Dhruti Shah

Creative Lead, Have You Thought About

Dhruti Shah is a multi-award winning neurodivergent journalist and author. The creative lead for her independent consultancy Have You Thought About, she brings an interdisciplinary perspective to all her collaborations. From kickstarting her storytelling career as a newspaper reporter, to spending nearly two decades as a journalist, producer and editor at the BBC before going solo as an independent operator, there's no strand she hasn't tried. She worked in hardcore news, across investigations, specialised in verification, distilled complex ideas in the business unit, and broke digital records while working the social beat in Washington DC. In her freelance chapter, she’s also written for The Guardian, The Washington Post, The New Humanitarian, Bear Environment, New Humanist, The I and New Scientist. She's collaborated with impact-focused organisations including Forensic Architecture; Media Action; Headlines Network; the G20 Land Initiative; and Rotary International. She’s the author of the illustrated award-winning nature-based financial literacy guide Bear Markets and Beyond: A Bestiary of Business Terms, and is a published short story writer and poet. She has performed on stage for Hammersmith Lyric Theatre’s ‘Our Place’, Fremantle, The Storycollider comedy science podcast, the Soho Media Club’s Be You Festival. She is the creator and host of the award-shortlisted Have You Thought About podcast and writes an accompanying Substack newsletter of the same name. She has also hosted podcasts for TRANSFORM (an initiative of Unilever, the UK Foreign Office and EY) and Haleon’s Centre for Human Sciences. She’s the recipient of five global fellowships and is an advisor for the Museum of Colour. She is an elected member of the UK Young Academy - an interdisciplinary organisation supported by the UK's seven learned societies including The Royal Society and The British Academy. She is also a founder member of the award-winning I Am Not A Typo collective. In 2025 she was selected for both The Radio Academy RAMP scheme and The TV Foundation’s Visionaries scheme for changemakers in the industry. Find her at: www.dhrutishah.com