When it comes to Starbucks, I take every threat very personally.

China traditionally has been a tea-drinking country but we turned them into coffee drinkers.

Work should be personal. For all of us. Not just for the artist and entrepreneur. Work should have meaning for the accountant, the construction worker, the technologist, the manager and the clerk.

Customers have different need states and life experiences.

I think we are living in a time where the consumer has lots of choices, whether it's coffee, newspapers or whatever it is. And there is parity in the market place and as a result of that the consumer is beginning to make decisions, not just on what things cost and the convenience of it.

I think Starbucks created a platform and, ultimately, a runway for many other companies to emulate. I suspect if we had not achieved what we have, there would have been many regional brands that would have succeeded. But I'm not sure there would have been a national brand of the scope of Starbucks.

Effective leaders share two intertwined attributes: an unbridled level of confidence about where their organizations are headed, and the ability to bring people along.