Reference no: EM132803886

On April 12, 2018, two black men, Rashon Nelson and Donte Robinson, were waiting for a business associate at Philadelphia Starbucks. Mr. Nelson and Mr. Robinson were entrepreneurs and were going to discuss business investment opportunities with Andrew Yaffe, a white real estate developer. As they waited for Mr. Yaffe, the two men had not purchased anything yet. When a store employee asked if she could help them, they said "no," and that they were just waiting for a business meeting. At some point after that, the men asked to use the restroom. Because they had not purchased anything, the store manager asked them to leave, and they refused, explaining that they were there to meet someone. The manager called the police because the men refused to leave. At least six Philadelphia Police Department officers arrived. The police officers told the men to leave the Starbucks immediately. They declined. The police officers then proceeded to arrest the men for trespassing. As the arrest occurred, Mr. Yaffe arrived and asked why the two men were being arrested. The two men were taken out in handcuffs and taken to the police station, photographed, and fingerprinted. They were held for approximately eight hours before being released from custody. Prosecutors decided that there was insufficient evidence to charge the men with a crime. Another patron at Starbucks recorded the arrest on her cell phone, and it quickly went viral. In an interview after the arrest, the woman mentioned that she had been sitting at the Starbucks for a while, and that she wasn't asked to leave even though she didn't order anything. After the video of the arrest went viral, Starbucks CEO Kevin Johnson released a statement: "We apologize to the two individuals and our customers and are disappointed this led to an arrest. We take these matters seriously and clearly have more work to do when it comes to how we handle incidents in our stores. We are reviewing our policies and will continue to engage with the community and the police department to try to ensure these types of situations never happen in any of our stores." In his apology statement and follow up video release shortly after the arrests, Johnson said, "The video shot by customers is very hard to watch and the actions in it are not representative of our Starbucks Mission and Values. Creating an environment that is both safe and welcoming for everyone is paramount for every store. Regretfully, our practices and training led to a bad outcome-the basis for the call to the Philadelphia police department was wrong." The week following the arrests, Starbucks announced it would temporarily close 8,000 stores to conduct unconscious bias training, which they did on May 29, 2018. When one customer complained on Facebook that closing the stores because of just one incident seemed like overkill, Starbucks responded: "There are countless examples of implicit bias resulting in discrimination against people of color, both in and outside our stores. Addressing bias is crucial in ensuring that all our customers feel safe and welcome in our stores." A similar complaint about closing thousands of stores because of the actions of a handful of employees prompted this response from Starbucks: "Our goal is to make our stores a safe and welcoming place for everyone, and we have failed. This training is crucial in making sure we meet our goal." Before this incident, Starbucks had no companywide policy about asking customers to leave, and the decision was largely left to the discretion of each store manager. A month after the arrests, Starbucks released a new "Use of Third Place Policy " which states that anyone can use Starbucks and its facilities without making a purchase; it also explains what managers should do if a customer becomes disruptive. Assignment: Considering all the information available to you, provide recommended course of action to CEO Kevin Johnson on how to avoid incidents like this in the future. In presenting a recommendation to the CEO, you are to identify those facts critical to your recommendation and at least two ethical theories (use three ethical theories if one of your theories is utilitarianism) that support it. In doing so, you must explain the theories upon which you rely and demonstrate how they support your recommendation. A well-written response to the problem will include:

1) Identifying the ethical dilemmas Starbucks was confronted with;

2) Explaining clearly the ethical theories that support your recommendation;

3) Clarifying the relationship between what the law might require in this situation and what ethics would require (although you do not need to get into any potential legal issues, you should be able to explain the relationship between law and ethics as presented by your professor)

4) Explaining Starbuck's social responsibility in this situation, using, but not necessarily limited to, the stakeholder model of ethical decision-making.

5) Supporting your recommendation with well-defined ethical theories and connecting the theories to the recommendation. To make a quality recommendation your recommended course of action needs to have some connection to the supporting theories.