Succession Questions Brew At Starbucks | Zelensky Gives A Communication Master Class | What Drove A Former CEO To Commit Fraud

Plus: How to encourage innovation while remote

Hello, and welcome to another edition of the CxO newsletter.

What do Tom Brady and Howard Schultz have in common? Last week, quite a bit: MVPs in their own right, both revealed they’d be coming out of retirement after short stints on the sidelines. But just one of those announcements took me by surprise. (Hint: The diehard New York Jets fan in me knew a NFL without the GOAT was simply too good to be true.)

When Starbucks announced on Wednesday that CEO Kevin Johnson would be retiring, and that two-time CEO Howard Schultz would be returning for round three, I was stunned. It’s highly unusual for a chief executive to return not once but twice. And though the company says his tenure will be on an interim basis, and that he’ll be paid just $1 (plus benefits), governance experts tell my colleague Jena McGregor that putting an interim in place can raise questions about long-term strategy, not to mention have implications for future CEO recruitment.

“When you have a culture among the management team where the founder is still around and still actually pretty heavily involved, it can be difficult to recruit somebody who wants to do their own thing,” says Jason Schloetzer, a professor at Georgetown’s business school.

And that’s not even the strangest part: The coffee company in its announcement acknowledged that Johnson first “signaled” his interest in retiring a year ago. Why does Starbucks need an interim CEO at all? What happened to succession planning?

“Why didn’t the board have a year’s time [to do something] other than bring somebody back from retirement?” asks Jeffrey Sonnenfeld, a senior associate dean at Yale’s business school, in an interview with McGregor. As she notes in her piece, Schultz isn’t just “somebody.” During his second stint as CEO, he oversaw a more than 500% rise in Starbucks’ stock, not to mention its global expansion.

Timothy Quigley, who studies CEO succession at the University of Georgia’s business school, tells McGregor that it’s possible Starbucks has someone in mind for the top job, but just couldn’t move quickly enough to fit the timing. No matter what may have unfolded behind closed doors, George Bradt, an executive onboarding expert and senior contributor to Forbes, says this serves as a reminder of the importance of reevaluating organizational processes, including succession planning. He suggests taking these steps to stay ahead of the curve.

Thank you for reading, and feel free to share your ideas with me at vvalet@forbes.com.

What's Next

Show Me The Money: On May 15, a new law in New York City will make it illegal for most employers to exclude pay ranges from their advertised jobs. In addition to putting on display the potential earnings for workers in one of America’s most expensive talent markets, the law could have wide-ranging effects. “What we’re seeing is some organizations start to realize that taking a state-by-state approach isn’t really a scalable solution,” Tauseef Rahman, a partner at human resources consulting firm Mercer, tells McGregor. “Instead of providing this information just for New York or Colorado, [they’re thinking] how can we start to think about doing this nationally?” Here’s how the law stands to affect your business, no matter where it’s based. And for more on how Colorado’s pay transparency legislation has changed the hiring game, check out this piece from Forbes’ Isabel Contreras.

Communication Dos: Congress may not be able to agree on much, but the resolute leadership of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky isn’t up for debate. On Wednesday, he received a standing ovation from both sides of the aisle in response to an address delivered via video from Kyiv. In his speech, he summoned the memory of Pearl Harbor and September 11, alluded to Mount Rushmore and cited Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s “I Have a Dream” speech, demonstrating—asserts communications expert Carmine Gallo in his latest piece for Forbes—words not only matter, but are essential to effectively influencing hearts and minds. For more on what you as a business leader can learn from his address, read this piece from Forbes Senior Contributor Edward Segal.

Communication Don’ts: Bob Chapek has his work cut out for him. After failing earlier this month to take a stance on Florida’s controversial “Don’t Say Gay” bill—a move that, the Wall Street Journal reports, was meant to steer the company clear of corporate America’s “culture clashes”—he’s changed course, denouncing the legislation, pausing Disney’s political donations in Florida and admitting during a town hall yesterday that the company made a mistake by not speaking out sooner, per Reuters. But these measures have done little to placate employees. According to CNBC, several employees of the entertainment giant have reached out to former CEO Bob Iger to “express their disappointment” in his successor. And since last Tuesday, LGBTQ+ employees and allies have staged daily, 15-minute walkouts, culminating in a full-day walkout today, to protest Chapek’s and Disney’s responses. In case you missed it, be sure to check out this piece from Segal, who draws on his crisis communications experience to analyze the response and offer guidance to those navigating similarly choppy waters.

By The Numbers

78%

The percentage of employers who are digitally surveilling their employees, according to a survey by software firm ExpressVPN. If you’re monitoring your workers’ every keystroke and conversation, consider the potential pitfalls: 59% of employees say surveillance causes them stress, and 54% would consider quitting their job over the implementation of such software.

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