Suddenly, everyone wants Sheryl Sandberg to lean out.

Apologies for using that obvious turn of phrase to describe the precarious situation the chief operating officer of Facebook now finds herself in. But it works perfectly for Ms. Sandberg, the author of “Lean In,” which made her very famous and helped burnish her reputation as a management wizard.

Now she finds herself facing intense criticism for how she and the company handled the Cambridge Analytica scandal, account hacks, Russians running wild over its platform and the hiring of a communications firm called Definers Public Affairs (which really sounds like something a bunch of toxic bros would come up with after too many beer bongs down at Faber College’s Omega Theta Pi) to slime various and sundry detractors. Many are even calling for her to be pushed out of the company.

To be clear, as the No. 2 in charge, Ms. Sandberg deserves much blame for the bad decisions at Facebook. But it’s notable that she is under much more fire than Mark Zuckerberg, the chief executive. While he underwent some scrutiny at Congressional hearings and in interviews, he has somehow managed to come off like a geek who has lost his way in the woods. Whatever blame he got has dissipated quickly.

[Kara Swisher answered questions about this column on Twitter.]

Ms. Sandberg dodged many of the Facebook controversies this year. But no longer. A recent New York Times article that laid bare the last months at the company began with the line: “Sheryl Sandberg was seething,” and went on to show her yelling at the company’s security chief, Alex Stamos, trying to slow roll the utterance of the word “Russia” in a report and alternately sweet-talking and strong-arming lawmakers to Facebook’s will.