Starbucks Founder Howard Schultz on How to Overcome Success
Starbucks Founder Howard Schultz on How to Overcome Success
6 Dec 2011
How do you know when your business is regressing? What do you do when you find out?
Last March, Starbucks founder Howard Schultz connected with Lewis Schiff, executive director of Inc. Business Owners Council, for an interview. Schultz was discussing his just-launched book, Onward: How Starbucks Fought for Its Life Without Losing Its Soul. He spoke with Schiff about Starbucks’s history in general, but he especially focused on his re-entry as CEO in January 2008, and his thoughts about what comes next. Here is some of what he said:
[Success meant] we were literally on this magic-carpet ride where everything we did, in every city, every country, almost without trying, was working. and it produced a sense of invincibility….Hubris and complacency began to establish themselves in the company, and I felt it was like a virus.
You get to thousands of stores, and people think money grows on trees. I had to remind people of the entrepreneurial heritage of the company.
[During start-up] I had such fear, because we couldn’t make payroll….I remember, literally, looking at pieces of paper, deciding what vendor we are gonna pay, and then what vendor we are gonna have to tell a story to.
I found this poster in a magazine—a photograph of hands in dirt, and I put it up in the boardroom. The poster says, “Those people willing to get their hands dirty are going to succeed.”
I wanted to say to our people that, when we started this business, we were in the roots of Starbucks and right now we’re managing the company at 30,000 feet. and from this minute forward, that is over.
I think great entrepreneurs must have the curiosity to metaphorically see around the corner. What’s coming? What can I anticipate that other people don’t see? And then you must have the courage of your convictions to execute the strategy.
There’s been such a seismic change in consumer behavior, and as a result of that, any business—small or large, consumer-based or not—that continues to embrace the status quo is, in my view, in deep trouble.
So the question is, How do you create the balance between preserving your core business but at the same time pushing for relevant innovation?
For us, I never imagined that people were going to be walking in with their computer and spending hours at Starbucks as their office. We certainly never got a rent check. But once we saw that, the question was, could we create something that could enhance the experience?
You’ve got to be curious. Where is technology moving? How is the consumer embracing it? And then you need to ask yourself, What can we do as an enterprise to be highly relevant to the seismic change in consumer behavior?
http://thebuildnetwork.com/2011/12/starbucks-founder-howard-schultz-on-how-to-overcome-success/
6 Dec 2011
How do you know when your business is regressing? What do you do when you find out?
Last March, Starbucks founder Howard Schultz connected with Lewis Schiff, executive director of Inc. Business Owners Council, for an interview. Schultz was discussing his just-launched book, Onward: How Starbucks Fought for Its Life Without Losing Its Soul. He spoke with Schiff about Starbucks’s history in general, but he especially focused on his re-entry as CEO in January 2008, and his thoughts about what comes next. Here is some of what he said:
[Success meant] we were literally on this magic-carpet ride where everything we did, in every city, every country, almost without trying, was working. and it produced a sense of invincibility….Hubris and complacency began to establish themselves in the company, and I felt it was like a virus.
You get to thousands of stores, and people think money grows on trees. I had to remind people of the entrepreneurial heritage of the company.
[During start-up] I had such fear, because we couldn’t make payroll….I remember, literally, looking at pieces of paper, deciding what vendor we are gonna pay, and then what vendor we are gonna have to tell a story to.
I found this poster in a magazine—a photograph of hands in dirt, and I put it up in the boardroom. The poster says, “Those people willing to get their hands dirty are going to succeed.”
I wanted to say to our people that, when we started this business, we were in the roots of Starbucks and right now we’re managing the company at 30,000 feet. and from this minute forward, that is over.
I think great entrepreneurs must have the curiosity to metaphorically see around the corner. What’s coming? What can I anticipate that other people don’t see? And then you must have the courage of your convictions to execute the strategy.
There’s been such a seismic change in consumer behavior, and as a result of that, any business—small or large, consumer-based or not—that continues to embrace the status quo is, in my view, in deep trouble.
So the question is, How do you create the balance between preserving your core business but at the same time pushing for relevant innovation?
For us, I never imagined that people were going to be walking in with their computer and spending hours at Starbucks as their office. We certainly never got a rent check. But once we saw that, the question was, could we create something that could enhance the experience?
You’ve got to be curious. Where is technology moving? How is the consumer embracing it? And then you need to ask yourself, What can we do as an enterprise to be highly relevant to the seismic change in consumer behavior?
http://thebuildnetwork.com/2011/12/starbucks-founder-howard-schultz-on-how-to-overcome-success/
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