Leadership Principles in Starbucks Coffee Company - Essay Example

This means that Schultz had a preconceived idea that like his business, those people with the opportunity to lead others in their organization should have got people skills to become effective leaders. In its broader sense, Schultz was combining the basic principles of leadership from the point of view of trait and behavioural theories. The very proof is the thought that this can also be explained using the contingency point of view of leadership particularly the Fiedler model which particularly highlights the match between the leader’s style of interacting with subordinates in certain situations to achieve high group performance (Arrmandi, Oppedisano, & Sherman, 2003). This may also fall on implicit theories of leadership where there is an emphasis on mental models that substantially include the combined idea of traits and behaviours of a person (Schyns, 2006).

Starbucks’s nature of business requires effective group performance, which can only be obtained if there is a leader who according to Schultz has the potential for people skills. At Starbucks, it is about the combination of different talents or skills to come up with product or service offerings that would place high value on customers. It requires a manager in this case who is a leader that at some point could influence the people to maximize their creativity or potential to do well in performing their respective roles in the organization. This must be achieved not because of the power of that manager to hire or fire people, but because of his or her people skills that would influence the subordinates. A strong will and loud voice may be integral parts of a boss, but an effective leader requires people skills (Williams & Denney, 2010).

Modern organizations applied the concept of team-based principle, where leaders’ leadership is assumed to be assigned (Appelbaum, Audet, & Miller, 2003). This is another reality at Starbucks. Leadership is assigned to those with excellent people skills. The search for good leaders based on certain standards remarkably is implied integral part of the organization’s strategic leadership principle.

The available theories and principles of leadership when combined or studied together create substantial information that could eventually explain an organization’s prevailing strategic leadership principle. This can be applied in the case of Starbucks which strongly adhered to finding the best talents and skills for its business by finding for effective leader with people skills. The idea about people skills encompasses various leadership theories especially when one has to look at it from the context of Starbucks Coffee Company.