Doris Kearns Goodwin

America’s “historian-in-chief” Doris Kearns Goodwin shares powerful insights from her latest #1 New York Times bestseller, An Unfinished Love Story: A Personal History of the 1960s, providing a front-row seat to the corridors of power based on her own White House experiences and those of her husband, Richard Goodwin. Offering a captivating look at one of America’s most transformative decades and the leaders who shaped it, Goodwin reveals intimate examples and keen analysis of iconic figures—John F. Kennedy, Lyndon B. Johnson, Robert F. Kennedy and Martin Luther King Jr.—demonstrating how they influenced and navigated change, supplying invaluable insights for today’s leaders.

Drawing poignant parallels between the turbulent 1960s and our own complex time, Goodwin offers timeless lessons that illustrate how effective leaders can galvanize public sentiment and drive progress, overcoming even the greatest of challenges.

Through her masterful storytelling, audiences will gain fresh perspectives on leadership—change management, recruiting talent, decision making, teamwork, communication, emotional intelligence, resilience, and much more—that is sure to inspire and guide today’s leaders.

At this challenging time in our nation’s history, as we face a cascading series of crises—a fight to protect democracy in Ukraine while we worry about the fragility of our democracy at home, a country more polarized than any time since the Civil War, “America’s historian-in-chief” Doris Kearns Goodwin puts this defining time in historical context. Not since the 1850s has our country been so politically divided, not since the Great Depression and World War II have we experienced such a string of collective hardships, and not since the 1960s have we struggled so for social and economic equality.

Drawing from her most recent book, Leadership: In Turbulent Times, Goodwin transports us back in time to provide perspective and analysis as she helps us understand how the presidents she’s studied most closely—Abraham Lincoln, Theodore Roosevelt, Franklin Roosevelt, and Lyndon Johnson—provide proof that as a country and a people we’ve been through most difficult times before and came through stronger. History, as Goodwin demonstrates, provides lessons, solace, and even hope.

Based on her longtime best-selling and award-winning book Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln, esteemed historian Doris Kearns Goodwin presents audiences with essential, object and fresh lessons in leadership, political acumen and management strategy. By deeply examining Lincoln’s leadership style and keen understanding of human behavior, Goodwin makes the case for Lincoln’s political genius by explaining his skillful navigation of the "team of rivals" he constructed to achieve not only political success, but also victory in the Civil War. Underestimated as both an effective orator and leader, this ordinary and extraordinary leader surprised both his colleagues and critics as he rose to political prominence, and today is remembered as one of the greatest presidents of all time. Goodwin, whose Team of Rivals was the basis for Steven Spielberg’s award-winning film Lincoln, also shares stories about her involvement in the hit film that saw Daniel Day-Lewis so convincingly bring Abraham Lincoln to life for millions of moviegoers.

Spanning 100 years of history, bestselling author Doris Kearns Goodwin takes audiences on the ultimate journey through some of the most momentous decades in American history – the industrial revolution, the rise of the robber barons, the Progressive Era, the Great Depression, and two World Wars. With an uncanny gift for both depth and detail, Goodwin masterfully weaves together a striking number of dramatic and complex story lines drawing from her Pulitzer Prize-winning book, No Ordinary Time: Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt: The Home Front in World War II (1995) and her bestselling book, The Bully Pulpit: Theodore Roosevelt, William Howard Taft, and the Golden Age of Journalism to provide an intimate, comprehensive and ultimately unforgettable portrait of the era’s three extraordinary leaders – Theodore Roosevelt, Franklin D. Roosevelt and Eleanor Roosevelt – along with the scintillating cast of characters, who together transformed the country.