Arthur C. Brooks

Arthur C. Brooks is the Parker Gilbert Montgomery Professor of the Practice of Public and Nonprofit Leadership at the Harvard Kennedy School and Professor of Management Practice at the Harvard Business School, where he teaches courses on leadership, happiness, and social entrepreneurship. Brooks has written 13 books, many of them #1 New York Times bestsellers, including From Strength to Strength: Finding Success, Happiness, and Deep Purpose in the Second Half of Life and Build the Life You Want: The Art and Science of Getting Happier, which he co-authored with Oprah Winfrey. He writes the popular “How to Build a Life” column at The Atlantic.

Blending academic rigor, wit, and strategic insight, Brooks speaks to audiences all around the world about human happiness and works to raise well-being within private companies, universities, public agencies, and community organizations. Brooks’ approach is evidence-based and data-driven, combining behavioral science and neuroscience research with philosophy and wisdom traditions.

In Build the Life You Want, Arthur C. Brooks and Oprah Winfrey invite readers to begin a journey toward greater happiness no matter how challenging the circumstances. Drawing on cutting-edge science and their years of helping people translate ideas into action, they reveal how the tools of emotional self-management can help people change their lives.

The bestseller From Strength to Strength is a practical roadmap born out of a seven-year journey that Brooks embarked on at the height of his career. At age 50, Brooks set out to discover how to transform his future from one of disappointment over waning abilities into an opportunity for progress. In From Strength to Strength, he explains how we can increase our happiness as we age by refocusing on certain priorities and habits that anyone can learn, such as deep wisdom, detachment from empty rewards, spiritual progress, and connection and service to others.

In his 2019 bestseller Love Your Enemies: How Decent People Can Save America from the Culture of Contempt, Brooks explores America’s divisive political and social landscape. Through engaging anecdotes, research findings, and thoughtful analysis, he argues for the importance of dialogue, compassion, and respect in bridging the gap between opposing viewpoints.

Brooks began his career as a classical French hornist, leaving college at 19 to tour and record in the United States and Spain. In his late twenties, while still performing, he returned to school, earning a BA through distance learning. At 31, Brooks left music and earned an MPhil and PhD in public policy analysis from the Rand Graduate School. During that time, he also worked as an analyst for the Rand Corporation’s Project Air Force, performing military operations research analysis. Brooks then spent the next 10 years as a university professor, primarily at Syracuse University, where he taught economics and nonprofit management, and published 60 peer-reviewed articles and several books, including the textbook “Social Entrepreneurship” (2008). In 2009, Brooks became the president of the American Enterprise Institute (AEI) in Washington, DC, one of the world’s most influential think tanks. Over the following decade, he was selected as one of Fortune Magazine’s “50 World’s Greatest Leaders” and was awarded seven honorary doctorates.

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