Nearly six years ago our hearts were shattered and our souls were shaken as news broke of the 20 young children and six adult staff members killed at Sandy Hook Elementary School during the deadliest school shooting in U.S. history.
Few issues are as politically polarizing or emotionally charged as guns. This time, I and my fellow Starbucks teammates, where I was the head of global corporate communications, felt connected. That’s because one of those victims was Lauren Rousseau — a 30 year-old substitute teacher and a part-time barista at the nearby Starbucks in Danbury, Connecticut.
Despite tear-filled pleas for gun law reform from President Obama, Sandy Hook victims’ family members and others, little changed. While we tried to do our small part at Starbucks by respectfully requesting, not demanding, that our customers not bring their firearms into Starbucks stores, the public outcry for action quickly receded.
But the response to last February’s shooting massacre at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, where 17 students and faculty were killed, has given gun law reform advocates hope. Unlike Sandy Hook, the Parkland survivors have catalyzed, galvanized and mobilize an anti-gun violence crusade unlike anything we’ve seen. Teenagers with a cause harnessing the power of social media with a raw, unfiltered voice and an unstoppable bias for action is a potent combination.
Along the way, their #NeverAgain movement inspired millions of like-minded Americans to march in Washington and in cities across the country, and orchestrated a 17-minute student walkout on middle school and high school campuses nationwide. It has also nudged more than a dozen companies to cut ties with the National Rifle Association (including Delta Airlines, Hertz and MetLife) and to take a more aggressive stance on gun control (including Dick’s Sporting Goods, Walmart and Levi Strauss).
Dick’s Sporting Goods CEO Edward Stack put it this way during a CNN interview a few days after the Parkland tragedy: “Our hearts went out to those kids and their parents. Everyone talks about thoughts and prayers going out to them. That’s great but that ;doesn’t do anything. We felt we needed to take a stand.” And in September, Levi Strauss CEO Chip Bergh declared in a Fortune Op-Ed, “While taking a stand can be unpopular with some, doing nothing is no longer an option.”
Indeed, it will be years, even decades, before we know the depth of the mark that the student-led #NeverAgain movement will make on reducing gun violence. In the meantime, there are four important leadership virtues we can take away from these future political, community and business leaders and the companies that are following their lead:
- People buy our products. They buy into our purpose.
- Authenticity is the new advocacy.
- Non-influencers are the new influencers.
- Courage is contagious.
#NeverAgain may not have the deepest pockets or the most sophisticated lobbying apparatus, but it has a courageous grit fueling its cause that can’t be bought. A courageous grit that may very well become the most valuable currency of our time — for businesses and leaders of all stripes and those of us who advise them.
To download a full copy of the 2019 Relevance Report, click here.
