The Soul of Enterprise: Business in the Transformation Economy by THRESHOLD

What makes an experience unforgettable? Why do some ideas, brands, museums, and attractions merely inform us while others permanently change how we think, feel, and act?
In this episode of The Soul of Enterprise, Ron and Ed welcome Bob Rogers, founder of BRC Imagination Arts and author of Deep Story: The Complete Guide to Creating Transformational Themed Attractions. Drawing on decades of experience designing award-winning visitor experiences for organizations ranging from Disney and NASA to Coca-Cola and the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum, Bob explains the difference between entertainment, engagement, and true transformation.
The conversation explores the power of storytelling to shape identity, create lasting emotional connections, and inspire action. Bob shares the principles behind "Deep Story," the framework he developed for creating experiences that move audiences beyond awareness and into meaningful change. Together, the hosts and Bob discuss what business leaders, educators, marketers, and experience designers can learn from the world's most successful attractions—and why the future belongs not merely to the Experience Economy, but to organizations capable of creating transformation.
Whether you're building a brand, leading a firm, teaching a subject, or simply fascinated by the art and science of storytelling, this episode offers a masterclass in creating experiences people never forget.

About Bob
Bob Rogers is the founder of BRC Imagination Arts, a globally recognized design and production company that creates transformative visitor experiences for leading brands, museums, and cultural institutions. A filmmaker, inventor, writer, and master storyteller, Bob has earned Academy Award nominations, received the IAAPA Thea Award for Lifetime Achievement, and helped shape attractions for organizations including Disney, NASA, Coca-Cola, and the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum

Professor Michael Munger returns to The Soul of Enterprise for a fourth visit and once again, the answer is transaction costs. Ron and Ed catch up with the Duke University economist, political scientist, author, and host of The Answer Is Transaction Costs to explore some of the provocative questions he has tackled in the podcast's latest summer episodes.
Why is being late an economic problem rather than merely bad manners? How have social media dramatically lowered the cost of coordinating outrage? Can transaction costs even explain the battle between the person who makes a resolution tonight and the same person who breaks it tomorrow?
Along the way, we'll explore Munger's larger argument that transaction costs are hiding in plain sight, shaping markets, institutions, cooperation, incentives, and everyday human behavior. It's another wide-ranging conversation with one of TSOE's favorite economists and the Knower of Important Things.

About Michael C. Munger
Mike Munger is the Pfizer/Edmund T. Pratt, Jr. University Distinguished Professor at Duke University, with appointments in Political Science, Economics, and Public Policy. A former president of the Public Choice Society and former FTC staff economist, he studies markets, institutions, regulation, and the sharing economy. He is the author of Tomorrow 3.0 and The Sharing Economy and hosts The Answer Is Transaction Costs podcast.

Ed and Ron (mostly Ron) empty out the overflowing stack of stuff and roam wherever intellectual curiosity takes them. On the docket: how Adam Smith's invisible hand actually works; what we should make of the latest government files on UFOs and UAPs (color us skeptical); whether standing desks are really healthier than sitting; the strange economics and crony capitalism of the college textbook market; encouraging news in the fight against dementia; and, in what may amount to professional heresy, the case against CPA licensing.
And because no serious program on economics, business, and human flourishing would be complete without it, we'll investigate an important question of Western civilization: Does Britain really have more cheeses than France?

What does it take to lead one of the largest state CPA societies through one of the most transformative periods in the profession's history? In this episode, Ron and Ed welcome Denise Froemming, President and CEO of CalCPA, for a wide-ranging conversation about the future of accounting, professional associations, and leadership in an era defined by AI and rapid change.
Drawing on her experience leading major professional organizations, Denise shares how CalCPA is reimagining its role—from serving members to building a vibrant professional community that helps CPAs thrive amid shifting business models, changing talent expectations, and emerging technologies. The discussion explores the profession's pipeline challenge, the evolving value of the CPA credential, the importance of authentic leadership, and why curiosity and adaptability are becoming the defining traits of successful professionals.
Whether you're a CPA, firm leader, educator, or simply interested in how professions reinvent themselves, this conversation offers practical insights into leading through change while keeping people at the center.
More about Denise
Denise Froemming, CPA, CAE, MBA, is President and CEO of CalCPA and the CalCPA Education Foundation. An accomplished association executive, she previously served as CEO of the Institute of Real Estate Management (IREM) and held executive leadership roles at the American Health Information Management Association (AHIMA). Denise is recognized for driving organizational transformation, fostering inclusive cultures, and advancing innovation to help the accounting profession thrive in a rapidly changing world.

Last week, Ron and Ed began exploring Pope Leo XIV's landmark social encyclical Magnifica Humanitas. This week, they continue the conversation, moving beyond first impressions into the document's deeper implications for business, technology, and the future of human flourishing.
What does it mean to remain fully human in an age increasingly shaped by artificial intelligence? Can technology serve the common good without reducing people to data points or algorithms? And is AI simply another powerful tool—or does it force us to confront far more fundamental questions about freedom, responsibility, work, and what it means to become the person we are called to be?
Along the way, Ron and Ed reflect on the encyclical's surprising engagement with economics, subsidiarity, solidarity, transhumanism, and the enduring tension between efficiency and human dignity. Whether you agree with every conclusion or not, Magnifica Humanitas offers one of the most thoughtful frameworks yet for understanding the AI revolution through the lens of philosophy, theology, and civilization itself.
Join us as we continue asking the question that lies at the heart of both the encyclical and The Soul of Enterprise: not simply what AI can do, but what kind of people—and what kind of society—it is helping us become.