Peet’s Coffee and Tea: Application of Machiavelli’s Ideas in Enhancing Business

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Table of Contents

Company Profile
Qualities of the Leader
Acquisition of Power through Individual Ability and Freedom
The Role of Favor in Maintenance of Power
Opportunity and the External Surrounding
Works Cited

Company Profile

Peet’s coffee and tea is a corporation found in San Francisco Bay and mainly specializes in coffee roasting and retailing. Alfred Peet established the organization in 1966 and it has been expanding year after another following his able leadership.

He established a small coffee roasting business that with the solely purpose of sourcing funds to cater for his expenses implying that he was never optimistic of forming a large organization that has the potential to compete with the market leader. The company was strategically situated, a factor that contributed to its growth since it served the students from the University of California.

Currently, the organization has several branches across the country, with the major ones in California, Washington, Oregon, Colorado, and Illinois. The management has been keen on exploiting the market in order to achieve the financial objectives.

The administration appreciates the fact that students are likely to consume coffee products and it has always ensured that it negotiates with various university bodies as regards to the opening of the coffee shops and outlets.

However, the organization does not have the capacity to compete with other market leaders, such as Starbucks because of its narrow focus. Unlike Starbucks, it only concentrates on coffee and tea production and retailing. This makes it a California company, with few stores and outlets across the country. This paper argues that the ideas of Machiavelli on the prince could be applied successfully to enhance business in the organization.

In other words, Peet’s coffee and tea has the potential of outsmarting the market leaders, such as Starbucks by simply borrowing the views of Machiavelli. In the Prince, Machiavelli was of the view that the leader has to apply all available tactics in order to achieve greatness for the city-state. Based on this, the leader can choose to be cunning, diplomatic, persuasive, or destructive, as long as the major goals are achieved.

This means that the end will always justify the means since the ultimate goal will clarify the path in which a leader followed. In this case, Peet’s coffee and tea has to employ all available strategies to outmuscle the market leaders, such as Starbucks. This paper looks at various aspects of Machiavelli’s views as far as gaining and maintaining power is concerned.

World’s most popular leaders, including Hitler, Stalin, Lenin, Mussolini, and Napoleon applied Machiavelli’s ideas successfully, even though some of them never modified the assumptions to suit their environments. Peet’ coffee and tea is encouraged to adjust the views to be consistent with the business environment in which it operates.

Since Machiavelli’s ideas relates to rising to power without moral or legal consideration, the organization has to borrow a few productive ideas, but it should not import them wholesomely. For Machiavelli, Peet’s coffee and tea will have to apply tricks, such as murder, betrayal, unfaithfulness, pitilessness, and impiousness to achieve the objectives.

However, all these would definitely lead to the collapse of the organization and it may as well attract legal tussles. Through Machiavelli’s techniques, the organization will simply gain power, but it would be difficult to achieve glory (Scott and Kesten 118).

Opponents of Machiavelli’s views are of the opinion that ethics must be considered when engaging in leadership and business implying that murdering some people to take over their wealth is immoral (Benner 89). Kantian theory of ethics suggests that any action has to be universal meaning that the majority has to support it or subscribe to it.

Additionally, Kant opposed the view that human beings could perhaps be used as the means to an end. On the other hand, utilitarianism tends to support the views of Machiavelli since a negative action can be taken to salvage the interests of the majority. Therefore, Peet’s coffee and tea should be aware of the general ethical standards and business codes of ethics when applying some of these ideas.

Qualities of the Leader

Machiavelli presented the qualities of a good leader with the capability of taking the organization to a different level. He talked about virtue, which has a stronger meaning as compared to the modern meaning. For him, virtues could mean a talent, expertise, power, dynamism, vigor, resourcefulness, bravery, or strength of mind.

In this regard, virtue is an important quality in leadership that the prince has to acquire if he is to govern the city in the most appropriate way. In the same way, the entrepreneur and the business manager need some of these qualities since they enable them to offer superior services to several stakeholders.

The management of Peet’s coffee and tea should employ some of these features since they are compatible with any business objective. Apart from virtue, Machiavelli talked about other three features of a good leader that enable him or her to maintain power.

Any leader should be stingy instead of being generous because bigheartedness does not allow people to note the difference, even though the leader might have brought several changes (Mulcaster 66). However, generosity is only applied when it is determined that it can achieve the immediate objective.

Peet’s coffee and tea has failed to achieve its main objective of gaining a competitive advantage because of laxity. In the global market, companies that have explored this feature effectively have succeeded in being the market leaders.

One such company is Microsoft because it always hoards products to control the prices, a technique that accountants refer to as cookie jar, which is effective in gaining competitive advantage. Another important feature for the leader is discipline whereby he noted that it would be far much better to be feared than to be loved.

Even though this would be challenging to apply in Peet’s coffee and tea, any manager has to study its viability. Finally, the leader has to be truthful, but can be applied only if it is a means to an end. Several leaders have applied deception to realize organizational ambitions, with Ian Telford, the internal entrepreneur at Dow Chemicals, being cited as an example.

The leader spread rumors about a project that ended up being successful. It should be noted that the features of a leader that Machiavelli suggested are only used to achieve power, but they are shrewd and treacherous because they do not consider morality.

Acquisition of Power through Individual Ability and Freedom

The qualities discussed in the above section help a leader in the organization to execute his or her duties professionally, but this cannot be achieved without self-confidence and self-being. This means that business managers should always be concerned with their health physically, emotionally, and psychology since any lapse can result in serious problems that could bring the operations of the business down.

The political climate in Italy at the time was characterized by competition and selfishness, which is the same as the current market that forces organizations to engage in zero-sum games. In this case, the political leader in the Italian society had to do things without relying on another person because no one was to be trusted.

Peet’s coffee and tea has to instruct its managers to concentrate on delivering the core objectives and this can only be realized when each leader moves in to deal with the situation personally without relying on the juniors.

Machiavelli gave an example of King David who refused to be given additional weapons to engage Goliath in a fight. Based on this, Peet’s coffee and tea should accumulate adequate resources to enable it fight for its rightful place in the market instead of relying on external forces, such as recession and government regulations.

Furthermore, Machiavelli recommended the recruitment of mercenaries in fighting the enemy because they are highly trained and dangerous enough to destroy the opponent (Machiavelli 8). In the same way, Peet’s coffee and tea should have close confidants who would swing into action to deliver the expected goals when conditions are extreme.

Machiavelli noted further that the activities of mercenaries in Italy made the country lose its position as the most powerful country in the continent.

In this case, Peet’s coffee and tea should not rely too much on other companies, including those contracted to supply and distribute goods, but instead it has to come up with ways that would enable it sustain market competition. Regarding the workforce, the management has to empower each employee to develop loyalty since devoted employees would be willing to die for the organization (Gladwell 12).

The Role of Favor in Maintenance of Power

In the tenth chapter of his book, Machiavelli talked about the nature of human beings by noting that they prefer conferring orders as opposed to receiving them meaning that they are naturally appetitive. He discussed the forfeited cities of Germany in the chapter, an idea that can be borrowed to strengthen the performance of Peet’s coffee and tea.

In this regard, it is factual that any organization is likely to cope with the changes in the external environment provided the management has the support of the workforce. Borrowing from the views of Machiavelli, the organization has to cater for the needs of all employees, including provision of security and basic needs (Gunnthorsdottir, McCabe, and Smith 46).

For instance, employees should be assured of their jobs to prevent any anxiety that comes because of loss of employment. The organization has to devise some of the strategies that will attract employees to work hard towards realization of major goals. Peet’s coffee and tea has to formulate and implement this strategy since major competitors are already doing it.

For instance, the owner of Starbucks, Howard Schultz, introduced health benefits meant to cater for the health needs of employees (Hill and Gareth 26). This had an effect because many hard working and reliable employees agreed to sign long-term contracts.

Opportunity and the External Surrounding

Machiavelli appreciated the role of luck in enhancing leadership since some people might possess all the features of a good leader, but they might not be successful in leading the organization to higher places. Even though a leader might achieve power through luck, such leadership is usually temporary, as it would be difficult to maintain it.

In fact, this is applicable in the business environment because a company should be able to fight for its place instead of relying on unpredictable circumstances to manage competition. Luck presents itself because of opportunities and it is suggested that any slightest chance has to be utilized maximally.

Many leaders in the world have succeeded without necessarily relying on fortune, but they explored opportunities that presented themselves during their tenures. Similarly, a number of organizations have been successful in the global market because of seizing any slightest chance. Once an organization is given an opportunity, it has to come up with strategies that would enable it expand and maintain the market.

Peet’s coffee and tea has several chances that it has to exploit to outsmart market leaders, such as Starbucks. For this to happen, its leaders should possess certain personal and interpersonal qualities, which are critical when it comes to executing duties.

Through these qualities, they have to create opportunities and exploit them to gain an advantage in the market (Whelan 88). For instance, Peet’s coffee and tea has to employ technology in its operations, especially in marketing of products since the social media is the new channel of information distribution.

It should be remembered that the views of Machiavelli should never be implemented wholesome because they were not meant for business. In fact, business principles were non-existent at his time and social corporate responsibility was not developed. In the modern society, the organization has to observe strict business ethics if it has any ambition of being the market leader.

Works Cited

Benner, Erica. Machiavelli’s Ethics. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2009. Print.

Gladwell, Malcolm. The Tipping Point. New York: Little Brown, 2000. Print.

Gunnthorsdottir, Anna, McCabe, Kevin, and Smith, Vernon. “Using the Machiavellianism instrument to predict trustworthiness in a bargaining game”. Journal of Economic Psychology, 23.2 (2002), 49-66.

Hill, Charles, and Gareth, Jones. Strategic Management Theory: an Integrated Approach. New York: Cengage Learning, 2012. Print.

Machiavelli, Niccolò. The Prince. New York: Sovereign, 2012. Print.

Mulcaster, Walters. “Three Strategic Frameworks.” Business Strategy Series, 10.1, (2009): 68-75. Print.

Scott, Armstrong, and Kesten, Greene. “Competitor-oriented Objectives: The Myth of Market Share”. International Journal of Business, 12.1 (2007): 116–134. Print.

Whelan, Frederick. Hume and Machiavelli: Political Realism and Liberal Thought. New York: Lexington, 2007. Print.

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