Onward
In 2008, Howard Schultz returned to the Starbucks CEO role he had left in 2000, walking back into a company that had over-expanded, watered down its coffee, and was hemorrhaging customers as the financial crisis hit. Onward is his account of the next two years: closing 600 stores, shutting every US location for a single afternoon to retrain 135,000 baristas, fighting the board on capital decisions, and trying to rebuild the brand and the share price simultaneously. The book is part memoir and part operating diary, with Schultz writing in real time about meetings, decisions, and the personal cost of pulling a public company out of a crisis.
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Howard Schultz tells how he returned to the Starbucks CEO role in 2008, closed 600 stores, retrained every barista, and rebuilt the brand through the financial crisis.
The most commonly searched is Onward: How Starbucks Fought for Its Life Without Losing Its Soul, by Howard Schultz, published in 2011. It chronicles Schultz's return as Starbucks CEO during the 2008 financial crisis.
Onward is part business memoir, part corporate strategy book. Howard Schultz uses Starbucks's recovery story to illustrate his views on leadership and brand authenticity.
Onward is 350 pages in standard print editions, though page counts vary slightly between hardcover, paperback, and large-print formats.
At an average reading pace of about 250 words per minute, Onward takes most readers 5 to 8 hours to finish.
Onward is a standalone novel by Howard Schultz, not part of a series.
Onward is available in hardcover, paperback, ebook, and audiobook formats from Amazon, Bookshop.org, ThriftBooks, and most major bookstores.