About Our Speakers
Our speakers are writers, thinkers, and changemakers who illuminate the deep challenges facing our society—from economic inequality to systemic discrimination—and offer powerful, practical visions for a more just and humane future. Many draw from lived experience at the intersections of race, class, gender, and identity, bringing nuance, urgency, and authenticity to the conversations we need most.
With clarity and compassion, they engage audiences on the issues shaping our world—belonging, equity, resilience, and repair—and spark the kinds of dialogue that lead to real change. Whether addressing institutions or communities, they don’t just raise awareness—they help build the roadmap forward.
Most of our speakers are also bestselling or award-winning authors whose ideas and advocacy have changed minds, moved hearts, and opened doors.
Our agency began in Harlem and our hearts remain rooted there although our staff now stretches across the United States.
Pande Lecture Management (PLM)
is a forward-thinking speakers’ bureau affiliated with Ayesha Pande Literary. We partner with universities, libraries, nonprofits, and other organizations to create events that spark conversation, deepen understanding, and inspire change.
The speakers we amplify are award-winning authors, thought leaders, and cultural catalysts whose work explores identity, power, and possibility. They speak to the urgent challenges facing our communities and bring insight, compassion, and imagination to questions of equity, belonging, and how we live together in a pluralistic society.
We’re a small, approachable team with roots in publishing, public programming, and library science—fields built on curiosity, access, and dialogue. That background informs our holistic approach: We don’t just book speakers; we help event hosts design meaningful experiences. Our close ties to the publishing world allow us to specialize in connecting audiences with powerful, discussable books, especially new and forthcoming titles that engage with the most pressing questions of our time.
Whether you’re ready to extend an invitation or you’re simply exploring possibilities, we invite you to sign up for our Event Planner’s Digest or follow us on social media for speaker updates, programming ideas, and behind-the-scenes insight from a team that’s passionate about the power of public conversation.
PLM is a member of the International Association of Speakers Bureaus.
Our Team
AYESHA PANDE
is our founding director as well as the founder of Ayesha Pande Literary, a Harlem-based boutique literary agency with an international focus. Before launching the agency, she worked as an editor at several publishing houses, including Farrar Straus & Giroux, HarperCollins and Crown Publishers. She has a graduate degree from Columbia University. She feels very lucky to work with clients that surprise her, teach her, and challenge her with new ideas and new ways of looking at the world. With Pande Lecture Management, she is determined to take her deep appreciation for and commitment to her clients one step further by helping amplify their voices and sharing their ideas with new audiences.
Katharyn Haas
is a lecture agent with Pande Lecture Management. After six years as a public librarian and programming coordinator, she discovered her passion for connecting authors and audiences in meaningful ways. Katharyn grew up in rural northern Michigan before pursuing her BA in English and Writing from Hope College and her MLIS from Wayne State University. She enjoys pairing speakers with like-minded venues who seek to challenge existing ideas and inspire new ones for the betterment of the world we all share.
Karuna khatri
is an assistant lecture agent with Pande Lecture Management and manages social media for Ayesha Pande Literary. She also works at her local library. Karuna grew up in a multicultural household and lived in Nepal and Thailand, leading her to gravitate toward authors who wrestle with their own complex identities. She attended Seattle Pacific University, where she received her BA in English Literature and developed a love for working with libraries. She feels so lucky to work with storytellers who continue to challenge and broaden our ideas about the world and each other.