The training focused on ‘mastering craft, building connections, communicating with impact and problem solving’ | Photo credit: Starbucks

Starbucks has sought to further improve employee and customer experience by holding a major two-day training course for its North American retail staff. 
 

Held on 26-27 October 2022, the two-day District Manager + Leadership Experience event brought together 2,000 District Managers, Regional Directors and Regional Vice Presidents from company-operated and licensed retail stores across the US and Canada. 

The Seattle-based coffee chain said the leadership gathering, the company’s first since 2014, demonstrated its continued investment in employees as part of Starbucks’ ongoing Reinvention strategy.  

This included training focused on ‘mastering craft, building connections, communicating with impact and problem solving’.  

“I believe love is what drives our company’s great success. It’s what makes customers choose us, again and again, when they have so many other alternatives. It is built not by a single action but compounding momentum over time. Decision upon decision, action upon action, turn by turn – each loop adding to the collective effect,” said Howard Schultz, interim CEO, Starbucks.  

In April 2022, Schultz used his first address as interim CEO to outline a new staff and community-focused vision for the coffee chain. 

Three months later, following a growing unionisation movement in Starbucks’ US business, Schultz pledged better opportunities for staff advancement and shared accountability between management and employees. 

In September 2022, Starbucks announced Laxman Narasimhan as its next CEO. The former head of UK-based health and hygiene company Reckitt Benckiser is being advised by Schultz until the latter steps down from his interim CEO role in April 2023. Schultz will remain on Starbucks Board of Directors following the handover.