Postcards

While Sheryl Sandberg Leans in, Marissa Mayer lies low

A look at Silicon Valley's two most powerful women from a journalist who has known both for nearly a decade--and offers news about Mayer's controversial HR policy and nursery at Yahoo

Never in the history of book marketing has there been a crusade quite like Sheryl Sandberg's. Last Thursday in New York, the Facebook (FB) COO hobnobbed with former U.S. Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner, film director George Lucas and Barbara Walters MORE

Ex-Lehman CFO Erin Callan stirs the pot on women and work

Facebook (FB) COO Sheryl Sandberg and Yahoo (YHOO) CEO Marissa Mayer aren't the only ones stirring up debate about women in the workplace.

Sunday's New York Times featured an unexpected guest writer: former Lehman Brothers (BCS) CFO Erin Callan on "Is There Life After Work?"

As you may recall, ex-Lehman CEO Dick Fuld pushed out Callan and President Joe Gregory in June 2008, four months before Lehman crashed into Chapter 11 bankruptcy. MORE

Martha Stewart reformed, style-wise at least

When Martha Stewart appeared in court in downtown Manhattan today--her first time in a courtroom since 2004, when she was convicted of lying about a stock trade to the government--she took a brand new tack, style-wise.

In place of the extravagant Birkin handbag that critics clutched upon to cast Stewart as a diva hardly relatable to her middle-class customers, she carried a bag that ordinary folk can afford: a walnut-colored Avery MORE

How AOL got its new brand chief

The straight path to success has never much interested Susan Lyne.

Starting as a journalist, she went from creating magazines for Rupert Murdoch to running ABC Entertainment for Walt Disney (DIS) to heading Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia (MSO)--then led online fashion retailer Gilt Groupe.

So Lyne's arrival today at AOL (AOL), as CEO of its Brand Group, comes as a surprise…and not.

"This represents a convergence of all that came before--print, video, technology MORE

Yahoo's new work policy: bold move, bad delivery

FORTUNE -- Marissa Mayer made a global splash last summer for landing the Yahoo (YHOO) CEO job while six months pregnant.

Then she grabbed the spotlight for starting a cultural revolution at the dozing tech giant—using perks like free smartphones and her so-called PB&J initiative to un-stick innovation.

Today, with Mayer making the front page of the New York Times (above the fold, no less) for her decision to require employees to MORE

If Mark Zuckerberg taught you to code...

Some people dream about becoming the next Mark Zuckerberg.

How distressing, then, that only nine states count computer science as credit toward high school graduation. The number of U.S. schools teaching computer science has actually declined in the past eight years.

Two wealthy and well-connected coders I know today launched a star-studded video about getting kids and educators jazzed about coding.

Hadi and Ali Partovi, who are funding the film and their new MORE

Rethinking the online education revolution

I met Pooja Sankar two years ago after she founded Piazza, a collaboration platform that facilitates class discussion among students and teachers. Starting with a few students at Stanford, Piazza now is used at top universities such as Stanford and Princeton and MIT and in 25 countries around the world. With $7.5 million in funding from Sequoia Capital and Bessemer Ventures, Sankar, 32, aspires to play a key role in MORE

H20 2.0: Speech lessons from Marco Rubio

You can learn from yesterday's laugh line--to make sure you aren't tomorrow's!

Guest Post by Mary Civiello

By now, most of us have seen Senator Marco Rubio's awkward snatch of Poland Spring during his State of the Union response.

And if you have spoken in front of an audience, you can empathize.

A combination of nerves and bright lights causes you to sweat, dehydrate, and need H2O NOW.

The longer you wait, the worse it MORE

Behind the shuffle of women execs at NBCU

FORTUNE -- The Fortune Most Powerful Women list includes, among its 50 execs, three stars at NBC Universal. The most powerful of the trio has just gained more ground.

NBCU's announcement yesterday that Bonnie Hammer, No. 33 on Fortune's power list, is now in charge of all of the company's cable entertainment channels is not such a great surprise. Hammer reprogrammed and built USA Network and Syfy into two of the MORE

How to tell a great business story

Every business has a story.

When I went to Stanford last week to interview Tory Burch about her amazing story (Young woman with no formal education in design and no MBA builds a $2.5 billion business from scratch in less than a decade!), the University folks asked me if I would let them interview me about, yes, the art of storytelling.

Over 29 years of writing for Fortune, I've learned a lot MORE