Dialogs

The New Humanities Produce Fresh Ideas,

Lively Conversation, New Perspectives

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In our changing and challenging world, we find ourselves scrambling to keep up the pace, staying on the leading edge, and trying to glimpse an unknown future, every organization has one element in common—the human condition. So, as much as times are changing, people haven’t. After encountering the New Humanities, both college students and workshop participants repeatedly comment that they really thought the humanities had nothing to offer their field only to find that it had everything to offer — a fountain of fresh ideas, new perspectives, and lively conversations.

The humanities are re-entering the workplace as a way of teaching seeing the big picture. They create a biosphere that develops integrated approaches, tears down communications silos, and makes organizations work better. Films and short stories in these workshops present memorable and surprising lessons – holistic visioning, learning to listen, and the joy of collaborating. Our sessions are tailored to your industry—business, healthcare, governance, among them—and are based in application of the lessons they teach.

Coming Up:

October 16, 2024: Des Moines, Iowa The Light We Carry by Michelle Obama.  Iowa Municipal Clerk Association

April 23, 2025: Des Moines, Iowa  Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business, by Neil Postman                                Iowa Municipal Clerk Association

 

We offer:

  • Continuing Education Workshops
  • On-site Team-Building
  • Leadership through Literature Dialogues

“Not only do I feel that I have learned strategies and applicable information to become the best leader and individual I can be, but I feel I am able to use critical thinking skills in order to see the bigger picture.”

Let’s Talk About It:

            Dialogs through Story

Our rich list of books opens a myriad of topics on which to build a conversation. A good dialog goes beyond what is between the book covers and considers the context in which it was written, the outside influences, and the history of the times. Just as governance, business, healthcare, and other organizations don’t live in a vacuum, neither do these texts. We query texts for principles of management, leadership, and best practices. Unless we understand the times in which a text occurs, we are less able to take the lessons back to work and make them effective in our communities and expose ourselves to a larger purview. Dialogs are enjoyable, relaxing, and beneficial with books chosen for their ability to focus on leadership, management, and empathy – basically, to see the forest for the trees.

Read more about Athenian Dialogs at Art & Humanities in the 21st Century Workplace

Management & Leadership

  • Team of Rivals

    Doris Kearns Goodwin

    When Lincoln chose his cabinet, he didn’t choose friends but rather men who challenged him.  In this time of polarity, how do we create organizations that move forward?  A fascinating approach to team-building and a foundation for exciting conversation!

  • Robot-Proof: Higher Education in the Age of Artificial Intelligence

    Joseph Aoun

    In the 21st century, in addition to technology literacy and data literacy, there is a third literacy Aoun advocates, what he terms “humanics”.  The addition of this component to modern thinking breaks silos and opens the door to cross-functionality.

  • Leadership In Turbulent Times

    Doris Kearns Goodwin

    Four Presidents in times of turmoil – Abraham Lincoln, Theodore Roosevelt, Franklin D. Roosevelt, and Lyndon B. Johnson.  Leadership is not necessarily perfect and Goodwin examines the good and the bad of each of these leaders.

  • Mistress Bradstreet

    Charlotte Gordon

    America’s first immigrant poet at the beginning of one the first successful English colonies, Anne Bradstreet established the truly American voice.  She was a wife, a mother, a grandmother and writes of her daily life.  But, unlike most of the Puritans, she was well-educated, knew this country’s early leaders and was sought out for her wisdom.  She and Benjamin Franklin carried on a long-lasting correspondence.

  • Abundance: The Future is Better than You Think

    Peter H. Diamandis & Steven Kolter

    Thinking for the 4th Industrial Revolution and beyond, Diamandis and Kolter provide insight into making the 21st century work well for us.

  • Paris Reborn

    Stephane Kirkland

    How did an old dowager of a city emerge into one of the world’s favorite places?  When legions of country workers migrated to the new factories in this old, medieval  city, there were health crises, housing crises, civil unrest, poverty, and an infrastructure that couldn’t handle the thousands of people, the horses, and their waste.  Napoleon III hired Baron Von Haussmann for the job. Over thirty years, one boulevard became over 100, new vertical housing was designed, and a sewer system, so fantastic that it became (and still is) a tourist attraction, was built.

  • Breaking Trail: A Climbing Life

    Arlene Blum

    Climbing Annapurna is a feat for any climber.  But for Arlene Blum, both a climber and a scientist, it was much more.  She brought the first all-woman group to the top in a world that saw women’s role at the basecamp to clean up and cook rather than to climb.  A true trailblazer, Blum is also the person who developed the flame-retardant for children’s pajamas.

Marketing & Public Relations

  • Au Bonheur des Dames (The Ladies Delight)

    Emile Zola

    Beneath the love-story text, Zola has deconstructed modern merchandising, consumerism, and their effects on society.  Key to modern life, the department store changed retailing, set values for a new middle class, and up-ended old class systems.  Today, as we see the decline in department stores, we have only to check out how their birth changed culture, retail, and management to forecast where the market place will go based on deep-seated human desires.  Marshall Field said, “Give the lady what she wants.”  What is that and what is the corollary for the future?

Public Health

  • Year of Wonders: A Novel of the Plague

    Geraldine Brooks

    Our public health is in crisis.  To vaccinate or not to vaccinate has become a prevailing question.  Geraldine Brooks, in her well-researched book, examines how, in 1616, one village took the bubonic plague in hand.  The public good vs. independent freedom.

  • Drinking Water: A History

    James Salzman

    There was a time when we took water quality for granted.  Today there is a question of bottled water vs. tap water.  We battle polluted aquifers, neglectful city management, water immigrants coming from one state to another, draught and flooding.  Water, according to Salzman’s fascinating history of water and its social impact, is both historic and wide-reaching.