CEO spurs discussions on race
16th February 2015 · 0 Comments
Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz knew that he was wading into unchartered territory when he decided to launch a series of discussions with his employees about race.
USA Today reported that the CEO did not back down from such a colossal challenge.
He recently invited hundreds of Starbucks baristas, managers and other employees to the California African American Museum in Los Angeles to engage one another in dialogue about their lives are impacted by their skin color and ethnicity, as well as how they interact with Starbucks customers.
He kicked off the series of forums on race in Starbucks’ Seattle, Wash., home base in December. The Seattle forum;s success led to subsequent gatherings in Oakland, New York and St. Louis in the wake of the Ferguson, Mo. massive protests.
USA Today reported that during the Los Angeles forum, Schultz talked about how the Historic Civil Rights Movement impacted him when he was growing up. He reported shared a video clip of Robert F. Kennedy talking about race after the assassination of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
Schultz also listened intently for more than three hours at the Los Angeles gathering where those in attendance shared very personal stories about how their lives were shaped by the lingering issue of race in the United States. USA reported that those testimonies were filled with raw emotion, hard-fought wisdom and clarity and humor
While the discussions unearthed serious problems and challenges for race relations and community-police relations, they also revealed hope. Amid the somber stories and heated debate, there was a discussion about bridging the racial divide with Starbucks’ employees, whom it refers to as “partners,” and also to how it views its customers.
“We need to learn how to embrace the diversity in our stores,” said Erik Taylor, a district manager and 19-year employee based in Orange County, Calif. “Do our partners reflect the community that we serve?” he asked.
Heather Crawford, Starbucks employee in Hawthorne, Calif., said inclusiveness was one of the features she loves the most about the coffee chain and that customers love to see familiar faces.
Los Angeles Starbucks employee Kelly Grass warned those gathered in Los Angeles about the folly about making assumptions about people . “You assume so many things about them just by looking at them,” she said, adding that you have to “throw it out the window.”
Schultz promised those in attendance that positive action would result from the forums and urged everyone to think about the divergent perspectives they heard at the forums.
“In every city we’ve had these meetings, there has been a tremendous amount of learning,” he told USA Today. “There’s been a true level of compassion about what it’s like to be in someone else’s shoes
Schultz said it would be unwise for Americans to ignore the realities and challenges caused by racial division in the U.S.
“Whether we want to admit it or not, we all have unconscious biases,” Schultz told USA Today.
He added that he felt “very restless, very concerned” after Ferguson and the other events, including an officer-involved shooting near a Starbucks store in Milwaukee. About 40 percent of Starbucks’ 150,000 employees in the U.S. are minorities, Schultz said, and “we had to do something.” He said “ignoring it or being a bystander” was not an option.
He told USA Today that as a business, Starbucks is in a unique position to act, having always strived to be viewed as more than just another coffeehouse chain.
This article originally published in the February 16, 2015 print edition of The Louisiana Weekly newspaper.
