Maya Shankar

A Slight Change of Plans was first published in 2021 by Pushkin Industries, the media company co-founded by Malcolm Gladwell and Jakob Weisberg.

A Slight Change of Plans explores what happens after a person experiences a life-changing event. It’s inspired by Shankar’s experience as a young classical violinist, training at Juilliard, whose career was cut short by an injury. “My whole childhood revolved around the violin, but that changed in a moment when I injured my hand playing a single note,” said Shankar. “I was forced to try and figure out who I was, and who I could be, without it.”

On the show, Shankar interviews people who have lived through different kinds of big changes — accidents, deaths, kidnappings — to understand how they navigated the waters ahead. The show emphasizes the universality of human psychology to help listeners feel less alone with their own choices. Shankar explains: “Cognitive science teaches us that the strategies we use to navigate those changes can be quite similar. Which is heartening to realize!”

A Slight Change of Plans was named the Apple Podcast of the Year in 2021.{{Cite news |date=Nov 30, 2021 |title=Apple Podcasts presents the Best of 2021 |work=Apple Newsroom |url=https://www.apple.com/newsroom/2021/11/apple-podcasts-presents-the-best-of-2021/ |access-date=Dec 21, 2013}} In 2023, it won the Ambie Award for Best Personal Growth Podcast.{{Cite web |date=March 7, 2023 |title=2023 Winners and Nominees |url=https://www.ambies.com/2023-winners#BestPersonalGrowthSpiritualityPodcast |archive-date= |access-date=Dec 25, 2023 |website=The Ambie Awards}} In 2022, Shankar earned a Webby nomination for Best Podcast Host.{{Cite web |date=May 16, 2022 |title=Webby Awards: A Slight Change of Plans Podcast |url=https://winners.webbyawards.com/2022/podcasts/features/best-host/203773/a-slight-change-of-plans-podcast |access-date=Dec 25, 2023 |website=The Webby Awards}}

Shankar served as a senior advisor in the Obama White House, where she founded the White House Social and Behavioral Sciences Team,{{Cite book|last=Thaler|first=Richard|title=Misbehaving: The Making of Behavioral Economics|date=June 2016|page=344|isbn=978-0-393-35279-5}} which was formalized by Executive Order 13707 in 2015.{{cite web |title=Using Behavioral Science Insights To Better Serve the American People |access-date=November 24, 2021|url=https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2015/09/18/2015-23630/using-behavioral-science-insights-to-better-serve-the-american-people |publisher=Federal Register }} Her work at the White House was profiled by The New Yorker in 2017.{{Cite magazine|url=https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/01/23/can-behavioral-science-help-in-flint|title = Can Behavioral Science Help in Flint?|magazine = The New Yorker|date = 16 January 2017}}

Shankar also served as the first Behavioral Science Advisor to the United Nations.{{cite web|url=https://behavioralpolicy.princeton.edu/ShankarAppointment|title=Maya Shankar Joins Center as Research Scholar|date=2016-10-18|access-date=2018-04-30}} She is a Director at Google.{{cite web |title=Maya Shankar |access-date=November 24, 2021|url=https://www.linkedin.com/in/maya-shankar-8b380350/ |publisher=LinkedIn }}

Shankar is a graduate of the pre-college program at the Juilliard School, where she was a private violin student of Itzhak Perlman.{{cite news |title=Loss and Renewal |newspaper=NPR.org|access-date=November 24, 2021|url=https://www.npr.org/2018/12/28/680679054/loss-and-renewal-moving-forward-after-a-door-closes |publisher=NPR }} When she was a teenager, she injured a tendon in her left hand, bringing her musical career to an end.{{cite web |title=Why We Do What We Do |date=March 27, 2019|access-date=December 27, 2019|url=https://www.endwellproject.org/maya-shankar-phd-why-we-do-what-we-do/ |publisher=End Well }}{{cite web |title=Loss and Renewal: Moving Forward After A Door Closes |date=December 31, 2018 |access-date=December 27, 2019 |url=https://www.npr.org/2018/12/28/680679054/loss-and-renewal-moving-forward-after-a-door-closes |publisher=NPR }}

Shankar earned her B.A. from Yale University in cognitive science and went on to earn her Ph.D. from the University of Oxford on a Rhodes Scholarship. In 2013, Shankar completed her postdoctoral fellowship in cognitive neuroscience at Stanford University.{{Cite web|url=https://stanford.edu/group/policyforum/cgi-bin/drupal/node/401|title=Maya Shankar {{!}} SIEPR Policy Forum|website=stanford.edu|access-date= December 27, 2019 |archive-date=April 25, 2017 |archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20170425150630/http://stanford.edu/group/policyforum/cgi-bin/drupal/node/401|url-status=dead }} She attended high school at the Juilliard School PreCollege program.

Maya Shankar's father is Ramamurti Shankar, Indian theoretical particle physicist and a professor at Yale University.{{cite web |date=June 27, 2002 |title=How Do You Get to Camp? Practice, Of Course; Teenagers Who Play Music, Not Tennis |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2002/06/27/arts/how-do-you-get-to-camp-practice-of-course-teenagers-who-play-music-not-tennis.html |access-date=December 27, 2019 |work=New York Times}} In her Meditative Story, The Joy of Being An Unwilling Traveler Through Life, she describes her father's influence on her and the insights he shared to ease her lifelong anxiety.{{Cite news |last=Shankar |first=Maya |date=July 14, 2022 |title=The joy of being an unwilling traveler through life |work=Meditative Story |url=https://meditativestory.com/the-joy-of-being-an-unwilling-traveler-through-life/ |access-date=December 25, 2023}}{{Nudge Theory}} Her mother is Uma Shankar, an International Scholar Adviser at Yale University.{{cite web |title=Uma Shankar (she, her, hers)|url=https://oiss.yale.edu/about/oiss-staff/uma-shankar |access-date=May 10, 2025 |work=Yale}} In a graduation speech Maya gave at The Juilliard School, she explains the role her mother played in her violin journey, and the lesson of "imaginative courage" her mom taught her.{{Cite news |date=June 26, 2023 |title=What a Musician Turned Cognitive Scientist Wants You to Know About Life |work=The Washington Post |url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2023/06/26/maya-shankar-juilliard-commencement-address/ |access-date=May 10, 2025}}

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