Page 186 - The Starbucks Experience

Leave Your Mark

District manager Karen Mahoney saw this type of leader-
ship development when her team worked with Habitat for
Humanity. Karen relates, “I enjoyed watching the partners
set a lofty fund-raising goal and exceed it through hard work.
It was also gratifying to see something they were so passion-
ate about. Once the building phase begins, we will be volun-
teering weekly as a team to build a home for some needy
family. Each Saturday during the construction, we’ll also con-
tribute coffee and bring it to the site in the morning to get
everybody started. This whole thing came from our partners,
and they are excited to see their dream, a house for a needy
family, about to be realized.”

Future Leadership
Although Starbucks leadership has already left a huge mark 171
on communities throughout the globe, the company isn’t fin-
ished yet. If anything, the management at Starbucks has
started to appreciate the unique opportunity available at this
point in the company’s history. Managers are aware that they
may change more than local communities and that they have
a role in sharing the lessons they have learned from their CSR
journey to date.
Sandra Taylor sums it up well: “Up to now, in Starbucks
history, we’ve committed to doing the right thing. We’ve
conducted our business in ways that reflect our values and
our principles because we thought it was good for our part-
ners and our suppliers, but only in recent years have we
talked about how we can be an example for leaders of other
industries. We aren’t arrogant enough to say ‘follow our
lead,’ ‘we’re the best,’ or anything like that, but we’ve had
success and we’ve had validation for the way we’ve con-