StarBucksStruck

People told me how frank he would be, how voraciously he would talk about our stores, how eloquently he could wax about all of the company's successes, ambitions, and problems. I'd read his book and been impressed - enough to spend meaningful portions of my 2005-06 school year chasing down his company. Everyone in my family asked whether I'd seen him on 60 minutes. I watched him 1-on-1 on MSNBC for 30 minutes. I'd already met the CEO and CFO of Starbucks. Still, nothing could prepare me for meeting Howard Schultz.

It wasn't like meeting Steve Yzerman at 13. I'd like to say it couldn't have been that special, but truthfully, I had no idea why meeting Yzerman was so special. It's only in looking back that I realize the weight of those moments in 1990. But today, on July 25, in the Tazo 7 conference room at Starbucks, I knew what I was getting into. Or so I thought.

He arrived kind of discreetly. One minute he wasn't there, and the next minute he was, just milling around by himself near the front of the room. As the interns leading the coffee tasting got things ready to go, I introduced myself to him. I'd never thought about what I would say. So I introduced myself as an intern from Coffee Category, and told him who I worked for. He asked where I'd joined from, and I told him Berkeley, that I was an MBA student there and I'd read his book as a student and - in Peets' domain - been inspired to work actively with the company. I didn't mention our MBA project because I didn't feel that it truly qualified as "working in the stores" - after all, this was Howard.

After a great tasting of aged coffee (his favorite), he got into his spiel. I can't imagine how he determines what he'll talk about. Moving into China? Inspiration? His history? Our growth? Coffee as a core? You can probably count, on one hand, the number of interesting 35-year-old companies whose entire histories are at the disposal of one individual, and Starbucks is one of those companies.

He kicked off talking about the importance of finding a company you can trust and believe in, one that truly shares your values. He mentioned that he'd met Tom Friedman a few weeks ago, and learned that Tom daugher works at the Seattle Friendship Plaza Starbucks. Milton said she liked her job...and proceeded to give Howard his view on life, which Howard passed on to us. Basically, he said that the "IQ" is trumped by the "CQ" (curiosity quotient) and "PQ" (passion quotient) when the latter two are combined effectively. Howard's addition (or interpretation) was that it's critical to balance the need for achievement with a passion and curiosity.

I later asked him to expound on this - his motivations for achievement were clear (difficult home life, etc.), but I wanted to understand more about the passion part. Were it not for the luck of running into Starbucks, I wondered, would he have been famous for coffee in some other way? He responded by saying that he was always searching for ways to allow people to connect, and that coffee was the vehicle for him to do so. The true a-ha came when he visited Italy and saw how people connected over coffee, and he realized that coffee shops (not just whole bean vendors) needed to come to America. The rest, obviously, is history.

Howard spoke about the importance of integrating CSR into business strategy. Go Haas and Kellie's CSR Class! He sounded exactly like she does. Some other interesting things (without divulging several things related to future products and innovations that were brought up):

• HR should generally be the first functional priority of a business, for two reasons: (1) the importance of hiring ahead of the growth curve; (2) finding talented people with shared values
• Starbucks is still in the "very early stages" of its growth
• "You have to demonstrate when you first come here that you can play on the team. You have to earn the right - you need to get your ticket punched in retail before you come here"
  
• Starbucks is a gift (same as Michael Casey told us)
  
• "I'm concerned about the 'Dilution of Aroma' that is happening in our stores" - something that he said the company is aggressively pursuing fixes on - to counter the non-coffee-ness that has seeped into too many of our stores' environments
• "You have to have the courage to put yourself in a position to win, which is a really risky thing...it entails trusting your own talents to say 'I can do this!'"

He mentioned in the answer to my question (I did not ask directly about this) that he felt he had failed with the Sonics.

Some asked about Health & Wellness, and obviously, this is high on his agenda. He mentioned that the company is looking all around the world at who does a great job with H&W - even some really small merchants in Asia - to learn whatever it can.

He believes Whole Foods is the best Merchant in America.

Howard felt that there have been 3 tipping points in Starbucks' history:

1. Instituting Bean Stock/Healthcare for all 20 hr/week+ employees (1992)
2. Expanding internationally, first to Japan (1996)
3. Beginning to "monetize the brand outside our stores" (now)
   

In many ways, it was interesting and amazing and inspiring to hear what he said. In other ways, it didn't matter. He was there, on time, patient, and willing, spending time with a group of people he'd never met, many of whom had written him long and intensely personal letters thanking him for changing their lives. He wasn't magnetizing, and he wasn't astoundingly captivating. But he was real. And all that he's accomplished is so much more real than what almost every other person in the private sector has accomplished. We experience it as customers every day, all over the world. Starbucks isn't Google, and it isn't Ford. Those companies change lives in ways never fathomed before their creations, but they are not truly experiences. Howard has personalized and monetized an experience, and in that, he may be alone in history.

And he had an hour for me.