Bucking Starbucks’ Star

Common sense would perhaps dictate that a company sporting a managerial culture of pathological lying as the default way of dealing with stakeholders must inevitably go under at some point. Kant’s categorical imperative insists that mendacity is unethical, for it violates the non-contradictory law of reason. What would the Prussian Kant say, however, to the good Germans who lied to NAZI Jew-hunters about hiding the enemies of the state? As laudable as such lies are, unsavory business managers seem instinctually wired to take advantage of the slippery slope by ignoring the rationale of avoiding extreme harm. What begins as a trickle can become a deluge. Perhaps that is what happened at Starbucks.

In late October, 2022, the director of the U.S. National Labor Relations Board “accused Starbucks of threatening to withhold benefits and wage increases from workers if they unionized; selectively enforcing work policies against union supporters; disciplining or firing workers who were activists; and failing to bargain in good faith.”[1] Starbucks had closed a store in Ithaca, New York. The lack of good faith can be seen in the Congressional testimony of Howard Schultz, Starbucks’ CEO, in 2023. He sanctimoniously “admitted” that people he had spoken with could erroneously infer intimidation. In other words, it’s on the other guy. Such toxic pomposity easily belies a mere patina of portrayed honesty.  

NLRB officials claimed in 2022, The “company has repeatedly broken the law by firing pro-union employees, cutting their hours and offering pay hikes and other benefits to those who decline to unionize.”[2] Least the company’s management’s denials of these claims be believed, fast-forward to April, 2023, when it was revealed that the company had lied that negative publicity and a related strike played no role in the company’s decision to permanently close another store in Ithaca.

The story begins back in April, 2022, when Starbucks’ public-relations firm notified its client that employees “went on strike due to repeated grease trap spills that caused an unsafe environment and lack of action from management.”[3] The lack of action regarding a known safety hazard at a store that the company had written had the “strongest real estate trade position in this area” such that “any relocation would be inferior” points to a single-minded and expedient orientation to money.[4] Such a mentality is ripe for pro-union votes. A managerial culture of mendacity just adds fuel to the flames.

Andrew Trull, a company spokesman, claimed, “Media attention had no bearing on our decision to close the store.”[5] In an internal email, however, Denise Nelsen, senior vice president of U.S. operations, wrote, “We have to solve these condition issues because we also keep getting media on the store condition there.”[6] A direct contradiction! In symbolic logic, A and not-A cannot both be true. A barista at the store at the time said regarding the closing of the lucrative store, “It was retaliation for the strike we went on because we were being forced to work in unsafe conditions. They didn’t care [before]. They cared all of a sudden now when we’re making national news.”[7] Admittedly, negative publicity can hurt the bottom-line. I venture to say nonetheless that the instinctual urge to retaliate, which Nietzsche claimed is out of control in the weak who seek to dominate, trumps the otherwise-hegemonic money-orientation in Starbucks’ managerial culture. The propensity to fabricate rather than tell the truth serves both the power-aggrandizing and economizing motives, especially when they are extreme urges out of control (i.e., not mastered, or channeled by the individual).  

The culture of mendacity in Starbucks’ managerial cadre reaches even the store-manager level. I know this from personal experience. At a Starbucks’ store in April, 2023, a store manager pointed to the last remaining seat. “It’s right below an air-duct that blows cold air.” I had been there in January. “We can adjust that for you,” the manager lied. “I though the temperature of stores is centrally controlled,” I countered. “Yes, it is; it reduces our carbon footprint.” He gave no outward sign that he had just contradicted himself, which can be construed as a lie on top of a lie. Perhaps he was assuming that customers are idiots and would not be likely to put two and two together. Well, I did, but I was polite enough not to tell him that I knew that he had just lied to me. Instead, I went after the accuracy of his claim that centralized control is environmentally friendly. “Well, I have lived in Phoenix, Arizona, where your stores are generally known to feel like refrigerators even when it is 116F degrees. I’d say that’s a pretty big footprint, wouldn’t you?” He stood there silent, like an idiot. The dumb shoes were on a different foot.

Meanwhile, employees of that store kept to their script—that they like their store manager so they would not vote to unionize. When on one occasion I overheard a shift-manager say that the company’s management had lied about giving the employees an additional day off, he was silent when I asked him if he still liked the management so much he would not vote to strike. He pretended like I had not overheard him, which itself is a kind of a lie. Even the employees, who are in no sense of the word “partners” as the company’s head management pretends and publicizes, lie to customers.

Lastly, when I was living in Arizona, I went to a Starbucks in area of Tempe north of the Salt River, which the city of Tempe lies is a lake even though it looks like any other river. Six police employees on their break on the 4^th of July will wandering around the customer area between tables. I approached a Starbucks employee to complain, as I was not used to looking up from my laptop and seeing so many guns passing by at close-range. She refused to act. Then when the group of guns were blocking the counter where drinks are available, I reapproached her and she finally decided to do something. She politely asked the police to hang out away from the bar. She was met with bloated egos, one of which, with his back to the customer area, kept turning his head to give us suspicious looks.

My thought was: if the guy feels such distrust for the public, perhaps he and his coworkers would feel more comfortable spending their breaks somewhere more comfortable. Somewhere more out of the way rather than front and center. This would also spare us, the taxpayers, from being subject to even the tacit intimidation of seeing bullet-proof vests and guns at such close range as we enjoy our coffee. No, I was not over-caffeinated, though maybe the police were, given all their pacing around the tables. Not that the police employees would have recognized their hyperactive state; after all, fish cannot see the water that they breathe, for they are always in it. I contend that such a blindness is conducive to literally and figuratively taking liberties, whether through intimidation or outright lashing out. 

I do contend that liberty includes freedom of the innocent from intimidation. It can be quite difficult to perceive, yet unconsciously it is surely felt. Notice, for instance, the policeman intently looking at me as I took the picture shown here. Is taking a picture suspicious enough to warrant such rapt attention as a hunting dog might have upon seeing a rabbit? As the youth of today would say, the guy needs to chill. Not that I would have walked over to him after taking the photo and say, Hey dude, just chill out a bit, huh? You're on your break. He would have sternly dismissed such an accusation and turned on me (hence proving my point for me) even though it was, after all, a holiday. July 4th, Freedom from Intimidation Day in the U.S.A. By the twenty-first century, the British Red Coats had all but been forgotten, even, I suspect, in Boston Massachusetts. In Arizona, the Red Coats are homegrown.

Fortunately for all concerned, the police huddle-formation soon broke up and the disgruntled cops left the store. I discovered only days later that the head of their local union had been broadcasting that Starbucks had demanded that the police leave the store, which was a lie. The egos were two degrees of separation from realizing that my complaint had some validity, and they felt the need to retaliate against the company just for being asked to move out of the way. Interestingly, the barista had refused to ask the police to stop wandering through the tight-knit customer area yet decided to act when the police were near her.

Laura Ingram of Fox News had decided that I must be a criminal. For its part, Starbucks sent in a vice president, who directly or indirectly told The New York Times that I must be “anxious” and that police of any number whatsoever are welcome in any Starbucks store. Considering the retaliation against employees, or “partners,” who have held strikes or sought to unionize, it is interesting that the vice president capitulated to the local police union—even scapegoating a customer in doing so. I wonder how many customers trust the company and its management; any such trust would surely not be deserved.

The esteemed Starbucks experience, which the company advertised at the time, apparently includes being thrown under the bus (i.e., sacrificed) for making a request that might upset the company’s cosy relationship with fellow power-aggrandizers. Mendacious birds of prey often fly together, for they understand each other, just as alcoholics and drug addicts do. Using people, whether for retaliation or more money, violates Kant’s moral imperative that rational beings (including us, even as we irrationally over-populate and, in doing so, risk even our own extinction) treat other such beings not just as means, but also as ends in themselves. Kant was insistent and adamant: Telling lies violates this moral requirement of what it means ultimately to be human—to partake in rational nature.

Furthermore, as Nietzsche emphasizes in his Genealogy of Morals, an unmastered and excessive instinctual urge of resentment, especially of the strong, and indeed of the ensuing retaliation too, is a mark of being weak. The strong are advised to keep their distance from the new birds of prey. Hence, job-seekers should avoid toxic managerial cultures if possible, and at the very least be on the lookout for the telltale signs—the red flags. A pattern of telling lies is such a flag, hence it is significant when a direct contradiction can be exposed. (Potential) customers should take notice too, though the want of local alternatives can make it difficult, practically speaking, to avoid the chain. Unfettered choices require a competitive market, which as the activities of companies such as Standard Oil, Walmart, and Facebook demonstrate, can be difficult to be maintained even in a republic.

See the booklet: "Bucking Starbucks' Star."

See the essay: "Starbucks Capitulates to an Overzealous Police Union in Spite of In-Store Intimidation."

---

 1. Dave Jamieson, “Starbucks Broke Law By Closing Unionized Store In Ithaca, Labor Officials Say,” Huffington Post, November 1, 2022.
 2. Ibid.
 3. Dave Jamieson, “A Starbucks Closed Abruptly—And Its Workers Say It Was Retaliation,” The Huffington Post, April 29, 2023.
4. Ibid.
5. Ibid.
6. Ibid.
7. Ibid.

On the Aristocracy of Wealth

The rule of a few—aristocracy. The rule of the wealthy—plutocracy. Where the few, being valued above the many, are determined principally on account of wealth, the two forms of government fuse into the aristocracy of the moneyed interest. The cardinal virtue is the fundamental desire for more—otherwise known as greed. Justice is limited to peerage, or amicitia (friendship) based on having wealth. This sort of justice, which can be derived from Cicero, is antithetical to justice as caritas seu benevolentia universalis (love, that is, universal benevolence), which comes from Plato, Augustine, and Leibniz.

The "ardent glow of freedom gradually evaporates;—the charms of popular equality . . . insensibly decline; —the pleasures, the advantages derived from the new kind of government grow stale through use. Such declension in all these vigorous springs of actions necessarily produces a supineness. The altar of liberty is no longer watched with such attentive assiduity; —a new train of passions succeeds to the empire of the mind; —different objects of desire take place: —and, if the nation happens to enjoy a series of prosperity, voluptuousness, excessive fondness for riches, and luxury gain admission and establish themselves—these produce venality and corruption of every kind, which open a fatal avenue to bribery. Hence it follows, that in the midst of this general contagion a few men—or one—more powerful than all others, industriously endeavor to obtain all authority; and by means of great wealth—or embezzling the public money, —perhaps totally subvert the government, and erect a system of aristocratical or monarchic tyranny in its room. What ready means for this work of evil are numerous standing armies, and the disposition of the great revenue of the United States! . . . All nations pass this parokism of vice at some period or other; —and if at that dangerous juncture your government is not secure upon a solid foundation, and well guarded against the machinations of evil men, the liberties of this country will be lost—perhaps forever!"[1]

 A society wherein aristocracy is defined in terms of money can be likened to an old industrial city wherein the masses are boorish and the few are refined. The latter spend their spare time at the two or three country clubs in town. On July 4^th, the masses have a motorcycle parade and fireworks downtown while the wealth-aristocrats enjoy golf and swimming followed by dinner in the dining room and then a separate fireworks show on the golf course. It is literally the tale of two cities—only one of which is gated, though some of the many can watch the clubs’ fireworks from outside.

 In an aristocratic plutocracy, business executives and the moneyed of the professional class (e.g., CPAs, physicians and lawyers, but not clerics and professors—the Brahmans who have been uneasily professionalized but not as well compensated) are valued and thus they rule. In other words, the country clubs rule the strip malls. It is not only that money is allowed to buy political power; wealth is valued so much that is presumed to have the right to govern.

 Although wealth is the defining difference in a society wherein aristocracy is a function of money, refinement itself tend to go with the upper classes; and yet for all the lubricating manners, the country club set is limited by its value on wealth. In other words, corruption can coexist with the superficial manners typically found on the putting green. True refinement, it turns out, comes not from wealth, but, rather, from being educated. Hence, the greatest difference in a society, it turns out, exists between the pedestrian mall and the scholar rather than between the poor and the rich. Even so, in a society wherein aristocracy is defined in terms of wealth, the distance between the rich and poor is exaggerated, which in turn is seen as justifying plutocracy. Once a society can be characterized as an aristocratic plutocracy, it may be that only a mass rebellion can bring back the demos in governance; for the propertied will only consolidate their rule, and their property, unless or until they are forced to relent.

1. The Impartial Examiner, Essay (March 5, 1788), 5.14.15, in Herbert J. Storing, ed., The Anti-Federalist (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1985), pp. 290-91.

A Professional Misnomer: Everyone Is a Self-Proclaimed Professional!

Certainly by the turn of (and well into) the twenty-first century, the term, "professional" had become such a cherished word in the American lexicon that every American had decided that he or she is one. Evincing the Lake Wobegon effect—the tendency of most people to describe themselves or their abilities as above average—nearly everyone is wont to say, “I am a professional.” On housing listings on Craigslist, for example, people routinely use the word to signify that they are not students. In fact, even some students characterize themselves as professionals (though not as professional students!). Such common usage belies the term's claim to having a specific meaning. Moreover, the tendency of non-professions to deem themselves as professions nonetheless may evince one of the downsides of democracy—namely, its proclivity to excess in terms of self-entitlement. This is particularly likely to ensue from a citizenry that is lacking in self-discipline, virtue and knowledge. 

I contend that the self-appellation of “professional” is in actuality an attempt at inclusion in what was hitherto known as “the professional class.” Nietzsche’s thesis is relevant regarding the instinct of certain herd animals to dominate as if they were strong—even though they are in fact weak. 

It is as though a manager at Walmart imagines a concept of egalitarianism wherein he is akin to a lawyer or surgeon—perhaps based on the fact that the manager distinguishes himself somehow from his subordinate “employees.”  Even in the midst of such self-vaunting, a knowledge of store policies and years of practice in dealing with customer complaints do not constitute an equivalent to the knowledge of law or medicine required of a lawyer and physician, respectively. Nor is there an obligation to the public such as in entailed in the practice of law or medicine.

Technically, the term "professional" applies to “the professions.”  This does not mean “any profession” in the sense of “any job category.” Because a professional relies on years of study, albeit undergraduate (meaning only one degree in a discipline/school of knowledge), in his or her practice, he or she must be allowed significant autonomy. Hence the partnership arrangement, wherein the self-discipline of peerage rather than a boss is relied on, is the typical business form for law firms, CPA firms, and medical offices. Managers in business are not professionals. This can be seen both from the standpoint of the relative salience of a responsibility to the client/customer and of judgment.

According to Relson (p. 750), “the basic social role of the physician . . . is to be an agent and trustee for the patient. Physicians are ethically bound to place the medical care needs of their patients before their own financial interests – an obligation that clearly sets the practice of medicine apart from business.” One could add a lawyer's ethical obligation to act in the interest of the client and the CPA's obligation to act in the interest of the public (people who rely on the financial statements). In business by contrast, "buyer beware" is often the default; a business practioner serves a customer for monetary gain.

Similarly, the judgment of a lawyer, physician or CPA is not easily second-guessed by people outside of the respective profession. Even in a hospital, a physician is not reviewed by a manager who is not also a physician. In contrast, non-managerial board directors commonly review the performance of managers.

Put another way, whereas one can manage a business without having attended business school, I do not think any of us would agree to be seen by a physician who had not graduated from a medical school. Nor would a defendant in a criminal case be likely to chance a conviction (and decades in prison) by hiring a lawyer who had not studied law. Creditors and investors would think twice about the unqualified opinion of a CPA firm whose auditors had not passed the CPA exam after years of study of accounting.  That a certified public accountant might also engage in consulting, however, does not mean that consultants are thereby also professionals. Even were consultants to devise a certifying exam, it would not be as substantive or relied on as the lawyer bar exam, medical boards, and the CPA exam.

According to John Boatright (2008), the "work of most financial services providers does not meet the standard criteria for a profession. Among the criteria for a profession which are lacking in financial services are a high degree of organization and self-regulation, a code of ethics, and a commitment to public service. These criteria are possibly met by financial planners and insurance underwriters, but not by brokers, bankers, traders . . ., who, in the strict sense of the term, are not professionals." Financial planners and insurance underwriters come up short, however, in terms of educational requirements. 

According to Boatright (1992), a professional’s stock in trade is a body of specialized knowledge that is the basis for making judgments. Not only is the reliance placed on a professional’s judgment relatively important; professionals are paid primarily for the value of their knowledge that is the basis for their judgments. Accordingly, it is difficult, if not impossible, anyone other than their peers to evaluate their practice.  In fact, Jean Van Houtte (p. 207) refers to professionals as “individuals who practice their occupation autonomously.” Even another surgeon is limited in being able to second-guess a colleague without being in the operating room at the time. The salient element of judgment includes discretion that is difficult for even colleagues to evaluate (though not impossible); obvious lapses, for example, can easily be discerned by a professional’s peers. 

In short, the term "professional" has a specific and limited meaning centered on the responsibility-autonomy that is entailed when specialized-knowledge-informed-judgment is salient in the practice of an occupation. The term does not apply to anyone who does something for a living (as opposed to being an avocation).  If it did, then even prostitutes and politicians would be professionals.  The term “professional politician” connotes ignorance, for which political office is not a job?  It is not like one can be governor of Alaska as a hobby. Also, neither "mature" nor "responsible” is interchangeable with “professional.” Nor does the term mean “acting impersonally or bureaucratically rather than emotionally.” It is no accident that people not in one of the professions use notably wide criteria.

Until the last few decades of the twentieth century, the term "professional" did not suffer from such lack of clarity. For example, Joe Flom, who was instrumental as a lawyer in the hostle take-over bubble that began in the 1970s, claimed that his parents wanted him to be a "professional." He wrote that for them, "being a professional was a great thing. . . . That meant either a doctor or a lawyer." This was the popular application: medicine or law--not a manager or sales person, or even a CEO. Then a sort of inflation set in, and the value associated with being a “professional” has diminished in proportion. The presumption that simply getting hired or being mature on the job makes a person a professional is odious and false. In fact, the over-reach itself evinces an underlying sordid character. Ironically, such a person is in need of more supervision, rather than warranting any sort of autonomy. 

Sources:

Jeff Madrick, Age of Greed: The Triumph of Finance and the Decline of America, 1970 to the Present (New York: Alfred A. Knoff, 2011).

John R. Boatright, “Conflict of Interest: An Agency Analysis.” Pp. 187-203 in Ethics and Agency Theory: An Introduction, Norman E. Bowie and R. Edward Freeman, eds. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1992).

John R. Boatright, Ethics in Finance (Oxford: Blackwell, 2008).

Arnold S. Relman, “Dealing with Conflicts of Interest,” New England Journal of Medicine 313 (1985): 749-51.

Jean Van Houtte, “Research Report: Conflicts of Interest in Law Firms in Belgium,” Legal Ethics 12 (part II): 207-28.

See also:

Skip Worden, On the Arrogance of False Entitlement: A Nietzschean Critique of Business Ethics and Management.

Hypocritical CSR during a Pandemic: O’Reilly Automotive, Inc.

In the retail sector, the behavior of managers and their employees at the store level is particularly relevant to customers. This relevance, I submit, outweighs the wider benefit of a company’s corporate social responsibility (CSR) program if the behavior contradicts either the CSR wording or actual programs. Besides the obvious bad odor of hypocrisy that vitiates CSR claims, a company’s direct effects on its customers (and employees) have implications in terms of responsibility. I submit that these implications are more important than those of CSR programs that are geared to societal problems because they are less central to a business. In short, having a CSR program does not make up for irresponsible policies or conduct toward customers (and employees). O’Reilly’s Automotive serves as a good illustration.
The company’s second CSR goal in 2018 was to enhance “the health and wellbeing of communities engaging with” the company.”[1] The company claimed that CSR is “embedded in” its business philosophy such that the operations are not to “become an obstacle or a burden in the way of people’s and the environment’s wellbeing.”[2] Regarding health, the company’s CSR program consisted of providing “nutritional boosting” by producing and distributing health and hygiene products to “enhance the wellbeing of its customers along with the various communities” with which the company has engaged.[3] To the extent that such products are sold to customers, the CSR program is more like an additional product line than from any sense of responsibility to help reduce societal ills. In other words, the health CSR program was rather self-serving.

In spite of the signage, two out of the three customers in the store were not wearing masks or maintaining physical distance from other people. No employee confronted the two customers. 

In just two years, the company’s store-level operations had negligently become an obstacle or hindrance to the health of employees and customers even as the company continued to tout its CSR health goal. Even though stores had signs indicating that masks were required due to the coronavirus pandemic, managers and/or employees in at least one store were refusing to enforce that policy when customers came in without wearing masks. Such customers could even ignore the barriers keeping customers at a distance from the check-out counter. One employee told me that some customers were even mistaking the barriers as an invitation to go behind the counter! I was just as astonished, however, at the employees’ impotence when it came to enforcing the mask requirement.
Perhaps just as the company’s CSR program was self-serving (i.e., selling an unrelated product line), so too was the company’s overriding dictum that the company’s mask policy should not be permitted to get in the way of customers buying products. That is, I suspect that the implicit priority was on the value of marginal revenue over the health of customers and employees. This business calculus may not be surprising, yet the refusal to enforce a salient (by signage) company policy is. To claim that a requirement that is not to be enforced is nonetheless a requirement involves not only cognitive problems, but also sheer weakness. Management includes both making policies and enforcing them. The decision not to enforce one, such as in telling employees not to accost customers who feel entitled to ignore the signage of a requirement, can thus be regarded as ineffectual management even if the goal is to maximize revenue.

[1] Matthew Harvey, “Corporate Social Responsibility of O Reilly Automotive, Inc.,” Essay 48 October 17, 2018 (accessed November 18, 2020).

[2] Ibid.

[3] Ibid.

On the Ethics of Business Donations and Saving Souls

In the film, Major Barbara (1941), Barbara, a Major in the Salvation Army, has been raised with her sister and brother by their mother. She is legally separated or divorced from the father, Andrew Undershaft, who nonetheless finances the lavish lifestyle of his family. Even Barbara, the idealist Christian evangelical, lives on her father’s armaments wealth. Yet when she meets him after several years, she leaves the Salvation Army after Andrew and an alcohol producer donate large sums. Although Barbara recognizes that the Army in London needs the money, she believes that the Army has sold out because providing weapons of death and alcohol are sinful. “What price salvation, now?” a customer at the Army’s soup kitchen asks Barbara after she had taken off her Army pin and given it to her father. Barbara is not willing to continue with the Christian organization because in her mind it has sold out even though it admittedly needs the donations to survive. But has the Army sold out? Furthermore, does Barbara sold out in using her father's business to convert workers. Ironically, that may be more ethical than the Army's approach to saving souls. 

The full essay is at "Major Barbara."

Pope Francis: Religious and Secular Arguments for Governments Subordinating Markets to Social Norms

The documentary, Pope Francis: A Man of His Word (2018) chiefly lays out the pope’s critique of economic Man. The film begins with references to climate change too loosely linked to the global population figure of 8 million humans, 1 billion of whom are unnecessarily living in poverty. The viewer is left to fill in the gaps, such as that because as biological organisms we must consume and use energy, the hyperextended overpopulation of the species is the root cause of climate- and ecosystem-changing CO2 in the atmosphere and oceans. Arguably, the salvific Son of God or the means into the Kingdom of God enjoy pride of place in the gospels, but compassion for the poor as well as outcasts and the sick is indeed a message that Jesus stresses in the faith narratives. Rather than being a sign of sin, poverty, especially if voluntary,  can permit the sort of humility that is much superior to the pride of the Pharisees. In the documentary, Jorge Bergoglio, who took the name Francis in becoming pope of the Roman Catholic Church in 2013, is a practical man who points to the sickness or temptation of greed that keeps humanity from riding itself of poverty, unnecessarily. Moreover, the hegemony of the market, with its culture of consumerism and commoditization, comes at the cost of the common good, which to Francis has a spiritual basis. Abstractly speaking, harmony, which inherently respects its own limitations, should have priority over greed and markets. Both of these can go to excess without enough built-in constraints as occurred before and during the financial crisis of 2008, with poverty plaguing humanity more rather than less as a result.

The full essay is at "Pope Francis."

A Grocery Store Company Lobbies for Special Status during the Coronavirus Pandemic While Falling Short

In early April, 2020, Albertsons Companies, which at the time owned Safeway, ACME Markets, Jewel-Osco, Vons, Pavilions and Albertsons grocery stores, joined with United Food and Commercial Workers International Union (UFCW) to get American governments to designate the workers as first responders. The joint statement reads in part, “The temporary designation of first responder or emergency personnel status would help ensure these incredible grocery workers access to priority testing, have access to personal protection equipment, like masks and gloves, as well as other workplace protections necessary to keep themselves and the customers they serve safe and healthy.”[1] Although keeping grocery workers healthy was important, the focus on testing and equipment can be viewed as problematic in that the company’s management was falling short on more crucial safety measures.

If the masks being sought were merely surgical masks—and in shopping in Safeway stores I saw many employees already wearing them—it is important to remember that that type of mask (i.e., without a respirator) does not keep the virus out; rather, the masks are designed to stop water droplets from getting out so the risk of infection to other people nearby is reduced as such droplets can carry virus. However, the virus can still go through and around a mask even just by the person breathing. Stopping that would (hopefully obviously) be worse than catching the disease.

I suspect that the typical worker was not aware that the mask does nothing to stop the wearer from getting infected; the purpose is more altruistic—namely, reducing the risk that the wearer infects other people. Because  I did not see any Safeway workers going out of their way to keep at a physical distance from customers even after more than a month, I don’t believe that the workers wore masks for the good of the customers. Furthermore, I can say that Safeway’s management extending down to the store level was shirking the responsibility to keep customers as well as employees as safe as possible. 

Why would a store manager watch employees pay little heed to keeping a distance from customers when such distance was possible? Why would an employee not even "hug" the other side of a hallway while passing a customer? Perhaps the employees, being used to putting policies to customers, took offense when the roles were reversed, with customers even just reminding employees of the store policy (and government guideline). I suspect that the employees were reacting to the reversal in power. When I asked employees to keep a distance, I saw facial expressions saying, in effect, I don’t have to take orders from you. 

Regarding the store managers, they were doubtlessly not used to being embarrassed by customers pointing to blatant employee noncompliance. Perhaps the managers were not used to confronting noncompliant customers; perhaps the managers were scared. Perhaps the managers were not comfortable taking an active role with employees and customers in the stores. Perhaps the managers were used to the weaker form, passive management, even when they knew that noncompliance was ubiquitous. Such a situation would require a real manager, rather than a person behind a curtain.  

One day in late March, I suggested to a store manager that he make an announcement reminding employees as well as customers that maintaining a physical distance was a store policy and government guideline. “Maybe I’ll have a store meeting on that,” he replied. Lest this be thought to be a sign of bureaucracy, I submit that the discretion involved rendered the choice a sign of weakness. No announcement for the customers ensued even as employees were clustering around customers at the cashier area where the manager was standing! Focusing on masks and testing can be viewed as of much less importance. In fact, the managerial judgment that prioritizes such a focus over keeping employees and customers safe in the first place is severely faulty. 

So too is the judgment of a store manager who refuses to intervene when a customer insults another customer for asking for some physical distance between them. In mid-April, I observed a store manager refuse to intervene to ask two people to observe physical distancing, as they had been violating it, and even to confront them when he heard them insulting another customer for having asked them to keep at a distance rather than pass close by. This was a case of disgustingly incompetent, impotent store management.

Meanwhile, store employees were walking closely by customers with impunity and even lie, "I'm trying" to offended customers. Actually trying would mean keeping to the other side of an aisle or hallway rather than walking down the center. Real trying would mean not walking directly at customers, expecting them to back away. During the first months of the pandemic, I did not see one employee pause, back up, or take even a slight detour so to maintain physical spacing. The presumption that the customers should move out of the way if they want to take precautions is so toxic that the supervising management can also be condemned; the attitude is that bad.

In incessantly interrupting and failing even to acknowledge that her subordinate had provided bad customer service, the manager over that department demonstrated the attitude to me in early April. I had asked the subordinate at the desk to call another store to ask whether it had toilet paper. “No I won’t call,” the subordinate had stubbornly replied, “because I know what they will say.” It was still early in the morning, and she had not contacted the other store yet that morning, so she told me she would call. She quickly went into the back office. When she came out of the small office only seconds later, she told me that she had had a conversation with the manager inside instead. In the conversation that lasted just a few seconds, the manager told her subordinate that all of the stores would get deliveries of the product that night. "But that doesn't mean that the other store is out of the product now, which is why I asked you to call," I replied. Because the employee didn't understand how she had not answered my question (which alone is telling), I asked to speak with the manager.

 
The forthcoming conversation was even worse. After I stated that just because all the stores in the district would get shipments that night, we can't assume from this that the other store was out. Rather than attending to my point, the manager went into a monologue on how much of every other product impacted by the hoarding was doing in the store. 

In retrospect, I would realize that the lack of concern for customers connected the bad customer service with the attitude of the management toward enforcing distance on the employees and reminding customers to keep a distance from each other. The failure or refusal to enforce physical distancing on employees demonstrates a lack of concern for not only them, but also the customers. So too does not making sufficient store announcements to customers when most are not maintaining physical distance from each other. Were physical distancing a priority of the store managers, then getting more masks and tests would have been much less necessary. 

  
Proper management of employees and genuine concern for customers in real time (i.e., even stopping a noncomplying customer from lashing out at other customers who had asked for more physical space from that customer) would have done a lot more than lobbying for masks, which do not prevent the employee-wearer from being infected, and tests after-the-fact. If the company’s management was really concerned about employees, the distance policy would have been enforced. Lest the company's management tout corporate social responsibility programs in order to deflect attention from a lack of genuine responsibility for employees and customers, a peripheral program does not trump social responsibility directly in the line of business operations because the latter has more of an effect on customers and employees, who are more central to a business than are societal problems.

 

I suspect that in American politics too, enabled by the media, secondary issues gain focus even at the expense of vital issues. Within an issue, symptoms or manifestations get more attention than does removing the cause. Redressing the cause of an illness is better than merely alleviating symptoms. As in the case of Albertsons Companies, focusing on a peripheral rather than a more central matter can be relatively easy and easier to problem-solve. Focusing on peripheral matters can thus make companies and governments look better than they actually are. How a company or government is actually falling short in more crucial ways is not transparent when the organizational and societal focus is on what the company or government is doing even to make up for its falling short. 

On Nietzsche's thought on weak management, see Skip Worden, On the Arrogance of False Entitlement: A Nietzshean Critique of Business Ethics and Management.

---

1. Aine Cain and Hayley Peterson, “A Major Grocer Is Pushing to Classify Its Employees as First Responders, Giving Them Priority for Testing and Protective Gear,” Business Insider, April 7, 2020 (accessed April 8, 2020).