Starbucks CEO tells employees to be more effective amid turnaround effort

Starbucks CEO Brian Niccol implored employees during an internal forum to make decisions more efficiently and to take ownership of them, reiterating his commitment to drastically improve operations in order to attract more customers back into stores.

“We’re not effective on how things get to the store, and we’re not effective in making decisions and then holding each other accountable to those decisions,” Niccol said during the forum. “This is why we had to make the changes that we had to make.”

Since taking over Starbucks last fall, Niccol has made it clear that the company is undergoing a turnaround, though he remains confident that it can overcome the challenges holding it back.

“We gotta untangle a few things right now,” Niccol said during the forum. “But you know what? It’s all things that we can untangle.”

Starbucks CEO Brian Niccol took over the coffee giant last fall. (Robin Marchant / Getty Images)

The company has been working to simplify operations in order to reverse its lackluster sales, which has included eliminating 1,100 support partner roles and closing several hundred additional open and unfilled positions. 

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Last month, when the cuts were officially announced, Niccol stated that they were part of an effort to eliminate “layers and duplication” and create “more nimble teams.” He also emphasized that these changes are crucial for positioning Starbucks for future success.

People pass by a Starbucks coffee shop in Manhattan on Jan. 15, 2025. (Mostafa Bassim/Anadolu via / Getty Images)

“Our intent is to operate more efficiently, increase accountability, reduce complexity and drive better integration,” Niccol said in the February letter to employees. “All with the goal of being more focused and able to drive greater impact on our priorities.”

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Niccol, who aims to return the company to its coffeehouse roots, is working to boost profitability and improve the work environment after the company faced years of growing pressure from unionization campaigns nationwide and consecutive disappointing fiscal quarters as traffic declined. To do this, the company deployed a plan called “Back to Starbucks,” which is a series of changes aimed at enhancing the in-store customer experience while improving efficiency.

A barista pours steamed milk into a cup at a Starbucks cafe. (Waldo Swiegers/Bloomberg via / Getty Images)

Part of Niccol’s strategy included separating mobile order pickup from the café experience, fixing its pricing architecture and trimming down the coffee chain’s “overly complex menu.”

The company removed more than a dozen “less popular” drinks from its menu, believing this will help improve innovation and reduce wait times. The goal is to cut wait times down to four minutes.

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The company, focused on reverting cafés back to their former “coffeehouse” aesthetic, re-introduced “personal touches” like mugs and messages written in Sharpie markers. It stopped charging for alternative milk and brought back the condiment bar, a nod to pre-pandemic times. 

Starbucks also reversed its open-door policy and will now only allow paying customers to use the restrooms and linger in its stores in order to reduce the crowd of people who occupy the space without making purchases. A few weeks later it began offering free refills of hot brewed or iced coffee as well as hot or iced tea to dine-in customers, to keep them in stores longer. 

Niccol also told FOX Business in an exclusive interview in December that he aims to make pricing on its app more transparent.