Nothing, it seems, has been more difficult to remedy than the issue of racism and implicit bias in this country, but this week, coffeehouse juggernaut Starbucks attempted to at least begin the conversation when they shut down more than 8,000 of their stores for a day of racial bias training following the April arrest of two black men in a Philadelphia location, sending the internet into a flurry of think pieces and expert quotes that had people wondering: Can a day of company training really fix a problem of this scope?
If the training video Starbucks showed is any indication, they’re at least using historical context to address exclusion. The passing of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 may have outlawed discrimination based on race, color, sex, religion or national origin, but in the video—released to the public Tuesday—the landmark law serves as a framework for understanding just how difficult it is to change hearts and minds, especially when it comes to the implicit biases we hold.
In the film, created by award-winning documentarian Stanley Nelson and underwritten by Starbucks, a narrator explores how access to public spaces has been regulated in this country, and how those areas have been made largely unattainable to black people. When blacks—who are maligned by stereotypes that have been intensified by the historical stink of slavery—enter those public spaces, it has been a punishable offense. That was no more evident than in April when two black men—Rashon Nelson and Donte Robinson—visited a Philadelphia Starbucks to attend a business meeting. While they were waiting for their friend to arrive, and after they’d asked to use the restroom, a Starbucks employee called the police, telling the 911 dispatcher that the men refused to purchase an item or leave. The call resulted in an arrest on suspicion of trespassing—though no charges were filed—and the high-profile incident sparked protests and calls for Starbucks to address what many believed to be racial profiling.
“It’s time we talk about what it means to not be welcomed as an American citizen,” Sherrilyn Ifill, president and director-counsel of NAACP Legal Defense Fund and senior consultant to Starbucks’s racial bias training says into the camera. And it’s a conversation Starbucks is committed to having, according to Rosalind ‘Roz’ Brewer, Starbucks’ first woman COO.
“We’ve always said that this training is a first step in a long-term journey—we cannot change ingrained behaviors and implicit biases within four hours,” she told Glamour.com, adding that the company will send representatives to a convening this summer hosted by the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights and will take steps toward understanding how they can address other forms of bias.
Additionally, she said, the company’s 100,000 hires each year will be receiving racial bias training upon becoming a Starbucks partner—something experts think is nonnegotiable for the chain.
“This wasn’t just a thing that was nice to do,” said Heather McGhee, president of equal-rights public policy organization Demos and an outside advisor to the training. “The executives had to believe and communicate that they couldn’t succeed as a business without addressing this issue,” McGhee said. “And I think they actually did that.”
Chafing at criticism that the training was more symbolic than effective, McGhee reiterated what the company has been saying since the bias workshop was announced—this isn’t just a one-day fix.
“I think that most of the commentary has really focused on the ‘one day’ because that’s the information that’s mostly out there, but the company has tried to get the message out that they know that one day is just the start,” she told Glamour.com. “They’re looking at ongoing, deeper training as well as reviews of their systems and practices and procedures so that the message is continuously reinforced.”
If Starbucks, which, according to TIME.com, stood to lose up to $12 million in its Tuesday afternoon closings, is investing time and money, and opening itself up to public scrutiny, in proposing racial bias training, it’s expected that the firm would make it an ongoing focus, said Tamisha J. Ponder, director of intercultural engagement at the Community College of Baltimore County.
“We know that these types of trainings need to be reinforced,” she said. “I don’t want to discredit this attempt because it speaks volumes. It’s beneficial because it’s their first discussion of racial bias, ever.” When companies and institutions implement racial bias training with this high a profile, it’s safe to assume it isn’t just for a day, Ponder said. And pulling back the layers of implicit bias and the historical context, much as the Starbucks video shows, is key.
“Before we discuss bias, we discuss the social construction of race,” Ponder said, describing her university’s approach to bias training. “By discussing race as a social construct, it exposes America’s history of legal and systemic racism and access to privilege. It lays the framework for how to discuss bias and how our country has legally supported bias to understand how you, yourself, can be biased.”
To measure the success of these trainings, Starbucks will likely do spot audits of their stores, implement retention and hiring practices to promote diversity, and measure engagement and interest in training from their employees.
Of course, there’s research that shows racial sensitivity training isn’t always effective. But considering Starbucks’s corporate Third Place policy—which aims to “create a culture of warmth and belonging where everyone is welcome” according to the website—chairman Howard Schultz’s recent directive that employees should let anyone (not just customers) use the restroom, and the company’s plan to make accessible all racial bias training material to employees, McGhee is hopeful.
“I think it needs to be a national effort…there’s so much misunderstanding about the way race and bias work in the human mind,” McGhee said. “If we’re going to be a diverse democracy, we’ve got to all—as people in this country—have better skills at interacting across lines of race.”
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