“It also happens that we come to someone’s office, store, home - and immediately find ourselves under the influence of the situation, with our whole being feeling the calmness emanating from it or, conversely, anxiety or excitement. It's not about the coffee. For many years now I have been mentally describing this situation with the words “talking walls.” Listening has the ability to open doors, and it will help you pave the way for yourself and the entire organization.
The mark of a good leader is working hard to change the situation, to make the unspoken explicit. You must create conditions in which people can not be shy and not hide their thoughts.”

A short excerpt from the book “It’s Not About the Coffee: The Corporate Culture of Starbucks”

“...Have you ever stopped in front of a great work of art in a museum? It takes hold of you and takes you somewhere. Mythology scholar Joseph Campbell called this phenomenon “aesthetic arrest.”
Art “holds” you and (with your consent) comes into contact with you. The same thing can happen in dialogue. If you stop and wait for the meaning to unfold and the emotions to unfold, the unspoken meaning becomes clear, a direct connection appears from heart to heart.

I once had a teacher who developed similar ideas, and with him I took the first step towards understanding that things have a voice. I remember him telling me that almost all store managers repeat the same sequence of actions every day in the morning: they unlock the store door, go inside, turn the switch, go to the office, start laying out the supplies for that day's work...

His advice was this: if you want to really feel the store, get new impressions from it every day. If it has two doors, enter through one, then through the other. From time to time, crawl into your office on all fours. After closing or before opening, when there is no one else in the store, sit on the floor in the middle of the sales area and just listen.

If you look at things with fresh eyes and listen well, you can learn a lot. This applies not only to stores, but also to corporate offices. Change your route. Look who's here, turn on your perception - and the room will speak.

Responsive Emptiness

There is a quote on the wall in my office that tormented and puzzled me for a long time before I was able to extract practical meaning from it: “responsive emptiness.”
This concept comes from an ancient Eastern religion with a different approach to communication than ours - more complex, requiring more activity and openness.

To get along with yourself, use your head; to get along with others, use your heart.

ELEANOR ROOSEVELT

Responsive Emptiness means empathy without bias, it invites you to be attentive but “empty” - free from any opinions or advice. As Western Buddhist scholar Joseph Goldstein explains it, “Responsiveness and emptiness are not different entities. Responsiveness is not a property, but simply a reaction to circumstances from a position of selflessness. The more empty we are, the less full of ourselves, the higher our sensitivity.”

Try to consider the concept of responsive emptiness in the context of communication between spouses, between parents and children. One of my friends told me about the work of Deborah Tannen, a famous psychologist and specialist in the field of interhuman communications, where related issues are discussed. The title of the book is: “Are You Wearing This? Mutual understanding in conversations between mothers and daughters."

According to Deborah Tannen, mothers express their love for their daughters and concern for them by trying to correct them, to “help” them. Almost all of them want to make comments to their daughters, give advice about their appearance and clothing, talk about how their daughters look after themselves and how they look in the eyes of others.
Really, who else is capable of caring so much? But why then is this modern form of maternal love capable of offending daughters and making them furious?
Because the mother's perception, although responsive - at least from one point of view - is not empty. In my experience, fathers behave the same way.

Responsive emptiness allows us to be equals

We recognize that everyone is one of a kind.
No one has all the answers. Nobody is in charge. And everyone feels the same thirst. When someone comes into your office with a problem - work or personal - you usually want to solve it. But more often than not, what people really need is to just talk it out.

And in most cases, you don't have to solve the problem yourself. There is a way to help a person overcome difficulties without taking them on yourself. This is a sympathetic emptiness, full of sympathy, but containing no ready-made solutions. It is very difficult to achieve. Yet, if you are able to conceptualize the idea of ​​responsive emptiness and learn to evoke it within yourself, it will lead you to perceive and communicate on a new, deeper level.

Attention and Focus: Habits to Help You Listen

Responsive emptiness gives us the opportunity to perceive the interlocutor in a new way, to conduct a dialogue with him, giving less importance to a given topic and more sensitivity. In fact, we know very well how this is done.
Everyone knows: listening well means communicating well. True, knowledge and action are not at all the same thing. A fresh perspective allows you to activate your instincts and connect with people on a more truthful and meaningful wavelength. Here are ways to help you learn how to create a responsive emptiness within yourself and put it into practice.

Communicate in person: There is no substitute for face-to-face contact. Sit down and chat. Take your time and don't rush your interlocutor. You'll learn—and maybe get done—more than if you sent out a dozen emails.
Stop sending memos, go get a cup of coffee. Thanks to modern technology, our communications have become more intense, but their quality has not improved. On the contrary, the use of technical means interferes with full communication, since in this case critical non-verbal components are missing. You've probably completely misinterpreted the tone of an email.

I've heard from some famous executives that they made the worst decisions of their lives on video conferences. Genuine communication must be personal. Don't project your own ideas and needs onto the situation, but give people the opportunity to express themselves and make a real attempt to understand the meaning of their words and understand their feelings. Forget about the specific task for a moment and think about the person. Let him know that you care about him and ask him how you can help him.

Try to grasp the hidden meaning of what was said. One day, an employee who was part of my team came to me with a work problem. She described her difficulties, and I tried to determine what was wrong with her. She looked upset, at some point she even cried. I walked around the table, intending to put my arm around her shoulders and say something encouraging - it seemed to me that she needed and wanted it. But no - she quickly pulled away.
Then I realized that she was not possessed by sadness, but by anger, and she needed only one thing from me - for me to listen and admit the truth. She continued to talk about the issues that had caused her distress, and I waited patiently for her to talk. Genuine listening is about creating an empty space into which the other person can pour out their soul.

Let silence fill your heart. Silence has amazing power. Pay attention to what people fill it with. What questions, anxieties, and bewilderments are hidden in it? Maybe the interlocutor is feeling insecure? Embarrassment? Is the problem bothering him? Or else, look at what happens when you announce a topic and simply ask, “How do you like it?” Sometimes the hardest thing is to listen when nothing is said.

People often want to fill the pause that arises. And here, be alert, try not to miss anything. Do not hurry. Let the silence fill itself. It might take thirty seconds. Minute. Five minutes. But it will happen. By trusting silence, you will open the soul of things, and the essence of a lot of problems will instantly become clear to you.

Ask and it will be given to you (answer)

Contrary to the proverb, no news is not always good news.
The opposite statement (that this is bad news) is also false.
You can't find out anything until you ask, you have to find out how things are going. And if you ask, both problems and successes become known faster, you can eliminate the former in time and develop the latter. In an atmosphere of open dialogue and constant communication, where everyone listens to each other and everyone's opinion is valued, you will certainly get the best ideas. You will recognize challenges long before they become problems.

Therefore, it is necessary to constantly encourage employees to express their opinions. Of course, you cannot implement all the suggestions, but you can certainly listen, think and learn. People understand that not all ideas will be accepted, and if you respect their desire to contribute to the common good, they will continue to try.

Recently, in a meeting at Starbucks, I found out how things were going. In response, it was as if a floodgate had opened. It turned out that she had to and did not like it.
This is her relationship with Starbucks. If she feels this way. I have the opportunity to learn about (and address) an issue that needs resonance. It's not about the coffee.

Make candidness safe

People surprisingly rarely act on their own initiative. They have guidelines, called bylaws in some companies.
Starbucks- is no exception: you should put cups on the shelf this way, prepare drinks - this way and that way. Often, a circular or directive is sent out from the support center to all cafes, and in practice it turns out that this is not a very correct order. But no one objects.

Eventually someone stands up and asks:
“Do you know that we do everything exactly and nothing comes of it?” It happens that work on the program has been going on for a whole month, and then someone makes a similar statement. The question arises: why was everyone silent for so long?

The reason is simple - they were afraid to speak out against an opinion that they perceived as authoritative. In such a situation, the error can persist indefinitely. At the same time, most cafe managers are absolutely clear that the decision was wrong, but they say: “Well, they just want us to act this way.” Who is to blame here?

Of course, management, and I think they - we - should be ashamed: we failed to create an environment in which anyone could stand up without fear and say that the plan is no good. It was necessary that 99% of employees were not afraid to speak out and take the risk of doing so. They had to be given the opportunity to be heard.

People are timid by nature. Many of us want to express our opinions, but refrain from doing so for fear that they will be pushed away and will not want to listen. As a result, they remain silent and do not speak out. The mark of a good leader is working hard to change the situation, to make the unspoken explicit.
You must create conditions in which people can not be shy and not hide their thoughts.

Open forums. It's not about the coffee.

Starbucks' public forums are quite famous. These are meetings that take place throughout the country and at which all employees of the organization can attend and speak.
We have created open forums to discuss planned changes and other issues that have caused or may cause a conflict situation.

In many cases, employees hid that they did not like a particular idea and simply remained silent in response to a quietly asked question. Coffee shop managers did not want to openly declare their disagreement - it seemed to them contrary to the spirit of the company and the policies of its management. Then I brought the topic to the forum - just to ensure its discussion.

Sometimes the silence was deafening. I had to learn to handle it and exist in it. Engaging people in dialogue required extreme concentration. I could pose a question, and if then someone spoke out - one or two minutes was enough for a remark - the floodgates opened at once, the whole room came to life and began to participate in the discussion. But I don’t think this would have worked if we hadn’t been able to patiently endure the general silence.

Over time, I realized that simply listening to people, allowing them to publicly express their opinions without fear of being punished or looked down on, dispels fear. At the forum in question, we did not reach complete unanimity, but mutual understanding was established between us. It was decided to first try introducing new additives at a few selected points and see what happens.
This way we were able to get people into the program and create a situation where they could continue the discussion and still disagree with management.
They were heard, and because of that we were all empowered to move forward.

Open forums have become a way of life at Starbucks. Here new ideas were put forward and indignation was poured out. When things got tough, we allowed each other to talk openly and honestly, without any fear. This culture of speaking and listening, these clear channels, have greatly enhanced our organization's ability to continually evolve.

Listening Brings Openness and Clarity

Often listening is the fastest way to deal with a problem. It can open up a new perspective and provide a fresh solution when worries about results, deadlines, conflict or lack of direction are at their peak.
You can count on him even - and especially - when you doubt the correctness of the chosen path, the actions being taken, or whether there is a way out of the current situation at all.
Listening has the ability to open doors, and it will help you pave the way for yourself and the entire organization.

Honesty to oneself is the main type of truth.
You know in your heart whether you believe in your company's mission and your own role in achieving that mission;
Do you trust the management and employees you work with? whether the words published on behalf of the company correspond to the actions performed by its representatives. If you don't have trust in the organization or the feeling that you are doing the right thing and what people need, you owe it to yourself to honestly assess the situation and take steps to change it.

Regardless of how justified the fear is and how much is placed on you, the truth will lead you to solving the problems that have tormented you and you will believe in the reality of the prospects. You need to find ways to always remember your goal, the big task.
Striving for it and being honest with yourself will give you the strength to change your situation - where you are, or where you may have to go. Look at your fear through the eyes of truth and understand what you can do to break it, break through it, or break away from it.

Let faith replace fear

When we free ourselves from our own fear, our presence automatically frees others.

NELSON MANDELA

Departure from the truth is usually a consequence of fear. We fear being rejected along with our integrity. When the list of employees to be laid off ended up forgotten on the photocopier, I felt not only upset, irritated, embarrassed, but also afraid. What will people think? Will they treat me worse?
If you are unable to speak frankly with your girlfriend (boyfriend), are you afraid to admit something to your wife (husband), what kind of life is this? How is a good relationship possible here? Likewise, if you don't have honest and open relationships with your co-workers, your boss, or your company's management, what kind of job is it?
What experience can be taken from it, other than negative?
And where does a good company come from?

Ray Kroc, the founder of McDonald's, once said: “Convert your fear to faith.”
I like these words. Fear blocks us from the future, the place where opportunities open up. What we fear enslaves us, what we encounter liberates us. Always tell the truth, even if it is met with disapproval..."

~ Howard Behar, “It's Not About the Coffee: The Corporate Culture of Starbucks.”

Howard Behar- President of Starbucks International, worked in senior positions at Starbucks for 17 years.
Largely thanks to him, the company reached the international level.

Everyone who has had the opportunity to work with Howard Behar assures him that he is a true professional, always thinking about people, believing in the common cause, true to his word, and respecting the truth.

Flip through the book

• About the book
• about the author
• Reviews (7)
• Reviews

Quote

“If you grow people, they will grow a business. This is the essence, and this is the highest priority."

Howard Behar

What is the book “It’s Not About the Coffee: The Corporate Culture of Starbucks” about?

The fact that the company should consider both its employees and its clients first of all as people, then everything else will come by itself. If a manager treats employees as partners, and not as one of the resources, they achieve fantastic results; if he sees clients not as a source of income, but as people to whom he provides a service, they come back again and again.

Why the book “It's Not About the Coffee” is worth reading

• The author of the book is not only a talented manager, but also a long-time keeper of the soul of Starbucks.
• The book talks about aspects of the company's internal culture that are not described in any official manual.
• The author shares ten key principles that helped him succeed and that every leader should follow.

Who is this book for?

For business leaders and managers at any level who want to learn how to inspire employees and achieve outstanding results.

Who is author

Howard Behar - President of Starbucks International, worked in management positions at Starbucks for 17 years. Largely thanks to him, the company reached the international level. Everyone who has had the opportunity to work with Howard Behar assures him that he is a true professional, always thinking about people, believing in the common cause, true to his word, and respecting the truth.

Video presentation of the book

Key Concepts

What needs to be done so that employees are loyal to their leader and the company not only in joy, but also in sorrow? Howard Behar (ex-president of Starbucks) believes that you need to start with a business philosophy. At Starbucks, the philosophy is that people (customers and employees) come first, and product comes second. This means that Starbucks listens carefully to the opinions of its customers and employees - and... Read more

History of the corporation. Personal history

A book about the inextricable connection between corporate culture and customer service, told by a man who became one of the authors of the success of the world famous brand Starbucks.... Read more

Review of the book “It’s Not About the Coffee”

Starbucks is a world-famous chain of coffee shops where the name of the visitor is written on the glass if you take coffee with you. And, probably, this fact perfectly reflects the philosophy of the company. In this book, Howard Behar, who was at the origins of Starbucks, tells how he searched for himself and formed the company's service standards. In many ways, this is a description of his development as a leader.... Read more

Review from Andrey Zhulay

Jim Collins said: “To create a Great Company, you first need to understand with whom, and then what...?!” For me personally, this is one of the most important Wisdoms of corporate life. A strong team, the synergy of which is able to overcome any challenges on the way to the pinnacle of Success, on the way to No. 1, on the way to creating a historically Great company. If you learn to perceive your employees and clients, first... Read more

Review from Pavel Tkachenko

I read this small-looking book (less than 200 pages, and almost pocket-sized) for 3 evenings! All of it is covered with underlining, and almost all of it can be taken apart into quotes and hung on the walls of the office, as the author of the book likes to do. It’s rare that anyone hasn’t heard of the international cafe chain Starbucks. Howard Schultz, the founder of this chain and the author of a best-selling book about the history of Starbucks, also...

(estimates: 1 , average: 3,00 out of 5)

Title: It's Not About the Coffee: Starbucks Corporate Culture
Author: Howard Behar, Janet Goldstein
Year: 2012
Genre: Corporate culture, Popular business, Foreign business literature

About the book It's Not About the Coffee: The Corporate Culture of Starbucks by Howard Behar, Janet Goldstein

The book "It's Not About the Coffee: The Corporate Culture of Starbucks" by Howard Behar and Janet Goldstein will be of particular interest to entrepreneurs and small business owners, especially at the initial stage of their activity, when core corporate values ​​are being formed. It is also worth reading for people who have just begun their career and strive to achieve great results. The book will help you develop your skills and understand what their true purpose is.

It can help leaders who dream of united team morale, improving the quality of service and achieving better results, as well as leaders who are trying to make changes to the culture of their team or its value system. The work will also benefit organizations that need literature related to managing teams and people.

In their book, It's Not About the Coffee: The Corporate Culture of Starbucks, Behar and Goldstein lay out some fairly accessible principles that should guide leaders who want to achieve unprecedented heights with their teams.

“It's Not About the Coffee: The Corporate Culture of Starbucks” reveals one very important point: if Starbucks did not have such a friendly and cohesive team, the world would never know the taste of their coffee. The main idea of ​​Starbucks is the following statement: “no people, no coffee.” And each person in the company must find his own method in order to benefit people and the organization.

Howard Behar, the president of Starbucks and a man who held various leadership positions at the company for seventeen years, shares in the book his own experiences that he gained while working at Starbucks. He is happy to pass on this experience to those who want to find their way to success and realize their wildest dreams. His appeal will help you become the creator of your life and achieve the highest results.

The central message of It's Not About the Coffee: The Corporate Culture of Starbucks is to treat your employees and customers as people first. When a leader treats his subordinates as partners, they can achieve fantastic results together. And if he looks at his clients, first of all, as people, and not as a source of income, then they will come back again and again.

On our website about books, you can download the site for free without registration or read online the book “It’s Not About the Coffee: The Corporate Culture of Starbucks” by Howard Behar, Janet Goldstein in epub, fb2, txt, rtf, pdf formats for iPad, iPhone, Android and Kindle . The book will give you a lot of pleasant moments and a real pleasure to read. You can buy the full version from our partner. Also, here you will find the latest news from the literary world, learn the biography of your favorite authors. For beginning writers, there is a separate section with useful tips and tricks, interesting articles, thanks to which you yourself can try your hand at literary crafts.

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Howard Behar featuring Janet Goldstein

It's not about the coffee. Starbucks corporate culture

Lynn, Sarina and Michael, Scott and Kim and our four wonderful grandchildren - Sydney, Ella, Matthew and Zoe - who make it so easy to say yes to everything they ask.

Translator M. Sukhanova

Corrector O. Ilyinskaya

Computer layout A. Abramov

Cover artist A. Mishchenko

© Howard Behar, 2007

© Publication in Russian, translation, design. Alpina Business Books LLC, 2008

Published under license from Portfolio, a division of Penguin Group, USA

© Electronic edition. Alpina Publisher LLC, 2012

All rights reserved. No part of the electronic copy of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means, including posting on the Internet or corporate networks, for private or public use without the written permission of the copyright owner.

Work in the world is like dirt.

Made somehow, it gets your hands dirty and crumbles to dust.

But a thing worthy of masterful execution is perfect in form, pure, and its essence is undeniable.

Greek amphorae for wine or oil, Hopi Indian pots for storing grain are exhibited in museums, but we know what they were intended for.

The jug asks to pour water into it, and the man asks to give him a real job.

Marge Piercy. Be needed

Forewarning

Although this book is entitled It's Not About the Coffee, it certainly says something about coffee: it's about people and coffee. Without the people who source, roast, deliver, prepare and serve coffee, we wouldn't have Starbucks. The true essence of Starbucks is that there is no coffee without people.

A second note along the same lines: Although this book is about Starbucks' corporate culture, you won't find what it says in any of the company's official manuals. In reality, there are no recipes for successful promotion at Starbucks, and there is not a single document that would instruct a leader to use any techniques or adhere to certain views. With us, everyone must find their own way to benefit the organization and the people for whom we work. Many books and articles have been written about Starbucks from a variety of perspectives. Here I talk about my personal journey, the lessons I learned, applied and passed on to others - both before becoming one of the leaders of Starbucks and during my time at the company. I humbly hope that these principles and my experience will help you find your path to success and the realization of your wildest dreams.

Preface

I am honored to present Howard Behar's book about the leadership principles by which he lived and acted during his time at Starbucks, and I am proud that Howard has placed such trust in me. This is the most serious and sincere person that can be in the world, he is absolutely alien to any pretense or boasting. Howard is always truthful - no matter what the truth is. His assertive style helps him quickly cut through irrelevant layers and get to the bottom of things. He is also distinguished by exceptional ardor, emotionality and a complete inability to hide his feelings. You always see his position (and at the same time yours), and we always stand shoulder to shoulder in any trials, whether they concern one of us personally or our organization.

As a leader, he is a treasure - a natural leader with a skill set that exceeds what the top executives of many, many companies can boast of. That Howard chose us in 1989, when we were a small regional company, was a great thing for me, for Starbucks, and for him, I think, too. From the very first days of his stay with us, he stood for the fact that “our business is the people we serve coffee to, not the coffee we serve people.”

This is a motivating and practical guide - a book about people and how important it is to always think about them first; about the role we all play in creating a corporate culture that gives the company life and keeps it growing and moving forward.

Through his time at Starbucks, Howard continually showed us that great businesses must have a conscience. His own more than thirty years in leadership positions is an excellent example of how one can succeed by doing good deeds. Howard's help and guidance have made me a much stronger leader, and I know full well that his incomparable influence on me, our employees and our clients comes from not only his experience, but also his endless goodwill coupled with his great love for our business. business.

Looking back at the history of Starbucks' achievements, we can see that everything worked out in a surprisingly timely manner. First of all, we always seemed to have a knack for finding the right person for the right job at the right time. If Howard Behar and Orin Smith had not once joined us, the company would have developed very differently, so that we would certainly not be at our current level of entrepreneurship and ingenuity. And we would also really miss that special chemical compound that was made up of the three of us: we understood each other almost without words, seeing the same goals and ways to achieve them.

To understand the dynamics of our relationship, it seems to me that we need to start with the following fact. I'm willing to dream and dream and dream, and Howard is happy to dream, but before he goes after his big dream, he's going to take five steps back and see what might be wrong (even if it's an idea he's passionate about). supports and wants to bring it to life). This dynamic, with its creative conflicts, has left its mark on the entire company's activities, where optimism is combined with caution. We never raced around corners. The company's point of view on various issues could change, but we always moved in the same direction. We have never had a dispute about the goal we are moving towards, only about the ways to achieve it.

Orin provided the balance between the different paths, as well as the financial guidance and relevant know-how we needed. Despite the fact that formally I was considered the head of the company, everything with us was based on exceptionally deep respect for each other, without a single hint of “divide and conquer.” Our employees aptly dubbed our triple alliance H 2 O (after the initial letters of their names - Howard, Howard, Orin). We have become a necessary ingredient for the company, like water for coffee.

Howard and I communicated in the language of trust. Both knew what sacrifices (understood only by a few) required the creation of an organization. Being a leader requires you to instill confidence, which can make many of us uncomfortable showing vulnerability or doubt, and can feel very lonely. Howard and I could share with each other. The conversations between us were about strategy, but were structured around our own dynamics. All the company's achievements came from them.

And Howard knew how to get his way like no one else. Here's a story we don't often hear about how the company almost died in late 1989. We opened a coffee shop in Chicago to show potential investors that the Starbucks concept was not a local phenomenon, but failed when we tried to raise more money. . Howard told me, "I'm going to go to Chicago and stay there until everything is done right." He knew that Chicago employees needed to believe in what they were doing, to understand that their task was larger than the role of each of them or even the entire cafe, that their efforts meant a lot.

By going to Chicago, Howard showed what it really means to care for people, demonstrated his famous ability to rally a team, and demonstrated the practical application of the principles outlined in this book. His magnetic personality, coupled with his passionate dedication to our goals, helped lift the morale of the entire company, which had an immediate impact on productivity.

The head of Starbucks is Howard Schultz, but two more people were at the origins of its amazing success - Howard Behar and Orin Smith. It was during the period of their joint activity that the company flourished.

Howard Behar's career at Starbucks began in 1989. At that time, the company owned only 28 retail outlets, teetering on the brink of bankruptcy. The opening of a new Starbucks coffee shop in Chicago almost put an end to the existence of the entire company, but Howard managed to avoid such an outcome and prove to investors the viability of the project. Then for the first time he proved that he could be a successful leader.

Howard Behar was a key executive at Starbucks for 17 years. During this time, the company experienced many difficulties, but its growth practically did not stop. Howard viewed the company as part of his family and valued and respected its workers and employees. According to the memoirs of Howard Schultz, Howard Behar always thought about people first, no matter what issue was on the agenda.

Today, Starbycks has almost 17,000 coffee shops around the world. Howard always said: “do what you love and success will come” . It was this concept that formed the basis of his book “ It's not about the coffee».

"It's not about the coffee"

The book contains a lot of useful information that will certainly interest any person in a leadership position: advice, recommendations, Howard’s personal experience, etc. The author has come up with 10 principles of a successful leader, each of which is devoted to a separate chapter in the book.

10 Leadership Principles from Howard Behar

Howard Behar understood the importance of respecting and accepting people for who they are. By elevating people in their own eyes, he gave them strength and confidence. Following the principles set out in the book “ It's not about the coffee“You will become more efficient, wiser and more responsible!

We also bring to your attention a video interview with Howard Behar! (original language retained - English).