like bringing in gen new set, who's our general counsel or Lori Goler, who is our Chief people Officer or Maxine Williams, who's our Chief diversity officer Nicola Mendelssohn, who's on my team who runs the global business group. There are so many great leaders and also women women make up 30% of our executive team who are in place and who are focused and who are incredibly talented and capable and it's up to us now to really lead going forward. We're excited to see what you do at meta. Um a lot to be done and a lot of work to do, but godspeed, thank you.