"The fact that they had to go back to Howard Schultz a third time, and do it in the way that they did it, suggests that the CEO succession planning is not where it needs to be," said Jonas Kron, chief advocacy officer at Trillium Asset Management, which owned 519,000 Starbucks shares as of March. "It's not robust, it's not fully in place. And that's concerning." Those worries come as shareholders grow impatient for a turnround in China and for definitive action regarding organizing workers.