Ever hear of a company having someone with the title “executive vice president of partner resources?”

That was a new one for me, but “partners” are what they call employees—aka, workers—at Starbucks. In English, that means the executive VP for partner resources is really the executive VP for human or employee resources. And, the new guy in that very HR-sounding position will “be paid a $400,000 salary plus $400,000 in stock options and eligibility for a bonus.”

This little bit of information comes from a story in the Seattle Post-Intelligencer about a filing the company made with the Securities and Exchange Commission on Thursday. It details what Starbucks is paying some executives as well as what the company is giving to former company president Jim Donald to keep his mouth shut—a $1.25 million severance package as long as he doesn’t “utter negatives to the press or any individual or entity about Starbucks, its business, its activities, its shareholders, employees, agents or relationships.”

I always find SEC filings to be a fascinating read because of all the inside information you can glean about a company and its management team. For example, the Post-Intelligencer found that “Donald also agreed not to work for McDonald’s or Dunkin’ Donuts, because they are ‘companies that directly compete with Starbucks’ field of business,’ ” the filing said. “However, it notes, he is allowed to work for grocery chains, such as Pathmark, Albertsons and Safeway, and he also is allowed to work for other fast-food chains, including Wendy’s, Arby’s and Burger King.”

McDonald’s as a competitor to Starbucks? Although Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz has been dismissive of the new McDonald’s coffee strategy, he is clearly concerned enough to want to bar former Starbucks executives from going to work there and has vowed to “fight to the death” against his competitors for coffee dominance.

And, although a severance package of $1.25 million to Donald sounds like a lot, it pales in comparison to what a lot of other CEOs or former executives are getting paid when they leave.

But it’s not all about the money. Launi Skinner, former president of Starbucks’ U.S. operations, not only got a nice severance package, but also “a lifetime of employee discounts on Starbucks products.” Given what they charge for a fancy coffee at Starbucks these days, Skinner’s discounts may turn out to be the best perk of all.

I try not to get too philosophical in this blog, but I found myself feeling that way when reading about the death this week of Irvine Robbins, one of the founders of the Baskin-Robbins chain of ice cream stores. He died in Rancho Mirage, California, at the ripe old age of 90.

The story of how he named the business he started with his brother-in-law, Burton Baskin, is uniquely American. As The New York Times recalled today in an obituary, “Although it was Mr. Robbins who opened the first store, at the intersection of Adams and Palmer Streets in Glendale, California, on December 7, 1945, and it was three years more before he and Mr. Baskin became partners, they took a carefully familial approach to deciding who would come first in the name of what eventually became a vast international enterprise. They flipped a coin.”

More important, in my book, is how the two brothers-in-law managed the company. “They worked closely on everything,” according to Robbins’ daughter, Marsha Veit. “They would come up with ideas for flavors based on what was happening at the time, like Cocoa a Go-Go, when go-go dancers were popular. They would sit in the kitchen tasting, making sure the best ingredients were used.”

Read enough of the obituaries of Irvine Robbins (such as this one in the Los Angeles Times ), and you can’t help but come away with the feeling that his legacy will be about the great innovation and fun-loving spirit he brought to his work. I’m not sure Robbins ever spent a lot of time worrying about that, but it got me to thinking: Do any of us spend much time considering what we will leave behind when our days as managers or executives come to an end?

For example, I spend a lot of time here writing about memorable good, bad and crazy workforce management practices. But on a more personal level, what do I want people to remember about me as a manager?

I don’t have a glib answer for that. What I always say when people ask me about my management style is this: Ask the people I’ve worked with. In fact, I’ve done this in job interviews. I tell the interviewer to phone any company I’ve worked at and simply ask for someone who remembers working with me. I’m confident that whatever they say will be a good reflection on who I am and what I do. If that’s my legacy, it’s one I’m happy with.

So, what is your legacy as a manager? What would you like for people to say about you after you’re gone? I’d love to hear what you have to say—either as a comment at the end of this post or as an e-mail sent to me directly at jhollon@workforce.com. I’ll share the best in a future blog post.

Chicago-based Tribune Co. has been through some rocky times over the past few years, including lots of internal squabbling and infighting. The company was bought out last year by legendary wild man Sam Zell, but alas, things haven’t gotten a whole lot better given his less-than-stellar view of the people working for him.

But, give Zell his due on one thing—he took a very aggressive approach to the health and wellness of his workforce. Under his leadership, Tribune took the “stick” approach and started the new year by charging workers $100 more per month if they were smokers. Although it was a policy originally put in place by previous Tribune management, Zell and his new management team ran with it, probably because it was a classic Zell approach to a workforce issue: aggressive, in-your-face and heavy-handed. It also made Tribune one of a small but growing group of employers that have chosen to take a punitive approach to workers who engage in a less-than-healthy lifestyle.

Well, Tribune seems to have had second thoughts on the matter.
This week, Tribune rescinded its $100 per month penalty for employees who smoke. “While well-intentioned, we think the tobacco-use fee implemented by the previous management team is inconsistent with the new culture we’re developing—we’d rather you use your own judgment when it comes to tobacco use, not impose ours upon you,” said a memo from Tribune management.

Notice the backhanded dig at Tribune’s previous management here? That’s complete BS, as far as I’m concerned. If Sam Zell has shown anything during his brief time as owner of Tribune, it is that he doesn’t feel bound by anything that previous management was doing. In fact, the opposite is true: Zell seems to revel in talking about how screwed up Tribune was/is and how different his regime is going to be.

Unfortunately, I think Tribune was on to something with the smoking policy. It is an interesting approach to a difficult problem and worthy of debate and discussion given the huge health costs that are associated with smoking.

Zell was, finally, taking a very different and groundbreaking approach to a tough problem. It’s unfortunate that he chose not to follow through. Unlike so many of the things he says and does, this one makes a little sense.

If America can’t ultimately solve the growing health care crisis, it won’t be for lack of talking about it.

I’m here this week at the Fifth Annual World Health Care Congress in Washington, where an intimate group of some 1,800 “prestigious leaders from business, health care and government” have gathered at the Marriott Wardman Park Hotel to “have an honest exchange of ideas … to create a dialogue to advance quality, improve cost and expand access in health care, both nationally and abroad.”

That’s a lot of lofty talk, and the speakers are pretty lofty too. On Monday morning, I was treated to a discussion on “The Presidential Health Care Agenda” with representatives of the three leading presidential candidates, the chairman and CEO of the Kaiser Foundation Health Plans and former Secretary of State George Shultz. Their conclusion? It’s that 2009 “is the year something will happen” for health care reform.

Unfortunately, that’s the kind of analysis you sometimes hear when you get so many CEOs, big shots and health care muckety-mucks together to discuss something that everyone knows we need to fix—but just don’t know exactly how to do it.

What I was expecting here was more focused discussion and analysis, such as we recently had in Workforce Management with our special report on consumer-driven health care, or our story a few months ago when we wrote about health care transparency. Unfortunately, I didn’t get that in any sessions or hear it from any of the speakers.

In fairness to everyone at the World Health Care Congress, the high-flown discussions may all be moot, depending on who wins the race for the White House. My guess is that the new resident there will have a lot to say about how we tackle the health care crisis.

Stay tuned.

Are guns at work ever a good idea? Most sensible people would quickly say no, but good sense sometimes gets sidetracked, as it recently did in Florida.

Earlier this week, Gov. Charlie Christ signed a bill “that will allow Florida residents to keep guns locked in their cars at work.” The new law doesn’t take effect until July, and will likely be challenged in court, but according to a story in The Miami Herald,  “Under the new law, businesses cannot prohibit employees or customers from keeping a legally owned gun locked inside their cars, as long as the owner has a permit to carry a concealed weapon.”

Businesses in Florida are worried—rightly, I think—that letting workers have easy access to firearms in the workplace is not a good idea. In fact, both the Florida Chamber of Commerce and the Florida Retail Federation have hired legal counsel to sue the state over the new law.

We’ve written before about the Florida debate over guns in the workplace, and also about the how the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 10th Circuit in Denver ruled that there was no right in Oklahoma to have access to a firearm at work, so this isn’t a new issue. What is new is that Florida seems to be well on its way to joining Alaska, Georgia, Kentucky and Mississippi as states where the potential for workplace violence just got kicked up quite a few notches.

Carl Hiaasen, the great novelist and Miami Herald columnist, had his own unique perspective on the issue. “After years of wimping around, Florida lawmakers finally passed a law that will allow you to bring your favorite firearm to work, providing you leave it locked in your vehicle,” he wrote.

“In the past, deranged employees who wanted to mow down their boss and colleagues had to drive all the way home to fetch their guns. It was the waste of a perfectly good lunch hour, not to mention the gasoline,” he added.  “Soon, however, any simmering paranoid with a concealed-weapons permit will legally be able to take his firearms to work. If a supervisor rebukes him for surfing porn sites, or a co-worker makes fun of his mismatched socks, he can simply stroll out to the parking lot and retrieve his Glock or AK-47 (or both) to settle the grievance.”

I can see Hiaasen’s point, and it hits home to me because I used to work with a guy who did a lot of hunting who just happened to carry his rifle in the trunk of his car—that he drove to work. He wasn’t a bad guy, but he could get angry and scary on occasion, and that’s not a good combination for someone packing heat in their car.

My guess is that Florida’s new gun legislation, dubbed the “Disgruntled Workers’ Speedy Revenge & Retaliation Law” by Hiaasen, will get held up for a few years, or more, as the courts work it out. Maybe more sensible heads will prevail in the end—at least I hope so. But I’m not holding my breath. After all, Florida is a state where many people still haven’t figured out how to vote. And that doesn’t give me confidence that they will figure out why guns in the workplace just makes no sense at all.