Blog Archives • The Neurodivergent Coach

Why your reasonable adjustments process should be more apple

2 November 2026

There is a moment most line managers will recognise. An employee tells you they need some support. You want to help, so you open the intranet to find your reasonable adjustments process. And suddenly you are inside a Microsoft product from 2009.

TL;DR: Most reasonable adjustments processes fail not because organisations refuse support, but because the process is too hard to use. They are built like old Microsoft software: comprehensive, configurable, and exhausting to navigate. The best ones work like Apple. The complexity still exists, but the system absorbs the effort so your employee does not have to. This post shows line managers what an Apple-style adjustments process looks like, and why ease of access matters more than how thorough your policy is.

The Microsoft experience

You know what it is like to use a system that was built to be comprehensive rather than usable.

Fourteen different forms. A dropdown menu that has not been updated since the company rebranded three years ago. A guidance document that runs to forty pages and references a policy that no longer exists. Three separate email addresses depending on which type of adjustment you are requesting, and no clear sign of which one applies to you.

You are a reasonably competent adult. You use technology every day. And yet you spend forty minutes going in circles before giving up and emailing HR directly, hoping someone there just knows the answer.

Now imagine you are the employee in that scenario.

Except you are also carrying the cognitive load of having disclosed something personal and vulnerable. You are already worried about how this will affect your relationship with your manager. You are probably exhausted from masking and compensating and making do. And now you are expected to self-navigate a system that was not designed with you in mind.

This is what most organisations call reasonable adjustments self-service. It is a Microsoft product. Powerful, configurable, technically capable of doing what you need. But only if you already know exactly what you are looking for, have the time and executive function to find it, and do not give up somewhere in the middle.

A lot of people give up somewhere in the middle.

The Apple experience

Now think about how you use an Apple product for the first time.

You do not read the manual. There is no manual. You pick it up, you tap around a bit, and it works. Not because the technology is simpler. Apple products are extraordinarily complex under the hood. It works because someone made thousands of decisions about what to hide, what to surface, what to name things, and in what order to present them. The complexity still exists. You just do not have to manage it.

That is the difference. Apple does not make things easier by removing capability. It makes things easier by absorbing the effort on your behalf.

Your reasonable adjustments process could do the same thing.

What an Apple-style adjustments process looks like

It does not mean having fewer options. It means your employees do not have to find the options themselves. Here is what that looks like in practice.

A single front door: One place to go. Not contact HR, or speak to occupational health, or raise a request through the system. One starting point that takes the employee to where they need to be, whatever they need.

Language that matches how people think: Not submit a workplace adjustment request under the Access to Work framework. Just: I need some changes to how or where I work. The system works out the rest. Employees should not need to know the name of the policy to get the support the policy exists to give them.

Guidance that arrives before people ask: An Apple product does not wait until you are confused to help you. It anticipates the likely next step. A good adjustments process does the same. Here is what typically helps people in this situation, here is what you can do today, here is what we would need to do together.

A process that moves: One of the most common reasons adjustments fail is not that organisations refuse them. It is that they stall. Someone submits a request and hears nothing for three weeks. The silence is its own message. An Apple-style system has clear timelines, proactive updates, and a named person who is accountable for moving things forward.

You as the interface, not the obstacle: Here is the part that matters most for you as a line manager. In a Microsoft-style system, you are a user of a complex process, often as lost as the employee you are trying to support. In an Apple-style system, you are the human layer that makes the technology feel personal. The system does the navigation. You provide the relationship.

Why your reasonable adjustments process matters more than you think

The adjustments that do not get made are not usually the ones that were formally refused.

They are the ones where the employee looked at the process and decided it was not worth it. Where they did a quiet calculation about the effort required, the likelihood of it working, and the risk of being seen as difficult, and concluded the answer was to keep coping.

That calculation happens every day in organisations that believe they have a good adjustments process because the policy document is thorough and the HR team is well-intentioned.

Thoroughness is not the same as accessibility. A forty-page guide is not accessible simply because it contains all the right information.

The organisations that support neurodivergent and disabled employees well are not the ones with the most comprehensive frameworks. They are the ones that made the process so straightforward that getting support was easier than going without it.

That is the Apple test. Not: does your system technically allow employees to access adjustments? But: is accessing adjustments easier than not accessing them?

A question worth sitting with

If an employee in your team needed a reasonable adjustment today, what would you tell them to do?

If the answer involves more than one step, more than one person, or more than a few minutes of their time, you are probably running a Microsoft process.

The good news is that the gap between Microsoft and Apple is not about resources or policy or senior buy-in. It is about design. It is about someone deciding that the employee’s experience of the process matters as much as the process itself.

That someone can be you.

Work with us

At The Neurodivergent Coach, we help organisations redesign workplace support so it is genuinely accessible, not just technically available. If you want to talk about what an Apple-style adjustments process could look like in your organisation, and join us.

WWII Sherman tank fitted with an improvised Rhino hedgerow cutter, illustrating practical workplace adjustments built to fit real conditions.

What two WWII tanks teach us about workplace adjustments

26 October 2026

In 1944, the Allies built two very different tanks. One was designed over many months in a planning room in England. The other was welded together in a muddy field in Normandy. The first was a costly failure. The second helped break the deadlock of the entire campaign. The gap between those two tanks tells managers almost everything they need to know about workplace adjustments, and about why the best ones are rarely the ones designed furthest from the person who needs them.

The story is worth telling properly, because the detail is where the lesson lives.

TL;DR: Many workplace adjustments fail for the same reason one famous WWII tank failed. They are designed in a back room, in advance, away from the real person and the real work. The adjustments that genuinely help look more like the tank that was improvised in the field: small, built with the person in front of you, tested quickly, and improved as you go. This post tells the story of both tanks, then shows managers how to run small adjustment experiments well and how to make it safe to get them wrong.

The tank is built in the back room.

The first tank was the DD, short for Duplex Drive. It was one of a set of inventive machines nicknamed “Hobart’s Funnies,” after the British officer who championed them. Engineers took a standard Sherman tank and added a folding canvas screen and propellers, so the tank could float and swim ashore under its own power, arriving with the first wave of infantry. On paper, it was brilliant. The plan was detailed. The engineering was clever. Everyone could see how it was meant to work.

Then it met the sea. On D-Day, off Omaha Beach, the DD tanks were launched far out in rough water. The canvas screens were never designed for those conditions. Of the twenty-nine tanks launched in that sector, twenty-seven sank before they reached the shore. The plan was elegant. The water was real. The two did not match, and the men paid for the gap.

This is what happens when we solve a problem far from where it actually lives. A great deal of effort goes into it. The thinking looks complete. Everyone signs it off. Then it touches reality and goes under.

Learning for the Workplace

Plenty of workplace adjustments follow exactly this path. A policy gets written. A standard list of accommodations is agreed centrally. Everyone with a particular diagnosis is offered the same software, headphones, and flexible start time. It feels thorough and fair. However, it was designed for an average employee who does not exist. For example, two autistic people can have opposite needs. One may want more structure and clearer instructions. The other may find the same structure stifling. A pre-built, one-size-fits-all adjustment cannot tell the difference between them, because it has never met either of them.

To be clear, this is not an argument against planning. The DD tank did not fail because someone planned. It failed because the plan was fixed and signed off before anyone tested it in real water. The same is true at work. An adjustment designed in full, approved, and rolled out without ever making contact with the person is a tank that has never been near the sea.

The tank was built on the beach

The second tank had neither a committee nor a budget. Once ashore, the Allies got stuck in the bocage, the ancient Normandy hedgerows: thick banks of earth and root that stopped tanks dead, or tipped them up and exposed their vulnerable undersides to enemy fire. The careful invasion plan had no answer to it. The advance stalled.

So a young American sergeant named Curtis Culin did something about it. Working in the field, he welded scrap steel, much of it cut from the German beach defences the Allies had just captured, into a set of tusks on the front of his tank. The tusks let the tank dig in and drive straight through the hedgerow rather than climb it.

It was crude.
It was cheap.
It was built from the enemy’s own rubbish.

And it worked. When General Omar Bradley saw a demonstration, he ordered the device fitted across the army. Those “Rhino” tanks helped power the breakout that finally got the Allies moving again.

Why it worked

Notice why it worked. Culin was standing in front of the actual problem.

He could see the hedgerow and the tank.
He built the smallest thing that would get one through the other, and he tried it straight away.
He did not write a specification and wait.
He did not design for an imagined hedgerow.
He solved the one in front of him.

Good workplace adjustments work the same way.

You sit down with the person and the task at hand.
You agree to make one small change this week.
You watch what happens.
Then you keep it, drop it, or adjust it again.

Nobody needs a perfect, finished solution on day one. Instead, you need a fast, honest loop between trying and learning. That loop is where genuine fit comes from, and fit is the whole point.

Why small experiments beat big plans for workplace adjustments

The reason small experiments win is simple. They make contact with reality sooner. A back-room plan hides its flaws until launch day, when they surface all at once and at maximum cost. A small experiment shows you within a week whether it actually helps. As a result, the cost of being wrong stays low, and you learn something useful either way.

There is also a great business example of this. Professor Shaun Fitzgerald, who founded the building ventilation company Breathing Buildings, has spoken about how the company began. Someone offered him a consultancy project to assess the market for his idea. He realised that actually starting the company would teach him far more, and far faster, than any report could. So he did the small real thing instead of commissioning the big study, and the market answered him directly.

That is the same principle that should guide workplace adjustments. A long assessment of what might work, written at a distance, is the consultancy report. A short, real trial with one employee is the company. Both have their place, but only one of them tells you the truth quickly.

How to run small adjustment experiments well

You do not need a new policy to do this. You need a different habit. Here is a simple loop any manager can use:

Start with the person, not the policy: Ask what gets in the way of their best work, and what would help. Their answer is your starting point, not the staff handbook. You are looking at this hedgerow, not hedgerows in general.
Pick one small change: Choose the smallest adjustment you could try this week. For example, a written agenda sent before every meeting, or a protected quiet hour with no messages. Keep it cheap and easy to reverse.
Agree how you will know it worked: Decide together what better looks like. Less anxiety before meetings? Fewer dropped actions? More focus in the morning? Name it before you start, so you are not guessing afterwards.
Review quickly: Check in after a week or two, not after six months. Keep what helps. Change what does not. Treat the first attempt as a first attempt.
Write down what you learn: A short note builds a picture over time. In addition, it means the learning survives even if the manager moves on or the role changes. Today’s small experiment becomes tomorrow’s good default.

For some people, a more structured starting point genuinely helps, especially where needs are complex or a manager is unsure where to begin. A Workplace Needs Assessment is the considered version of building on the beach. It looks closely at the real person doing the real job, then recommends adjustments that fit them specifically, rather than handing over a generic list. The point is not to skip the thinking. The point is to think with the person, not instead of them.

Making it safe to get it wrong

None of this works if people are afraid to fail. Here, the DD tank teaches a second lesson. It was a failure, but a useful one, because the army learned from it and adapted. The real danger is never a single adjustment that does not land. The real danger is a culture where nobody dares to try anything small, so the only option left is the big, slow, back-room plan that sinks in public.

Managers set this tone more than they realise. When an adjustment doesn’t work, treat it as information rather than blame and say so out loud. Try the next small thing. Over time, this builds a team where experimentation is normal and asking for what you need feels safe rather than risky. That cultural shift is often worth more than any single adjustment you will ever make.

It also quietly changes the wider conversation about neurodiversity in your organisation. Instead of a tense, one-off negotiation triggered by a diagnosis, support becomes an ordinary, ongoing part of good management. Therefore, the question stops being “what are you entitled to?” and becomes “what helps you do your best work?” That is a far better question and serves everyone, not only those with a label.

Build on the beach, not in the back room.

The Allies needed clever planning and improvisation in the field, but it was the tank built in front of the problem that broke the deadlock. Workplace adjustments are no different. Plan enough to make a sensible start, then get close to the person, try something small, watch what happens, and improve it in the open. That is how you build adjustments that actually float, and how you build a workplace where getting it slightly wrong on Monday is how you get it right by Friday.

If you would like help putting this into practice, our coaching for managers supports leaders to have these conversations with confidence, and our Workplace Needs Assessments turn them into adjustments that genuinely fit the person. You can also book a talk or workshop to open the wider culture conversation with your team.

Stay connected

If this post was useful, there is plenty more where it came from. Every month, we share practical insights on neurodiversity, management, and making workplaces work better for everyone. Sign up for the newsletter here.

A person with brown hair putting their arms around another person with blonde hair. Talking about autistic coping strategies at work.

Autistic coping strategies at work: when help backfires

19 October 2026

Autistic coping strategies at work keep people safe. Autistic employees often build a sense of predictability and control in a world that can feel unpredictable. But what happens when a strategy that once protected someone starts to limit them?

This is a familiar pattern in workplaces. A colleague who only uses one specific browser. A team member who refuses meetings on Mondays. A new starter who insists on filing everything twice. None of this looks unreasonable from the inside. From the outside, it can look rigid, inflexible, or unwilling.

TL;DR: Autistic coping strategies at work are usually built on real experience, often to prevent a past harm from happening again. Over time, they can become barriers to flexibility, energy, and performance. The job for HR leaders and managers is not to remove them. It is to recognise what they are protecting against and help build healthier adaptations alongside them.

A real story: when safety becomes a restriction

One of my children has always struggled to drink enough water at school. On one sports day, another child put a used vape container into his water bottle as a prank. He did not notice and drank from it.

The school called us straight away. We spent hours at the hospital checking him over. Physically, he was fine. Psychologically, the incident left a lasting mark.

To protect himself, he built two rules.

Rule 1: Only drink from a transparent bottle so the contents are visible.

Rule 2: Only drink from bottles he has filled himself, and never let them out of his sight.

These rules made him feel safe. They also caused new problems. If his bottle was not available, he simply did not drink. He often ended the day dehydrated, irritable, and exhausted. The coping strategy that kept him safe now risked his wellbeing.

Why autistic coping strategies at work become rigid

For autistic people, coping strategies are usually built around preventing a recurrence of something distressing. Guidance from the National Autistic Society notes that autistic people may become more insistent on routines as a way of managing uncertainty and fear. Strong protective habits can also develop after a difficult experience, even when the actual risk of repetition is low. Psychologists call this the generalisation of fear. It is a survival instinct doing its job a little too well.

At work, this can look like:

Refusing to use certain tools: After one bad experience with technology, a whole category of systems becomes off-limits.

Repeated checking: Tasks take far longer than expected because invisible verification steps have been added.

Avoiding specific interactions: Particular colleagues, meeting types, or tasks are quietly sidestepped after one difficult moment.

Building workarounds: Elaborate alternative processes emerge around systems that have changed, even when the change was minor.

None of these are about being awkward. They are autistic coping strategies at work, built from real experience. The challenge is that the original incident is often years in the past. The cost of the strategy is now greater than the risk it was designed to prevent.

How to spot autistic coping strategies at work

A few patterns tend to recur. Look out for these signals.

Disproportionate response to change: A small system update triggers significant stress, often because it removes a workaround the person had carefully built.

Hidden checking processes: Tasks consistently take longer than expected because invisible verification steps have been layered in.

Avoidance of specific contexts: Particular rooms, days, or types of meetings are quietly avoided without explanation.

Strong preferences with little flexibility: A specific seat, a specific time, a specific way of receiving instructions, with real distress when these are not available.

None of this is dysfunction. It is information. Each pattern points to something the person needed to manage, usually long before they arrived in your team.

How HR leaders and managers can support autistic coping strategies at work

The goal is not to remove the coping strategy. That tends to make things worse. The goal is to broaden the range of what feels safe, so the person has more options when their preferred option is not available.

Get curious, not critical: Instead of treating a behaviour as a problem, ask what it might be protecting against. What experience might have shaped it?

Co-create adjustments: Work with the person to find solutions that meet the underlying need. A transparent water bottle solved my son’s problem. In a workplace, a visible workflow board can ease the anxiety that drives over-checking.

Introduce gradual flexibility: Rigid strategies do not shift overnight. Start small. Ask what one other safe option could be tried. Ask how the person might prepare for times when their preferred option is unavailable.

Normalise psychological safety: When employees trust that adapting a strategy will not be held against them, they are far more willing to try.

Why this matters for performance, not just compassion

Coping strategies cost energy. The colleague who checks everything four times is exhausted by 11 am. The team member who avoids a specific room is constantly routing around it. The new starter who can only use one tool falls behind when that tool is unavailable.

When organisations help autistic employees move from rigid coping to flexible adaptation, the results are concrete.

Energy is conserved: Less cognitive load spent managing safety routines means more capacity for the work itself.

Anxiety drops: Reducing reliance on rigid strategies reduces the background hum of threat that drives them.

Productivity improves: Employees who can adapt to changing circumstances are more effective and more resilient.

Strengths become visible: When coping strategies are no longer the loudest thing in the room, what the person is actually good at can come through.

This is not a wellbeing initiative dressed up as performance. It is performance.

Where to start with autistic coping strategies at work

If you are noticing patterns like this in your team, a Workplace Needs Assessment is often the most efficient first step. It surfaces the patterns, names the underlying needs, and produces clear adjustments the employee and manager can act on together.

You might also find our talks and workshops or one-to-one coaching a useful next step if you are looking for more hands-on support.

Stay connected

If this post was useful, there is plenty more where it came from. Every month, we share practical insights on neurodiversity, management, and how to make workplaces work better for everyone. Sign up for the newsletter here.

Understanding workplace boundaries: Why “kindness without clarity” fails teams

12 October 2026

TL;DR: Supportive managers often let boundaries drift out of kindness until support starts to replace the role rather than enabling it. This post uses a simple garden metaphor to show how that happens, why it is especially tricky for neurodivergent leaders, and how high support with high challenge, clear roles and kind conversations can reset things. Boundaries are not barriers. They are clarity.

There is a quiet risk in many well-meaning workplaces of failing to understand workplace boundaries.

It starts with kindness. With flexibility. With a genuine desire to support.

And slowly, without anyone quite noticing, the boundaries begin to shift.

This post builds on the idea that boundaries undefended will fall. But here, we go one step further. Because understanding workplace boundaries is not just about holding the line, it is about knowing where the line is in the first place.

The garden problem: When a little space becomes the whole lawn

Imagine your home. You have a garden.

One day, your neighbour asks if they can use a small corner to plant a few vegetables. You agree. It feels reasonable.

But you never clearly mark where that space ends.

A week later, the patch is a little bigger. A month later, there are rows. Before long, carrots are growing right up to your front door.

Not because your neighbour is malicious. But because the boundary was never defined.

This is exactly what happens in workplaces.

When we are unclear about what support looks like, what flexibility means, and where responsibility sits, the “garden” of someone’s role can slowly disappear.

Why understanding workplace boundaries is hard for supportive leaders

Many managers, especially those who care deeply about their people, struggle with boundaries.

This is even more complex for neurodivergent leaders.

If you are autistic, for example, you may:

Take commitments very seriously
Want to be fair and consistent
Find it difficult to shift expectations once set
Experience stress when roles become unclear

At the same time, you may be managing or supporting someone with neurodivergent traits, whether disclosed or not.

This creates a powerful tension.

You want to help. You want to be inclusive. You want to do the right thing.

But without clear boundaries, support can turn into overextension.

And overextension leads to burnout, confusion, and resentment.

When support starts to replace the role

Let’s bring this to life.

A manager is working with an individual who has complex needs. They begin by offering small adjustments:

Extra time for tasks
More frequent check-ins
Flexibility around communication

All good. All appropriate.

But over time:

The individual begins to rely on the manager for decisions they should own
Meetings increase in frequency and urgency
The manager’s own workload starts to slip
The role itself becomes blurred

The manager is no longer managing. They are compensating.

This is not sustainable.

And crucially, it does not help the individual either.

Because real support should enable someone to succeed in their role, not replace it.

As explored in What stops workplace adjustments working, meaningful support comes from understanding the individual in front of you, not making assumptions or overcorrecting with well-intentioned actions.

High support, high challenge: The balance that works

There is a model that helps here: high support, high challenge.

Too much support without challenge leads to dependency.

Too much challenge without support leads to failure.

We need both.

What High Support Looks Like

Clear communication about expectations
Adjustments that reduce unnecessary barriers
Psychological safety to ask questions and make mistakes
Collaborative problem-solving

What High Challenge Looks Like

Accountability for outcomes
Clarity on role responsibilities
Stretching capability over time
Honest conversations about performance

The key is that both exist simultaneously.

Not one instead of the other.

Boundaries are not barriers; they are clarity

One of the biggest misconceptions is that boundaries are harsh.

They are not.

Boundaries are information.

They answer questions like:

What is my role?
What is your role?
Where does support end and responsibility begin?
What does success look like here?

Without this clarity, people fill in the gaps themselves.

And that is when gardens turn into farms.

Holding boundaries with kindness

This is where many leaders hesitate.

They worry that setting boundaries will damage trust.

In reality, the opposite is true.

Clear, kind boundaries build trust by removing ambiguity.

Here is what that can sound like in practice:

“I want to support you, and part of that is making sure you can succeed in this role independently.”
“Let’s agree on what you own and where I step in.”
“I’m noticing I’m taking on tasks that sit within your role. Let’s reset that together.”

Kindness is not about saying yes.

It is about being honest, respectful, and consistent.

When boundaries break down, look at the system

It is easy to see this as a people problem.

It is not.

It is usually a system problem.

Questions to ask:

Are role expectations clearly defined?
Is there alignment between the manager and the individual on what the job actually involves?
Are adjustments supporting performance, or replacing it?
Is the manager supported in their role?

This is where structured approaches, such as a Workplace Needs Assessment, become invaluable.

As highlighted in our post on the manager’s role in a workplace needs assessment, understanding what is really happening day to day, not just what is written in a job description, is often the first breakthrough.

The role of coaching in understanding workplace boundaries

When boundaries have already blurred, it can feel awkward to reset them.

This is where coaching can make a significant difference.

Coaching creates space to:

Explore what is happening without blame
Rebuild clarity between the manager and the individual
Identify practical ways of working that support both people
Re-establish ownership and accountability

Joint coaching between the manager and the employee can be especially powerful.

It shifts the dynamic from “fixing a problem” to “building a partnership.”

You can explore this further through our coaching services, or bring these conversations into your organisation through our talks and workshops.

A simple boundary check for managers

If you are unsure whether your boundaries are holding, ask yourself:

Am I doing work that sits in someone else’s role?
Do I feel stretched beyond my capacity because of one individual?
Are expectations clear and shared?
Am I avoiding a conversation I know needs to happen?

If the answer to any of these is yes, your garden might need a fence.

Not a wall. Just a clear edge.

Final thoughts: Clarity is kindness

Understanding workplace boundaries is not about being rigid.

It is about being clear.

When we combine clarity with compassion, we create environments where people can thrive, not just cope.

If this resonates with you and you are navigating complex team dynamics, it might be time to take a closer look at how support and responsibility work in your organisation.

A Workplace Needs Assessment is a good place to start, or you can get in touch to talk through your situation.

Because good fences do not divide teams.

They help them grow.

Stay connected

Rethinking ADHD Support A person with blonde hair working on a standing desk.

Rethinking ADHD Support: Is It Always ADHD or a Need for Movement?

5 October 2026

TL;DR: ADHD diagnoses are rising, but some of what looks like ADHD may be a natural response to environments that allow too little movement. This post looks at the role of environment, why movement matters for focus and regulation, and how coaching and personalised strategies can help, all without dismissing ADHD as a real condition.

A friend recently shared a story about their son, who struggled to sit still in class. With ADHD diagnoses on the rise, they began to wonder whether he might have ADHD.

Instead of jumping straight to conclusions, they tried something different: regular gym sessions.

The result? A noticeable improvement in focus, behaviour and overall well-being.

The physical outlet gave him what he truly needed: movement. Once that need was met, he found it much easier to concentrate during quieter tasks.

His experience raises an important question: are some ADHD symptoms actually a natural response to environments that don’t allow enough movement?

Why We Need to Rethink ADHD Support

ADHD is increasingly recognised in both children and adults. While this has improved awareness and access to support, it also raises a crucial question:

Are we always identifying a neurodevelopmental condition, or sometimes misinterpreting environmental responses?

Rethinking ADHD support means looking beyond labels and considering how lifestyle, environment and daily structure influence behaviour.

In this article, we explore:

The role of environment in ADHD-related challenges
The importance of movement for focus and regulation
How coaching and personalised strategies can help

Is ADHD Being Overdiagnosed?

As ADHD diagnoses continue to rise, many people are asking whether it is being overdiagnosed.

Children and adults who are energetic, restless or struggle in traditional settings are often flagged for ADHD assessment. However, some research suggests that the diagnostic criteria may be too broad, and that modern environments may not suit everyone’s natural way of thinking and moving.

In the past, daily life involved far more physical activity. Many jobs were hands-on and movement-based. Today, long periods of sitting and sustained attention are the norm.

This shift raises an important question:

Are we sometimes labelling natural energy and movement needs as a disorder?

The Impact of Environment on ADHD Symptoms

Our environment plays a powerful role in shaping behaviour.

Rigid classrooms and desk-based workplaces can be particularly challenging for individuals who need movement to regulate attention and energy levels.

Instead of focusing solely on the individual, we should also ask:

How can we adapt environments to support different needs?

Research shows that simple changes can significantly improve focus and engagement, including:

Regular movement breaks
Standing desks or flexible workstations
Hands-on, interactive learning
More dynamic and adaptable workspaces

These strategies benefit not only people with ADHD traits but also the wider population.

A Balanced Approach to ADHD Support

Rethinking ADHD support is not about dismissing ADHD as a condition. Instead, it’s about adopting a more balanced and holistic approach.

Effective support often includes:

Environmental adjustments
Increased opportunities for movement
Personalised coaching strategies
Medication, where appropriate

The goal is to improve executive function, the brain’s ability to plan, organise, manage time and regulate impulses, while enhancing overall quality of life.

By creating environments that support a range of neurotypes, we allow individuals to thrive in ways that work for them.

Where to start

Start with the environment before the label. Notice when focus comes easily and when it slips, and what is different in between: how long you have been sitting, whether you have moved, and what the space around you is like.

Try one small change for a couple of weeks, such as a short movement break every hour or a standing option for some tasks, and see what shifts.

If you would like help working out what makes the difference for you, coaching can help you build strategies around how your brain actually works. If you would like to talk it through, get in touch.

Stay connected

neurodivergent women at work A person holding in their hand a symbol for womanhood and the female cycle.

Neurodivergent women at work: the menstrual cycle matters

21 September 2026

A Personal Note: Before diving into this topic, ‘ Neurodivergent women at work: the menstrual cycle matters’, I want to acknowledge something important when sharing my observations: I’m not trying to explain the female experience to other women, but rather to point out some patterns that I’ve noticed that I believe deserve more attention in our workplace conversations. To help support leaders, managers, and colleagues in creating more inclusive and kinder working environments.

A team member who consistently delivers strong creative work in week one is suddenly missing deadlines in week three. A colleague who runs the Monday meeting with confidence cannot manage the same room on another week. A high performer is privately exhausted and cannot explain why.

These patterns are easy to miss and even easier to misread. For many neurodivergent women, they are tied to a biological cycle that workplaces have been slow to acknowledge.

Personal note: I am not trying to explain the female experience to women. I am pointing at a pattern I keep seeing in coaching and Workplace Needs Assessments, one that deserves more attention from the leaders, managers, and colleagues who shape the working environment.

TL;DR: Hormonal fluctuations affect everyone who menstruates, but for many neurodivergent women, they amplify existing challenges with sensory processing, executive function, and emotional regulation. The result is a predictable monthly pattern that can be supported by small workplace adjustments. The cost of not addressing it is burnout, masking fatigue, and lost talent.

Why this matters for neurodivergent women at work

Just because something happens every month does not mean it loses its impact. Predictable does not mean easy. For neurodivergent women who already navigate higher sensory load, more demanding executive function, and more energy spent on masking, the cyclical hormonal shifts add another layer on top.

For too long, conversations about women’s biology at work have been treated as personal rather than structural. This is changing, but slowly. Recognising the intersection of neurodivergence and hormonal cycles is not about announcing menstruation in team meetings. It is about acknowledging that performance can be cyclical, and that this is a legitimate consideration alongside other adjustments.

The science in brief

The menstrual cycle has four phases, each shaped by different hormone levels.

Follicular phase (days 1 to 14): Rising oestrogen brings improved mood, cognition, and energy. Many neurodivergent women describe this as their most productive window.

Ovulation (around day 14): Oestrogen peaks. Confidence, sociability, and focus are often at their highest. This is a strong time for collaborative or creative work.

Luteal phase (days 15 to 28): Oestrogen drops while progesterone rises. Fatigue, irritability, and reduced executive function are common. This phase brings the most significant workplace challenges for many.

Menstruation (days 1 to 5): Both hormones are at their lowest. Energy is low, sensitivity is heightened, and recovery time matters.

These shifts affect everyone differently. For neurodivergent women they often interact with existing traits in ways that compound the impact.

How cycles interact with neurodivergent traits for neurodivergent women at work

For women with ADHD: Oestrogen modulates dopamine, the neurotransmitter at the heart of ADHD. Falling oestrogen in the luteal phase can dampen the effectiveness of stimulant medication, make initiation harder, and reduce the consistency of mood and motivation. A woman who runs project management beautifully in week one may genuinely struggle with the same work in week three. This is not a commitment issue. It is a biological one.

For autistic women: Change is often harder for autistic people generally, and the cycle is a recurring change happening inside the body. Sensory tolerance shifts. A meeting that was comfortable last week may feel overwhelming this week. Tolerance for fluorescent lighting, background noise, and unstructured conversation can drop sharply in the second half of the cycle.

For women with cyclical mental health: Premenstrual Dysphoric Disorder (PMDD) is significantly more common in neurodivergent women than in the general population. It produces severe mood and cognitive disruption that is genuinely disabling for days at a time.

What helps: practical steps for the individual

Track and identify patterns: Use a cycle tracking app to map mood, energy, sensory tolerance, and capacity across the month. Patterns become much easier to manage once they are named.

Design work around your phases: Schedule demanding cognitive work for high-energy phases. Save routine, structured tasks, templates, and checklists for lower-energy weeks. Build in recovery time around the lowest points.

Reduce sensory load when it counts: During heightened-sensitivity windows, choose quieter spaces, reduce visual clutter, and protect headphones-on time.

Have the conversation early: Talk to your manager about patterns during a phase when you feel resourced. Frame the conversation as optimising performance, not asking for concessions.

What helps: practical steps for managers and HR

Listen without dismissing: If a colleague names a pattern around her cycle, treat it as information about performance, not a personal disclosure to manage. The most common mistake is to underweight it.

Build flexibility into how the team works: Asynchronous communication, flexible scheduling, and remote options all reduce the cost of a low-energy week without requiring anyone to disclose anything.

Avoid scheduling assumptions: High-stakes presentations, full-day workshops, and intense decision-making sessions land better when the person has some control over when they happen.

Update inclusion policies: Most organisations have policies covering disability and wellbeing. Few of them name cyclical conditions explicitly. Adding this is a small change with a meaningful signal.

Treat masking as a cost, not a virtue: Many neurodivergent women hold it together through luteal weeks at huge personal cost. The team sees a smooth performance. The person ends the year exhausted. A workplace that quietly removes some of that cost gets a more sustainable employee.

The intersection of authenticity and professionalism

Many neurodivergent women describe professional masking as a constant. During the second half of the cycle, the cost of maintaining it can become unsustainable. The choice on offer is too often perform or disclose, and neither feels safe.

A workplace that is genuinely flexible removes the need for that binary. People can have a quiet week without explaining themselves. They can shift a meeting without justification. They can work from home on a heavy day without anyone reading meaning into it. None of this is special treatment. It is good design that benefits everyone.

Where to start with support for neurodivergent women at work

If you are noticing these patterns in your team, a Workplace Needs Assessment is the cleanest way to surface what is going on and identify the adjustments that will actually help. For broader awareness across the team, Talks and Workshops build the shared understanding that makes adjustments easier to land.

Reasonable adjustments: so what is reasonable?

A practical guide to what counts as reasonable and why the threshold often sits lower than managers think.

Manager role in workplace needs assessment: what HR leaders need to know

The most underused lever in workplace adjustments is the manager’s part. Here is how to use it well.

Coaching for neurodivergent employees: what HR leaders should consider

What coaching can and cannot do for neurodivergent staff, and how to commission it well.

Stay connected

If this post was useful, there is plenty more where it came from. Every month we share practical insights on neurodiversity, management, and making workplaces work better for everyone. Sign up to the newsletter here.

Tone policing: How neurodivergent honesty gets misunderstood

14 September 2026

Tone policing in Neurodivergent Communication: When authenticity Is mistaken for aggression

Tone carries meaning, but not always the meaning others think it does. For neurodivergent people, what feels like a neutral or relaxed way of speaking can sometimes be perceived as blunt, irritated, or even confrontational.

It’s a phenomenon often called tone policing, in which someone’s emotional expression (or lack of it) is judged more harshly than their actual words or intent.

In this piece, we’ll explore:
• What tone policing looks like in neurodivergent communication
• Why it happens, linguistically and emotionally
• How to manage the impact on relationships and teams
• How leaders and caring professionals can respond more thoughtfully

This builds on the ideas in Kim Witten’s Go Deeper With What You Already Have, where she explores how language and listening shape connection.

What tone policing looks like

Tone policing isn’t always overt. It can show up as:
• “You don’t need to be so aggressive.”
• “I don’t like your tone.”
• “Calm down.”
• Or even silence and withdrawal or stonewalling.

In reality, what’s happening is often a mismatch between expression and interpretation. A neurodivergent person may simply be communicating without the extra social “padding” of tone modulation, small talk, or mimicry, particularly when they feel safe enough to drop their mask.

But that same authenticity can trigger discomfort for people accustomed to neurotypical speech rhythms or emotional cues. What’s heard as annoyance may actually be safety and presence.

Why does this happen: The linguistic layer

Kim Witten reminds us that we are all experts at picking up sociolinguistic cues, even when we don’t realise it. We subconsciously read accents, pacing, pitch, and facial expression to decide what people mean.

For neurodivergent communicators, this can create misunderstanding because:
• Tone may not fluctuate in the expected way (for example, flat or monotone speech).
• Masking fatigue can make speech more abrupt.
• Directness, often valued for clarity, may clash with social expectations of “softened” language.
• Emotional regulation differences can affect how volume or intensity is expressed.

When others aren’t attuned to these variations, they may judge the delivery rather than the content, policing the tone rather than engaging with the message.

The emotional layer: When safety feels unsafe

Dropping the mask, the effortful filtering and mirroring of social behaviour, often signals trust. For neurodivergent people, being able to “just talk normally” can feel like finally exhaling.

Unfortunately, in some environments, authenticity isn’t rewarded. Especially in workplaces or caring professions with a “toxic positivity” culture, where smiling and warmth are equated with kindness, any deviation from a cheerful tone can be seen as hostility or lack of empathy.

This happens frequently in nursing, teaching, childcare, and social work, where the expectation to “always be kind” can silence necessary honesty.

As Brené Brown might say, “Clear is kind. Unclear is unkind.” Tone policing often flips that truth on its head, rewarding pleasantness over authenticity.

Recognising what’s going on

When tone policing happens, everyone loses. The neurodivergent speaker may feel ashamed or self-conscious, while the listener feels misunderstood or unsafe.

Here are some reflections that can help both sides:

If you’re the one being tone-policed:
• Pause before self-blame. Ask: “What did they hear that I didn’t mean to send?”
• Check for context fatigue; were you tired, overstimulated, or masking all day?
• Clarify intent calmly: “I might sound short, but I’m not annoyed. I just need a minute to think.”
• Notice where tone mismatches occur most and decide which relationships can hold your unmasked communication safely.

If you notice yourself tone-policing someone else:
• Ask: “Am I reacting to what they said, or how they said it?”
• Reflect on whether discomfort is coming from unmet expectations of emotional performance.
• Use curiosity instead of correction: “I sense some urgency in your voice; is that right?”
• Remember that kindness doesn’t always sound gentle. Sometimes it sounds like honesty.

Building healthier communication habits

Healthy relationships at work or home depend on mutual understanding.

You can support more inclusive communication by:

At work
• Explicitly discuss communication styles during team meetings or workplace needs assessments.
• Encourage “meta-conversations” about tone: how people like to be spoken to, and what helps them listen best.
• Replace feedback like “your tone is off” with specific, behaviour-based examples: “When you spoke quickly, I felt rushed; can we slow down?”

In personal relationships
• Agree on signals for when tone feels tense, without shaming.
• Build recovery rituals: short pauses, check-ins, or humour to reset the emotional field.
• Offer reassurance after difficult exchanges: “I know that came out strong; I care about you.”

What leaders can learn

For HR and people leaders, this is a wake-up call. Tone policing can silence neurodivergent voices, especially those raising valid concerns.

True inclusion means:
• Valuing content over comfort.
• Recognising that emotional neutrality doesn’t mean disengagement.
• Training managers to listen for meaning, not mood.

Leaders who model curiosity over correction foster psychological safety and reduce misinterpretation.

What next

If tone policing is showing up in your team, a workplace needs assessment is a practical place to begin, helping you understand what is really being communicated and how to support it. Where the pattern runs across a whole team or department, our talks and workshops open the conversation for everyone at once. For neurodivergent professionals wanting one-to-one support building sustainable communication habits, coaching offers a space to do that work directly. And if you are a leader, manager, or coach carrying responsibility for others, navigating this, supervision offers a thinking space of its own. Get in touch to find out more.

To be unclear is to be unkind: neurodiversity and the trust trap

A closer look at why clarity, not softened language, is what actually builds trust in neurodivergent teams.

RSD and Boundaries: Why Saying No Can Feel Like Rejection

For anyone who recognises themselves in the being tone policed section above, this explores the emotional weight behind holding a boundary.

Colleague dynamics at work: the hidden impact on neurodiversity and what managers can do

Practical guidance for managers on the wider dynamics tone policing sits inside, and what to do differently.

Stay connected

An image of a document and a red target over the top symbolising project scope.

Your Project Neurodiversity

7 September 2026

Are you managing your unique operating system? Imagine your neurodivergent traits as a complex, dynamic project that requires careful planning, ongoing assessment and updated strategies. Just like any high-stakes project, managing your neurodivergence demands a systematic, thoughtful approach to Project Neurodiversity!

Your Project Neurodiversity scope:

In any project management framework, defining the scope is essential. When it comes to neurodivergence, your scope includes understanding your own unique traits, recognising your strengths, identifying potential challenges and setting clear boundaries.

What’s in scope? – Your personal experiences, specific needs and individual goals.

What’s out of scope? – Comparing yourself to others, meeting societal expectations and trying to fit into a one-size-fits-all approach.

By focusing on what truly matters to you, you can create a strategy that works for your neurodivergent mind.

Daily and long-term strategies

Life can be seen as a series of sprints, short, focused periods where you set goals, take action and review progress. A sprint could be a week, a month, or even a specific life phase and each one requires careful planning. To make the most of each sprint, you need clear objectives, a good use of resources and a way to measure success. Regular self-assessments help you stay on track, while identifying what works well allows you to build on your strengths. If something isn’t delivering results, you should be ready to adjust quickly. It’s also important to allow extra time for unexpected challenges so they don’t derail your progress. By approaching life with this structured but flexible mindset, you can stay focused and adaptable, making steady progress towards your goals.

Your Project Neurodiversity support ecosystem

Your support system is like the stakeholders in a project, people who have an interest in or influence over its success. In project management, stakeholders are individuals or groups affected by the outcome. In your neurodivergence journey, you are the primary stakeholder, but others, like family members, employers, healthcare providers and mentors also play a role. Clear communication with them is key. This means being open about your needs, asking for specific support or adjustments and helping others understand how your mind works. When you communicate clearly, you create an environment where you can thrive with the right support around you.

Your Project Neurodiversity Risk Management

Every project comes with risks, and managing neurodivergence is no different. The key to reducing stress and setbacks is identifying potential triggers before they become obstacles. This means recognising situations that might overwhelm you, such as sensory overload in busy environments, sudden changes in routine, or tight deadlines. Developing backup plans, such as carrying noise-cancelling headphones, using scheduling tools to plan ahead, or having a quiet space to reset can make a big difference. Creating strategies for handling high-stress moments, like practising mindfulness, setting clear boundaries, or using structured problem-solving techniques can make you feel less panicked. By preparing in advance and building resilience, you can navigate challenges more smoothly and stay in control, even when things don’t go as expected.

Continuous improvement

Continuous improvement is a key principle in project management and it can be just as valuable in managing neurodivergence. Regular self-reflection, such as tracking energy levels or reviewing past challenges helps you assess what’s working and what isn’t, allowing you to make small, steady adjustments to your strategies. Staying open to new tools and techniques, like using productivity apps, trying different time management methods, or exploring sensory-friendly workspaces can lead to better ways of managing challenges. Recognising and celebrating small wins, such as successfully advocating for your needs, or maintaining a new habit keeps motivation high. By continuously refining your approach, you can create a system that supports your needs and helps you thrive over time.

Investing in your success through Project Neurodiversity

Just like a budget, your personal resources, energy, attention, emotions, and money are limited. To use them wisely, focus on what makes the biggest difference, invest in tools that genuinely support you, protect your energy and choose the right support. It’s a good idea to track your journey. Keep a log can help you understand what works best for you, this could be a simple list in the notes of your phone. Document successful strategies, track challenges and how you overcome them, note environmental factors that affect your performance and create an evolving guide tailored to your needs. If you notice, this is about starting to become aware of what is affecting you and how you can manage and excel in your own life.

Now it’s time to measure success on your terms. Traditional success metrics may not apply, so it’s important to define your own. Your progress might be reflected in greater self-understanding, lower stress levels, improved communication, better performance at work or school and an overall higher quality of life.

The launch and ongoing iteration

Your neurodivergence isn’t a problem to be solved, but a project to be managed. It’s a dynamic, ongoing process of understanding, adapting, and thriving. Remember: You’re not just managing challenges; you’re optimising a complex, unique system designed for innovation, creativity, and extraordinary performance which is all wrapped up in YOU. Treat your neurodivergence like the sophisticated, multifaceted project it is. Be the project manager of your life, strategic, adaptable and focused on continuous, sustainable growth.

AuDHD: When autism and ADHD show up together

31 August 2026

TL;DR: When it comes to neurodivergence, co-occurrence is the rule, not the exception. One of the most common overlaps, autism and ADHD together, is so common it has earned its own name: AuDHD. But the label matters far less than the person in front of you. This post looks at what AuDHD can feel like, why a name can help and where it stops helping, and why meeting someone where they are will always beat sorting them into a box.

We have a habit of talking about neurodivergent conditions as if they arrive one at a time. ADHD in one box, autism in another, dyslexia in a third. Yet autism and ADHD very often travel together, so often that the overlap now has a name of its own. It makes for tidy explanations to keep them separate, but it is not how brains actually work.

When you look at the research, overlap is recognised as the rule rather than the exception. Most neurodivergent people carry traits from more than one area, and plenty have traits from several without ever meeting the formal threshold for any single one. Co-occurrence is not the unusual case. It is the normal one.

One of the most common overlaps is autism and ADHD together. It happens so often, and creates such a distinctive experience, that it has earned its own name: AuDHD.

Does a name make it special?

A name can be a real relief: it gives someone language for an experience that never quite fit the single labels they had been handed. It can open a conversation, and sometimes a door to support. For a lot of people, finding the word AuDHD is the first time the whole picture has made sense.

But the name is not what matters most: a label can describe a pattern, but it cannot tell you what any one person needs. Two people who both identify as AuDHD can have almost nothing in common in how it shows up from one day to the next. The word is the start of a conversation, not the end of one.

What AuDHD can feel like

An internal tug of war: what makes AuDHD so distinctive is that the two profiles can pull in opposite directions. ADHD often reaches for novelty, stimulation and spontaneity. Autism often reaches for routine, predictability and depth. Living with both can feel like having one foot on the accelerator and one on the brake. The part of you that craves a new project and the part that needs the comfort of the familiar are not always on speaking terms.

That internal negotiation is tiring, and it is largely invisible to the people around you. From the outside it can look like inconsistency. From the inside it is two genuine needs trying to share the same nervous system.

Meeting the individual where they are

This is where the stance matters more than the diagnosis: whether we are coaching someone or assessing their workplace needs, the job is not to work out which box to tick. It is to understand the difference in front of us and build around it.

That means asking what actually helps, rather than assuming. It means designing support for the specific push and pull this person lives with, not a generic ADHD strategy or autism strategy lifted off a shelf. The approach is the same one we take with any neurodivergent person, just with more threads to hold at once: notice the strengths, understand the friction, and shape the environment so the person can do their best work.

Why this sits across everything else we write

If you have read our posts on ADHD and movement, on coping strategies that actually stick, or on recognising and empowering neurodivergent traits, you will notice the same thread running through all of them. None of them are really about a label. They are about understanding how a particular brain works and meeting it where it is. AuDHD is simply that principle turned up a notch, because there is more than one pattern to honour at the same time.

The point is the person, not the acronym: it is tempting to treat a new name as a new category to be sorted into, and we would gently push back on that. AuDHD is a useful word because it points at something real and shared. It stops being useful the moment it becomes another box that flattens the individual inside it.

So use the language if it helps you make sense of your experience. Then put it down, and look at the actual person, with their particular strengths, their particular friction, and their own idea of what a good day looks like. That is where the real work happens, and it always has been.

Bringing this into your workplace

If someone in your team is navigating more than one neurodivergent profile, a workplace needs assessment gives both of you a clear, practical picture of what genuinely helps, and coaching builds the strategies around it. Get in touch if you would like to talk it through.

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A woman sitting at a desk with icons symbolising sensory overload flying around her.

Autistic work environment: what HR can change

17 August 2026

Walk into a typical modern office and notice what is happening to your senses. Fluorescent lights humming overhead. A printer cycling somewhere across the room. Two conversations overlapping near the kitchen. Air conditioning moving cold air across your shoulders. Someone’s perfume. Someone else’s lunch.

For most people, the background hum fades within a few minutes. The brain filters it out, prioritises what matters, and lets the rest go. For many autistic people, that filtering does not happen the same way. Every signal stays at full volume. The cognitive load of just being present is significant before any work has even started.

TL;DR: An autistic work environment is one designed with sensory load, predictability, communication, and recovery in mind. Most workplaces fall short on all four without realising it. The good news is that the changes that help autistic employees tend to help everyone. The cost is low. The performance and retention gains are not.

What an autistic work environment actually means

When people hear autistic work environment they sometimes picture a separate space or a special arrangement. That is not what is needed in most cases. An autistic work environment is one where four conditions that genuinely affect autistic performance are taken seriously across the whole workplace.

Those four conditions are sensory load, predictability, communication clarity, and recovery space. Each is shaped by physical setup, team culture, and management practice. Get all four right and most autistic employees will thrive. Get any of them badly wrong and even small workplace events will cost outsized amounts of energy.

Sensory load: the silent tax on autistic performance

The single most underestimated factor in an autistic work environment is sensory load. Lighting, sound, smell, temperature, and movement all carry a cost. For autistic employees, that cost compounds across the day.

What hurts: Open plan offices, hot desking, fluorescent strip lighting, hard floors that amplify sound, scented cleaning products, air conditioning that cannot be adjusted locally, and glass walls that turn every walk past into visual movement.

What helps: A consistent desk in a consistent location. Permission to use noise-reducing headphones without judgement. Soft lighting options. The ability to face away from high-traffic areas. Plants and soft furnishings that absorb sound. A clear option to step away when the environment becomes too much.

None of this is luxury. It is the difference between an autistic employee who can sustain a full week and one who is recovering all weekend.

Predictability: the autistic work environment needs structure

Autistic people often do best when they know what is happening, in what order, with whom, and for how long. Surprise is not a small inconvenience. It interrupts the cognitive scaffolding that holds the day together.

What hurts: Last-minute meeting changes, agenda-free meetings, unannounced drop-ins, calendar invites with no context, and projects where scope shifts without explanation.

What helps: Agendas circulated in advance. A consistent weekly rhythm. Calendar invites that include purpose, expected outcome, and length. Project documents that explain the why alongside the what. Notice ahead of changes wherever possible, even small ones.

A manager who consistently flags what is coming next, even when nothing dramatic is happening, becomes one of the most valuable adjustments an autistic employee has.

Communication clarity: written, specific, direct

Autistic communication tends to value precision. Many autistic employees process written information more easily than fast-paced verbal exchange. Implied meaning, indirect requests, and feedback wrapped in qualifications all carry a processing cost.

What hurts: Critical information delivered only verbally in a meeting. Open-ended requests with no deadline or success criteria. Feedback so carefully cushioned that the actual point gets lost. Long, unfocused meetings where the real decision happens in the corridor afterwards.

What helps: Written follow-up after important conversations. Requests stated clearly with what, by when, and what success looks like. Honest, direct feedback. A written summary of decisions and next actions at the end of every meeting. Cameras off as a default option, not an exception.

Direct communication is sometimes mistaken for harshness. Done with care, it is the opposite. It removes the cognitive cost of guessing and lets the person focus on doing the work well.

Recovery space: the piece most autistic work environments are missing

Even in a well-designed workplace, autistic employees need somewhere to decompress. Sensory regulation is metabolic work. Without recovery time, it accumulates as fatigue and eventually as burnout.

What hurts: No quiet spaces available. Lunch eaten at the desk in an open plan office. Back-to-back meetings with no gap. A cultural expectation that downtime equals slacking.

What helps: A genuinely quiet room, not a glass-walled fishbowl with a sign on the door. Permission to take walking breaks. Calendar buffers between meetings. Hybrid or remote options for the days when the office is too much. A culture that treats recovery as part of performance, not the absence of it.

What HR and managers can do this quarter

You do not need to redesign the building to make a meaningful difference. Most of these changes are small.

Audit one room: Walk through your office with autistic employees in mind. Note the lighting, the noise, the smells, the visual clutter. Pick two or three things you could change in the next month.

Update meeting culture: Set a team norm that all meetings have an agenda and a written summary. Make cameras optional on video calls. End meetings five minutes early to allow a buffer.

Build a quiet space: Even a single small room with soft lighting and a do not disturb norm changes the day for autistic employees.

Train managers in direct communication: Not blunt, not harsh. Direct, clear, and specific, with written follow-up.

Default to flexibility: Hybrid working, flexible hours, and protected quiet time all give autistic employees the recovery they need without requiring anyone to disclose anything.

Where to start with your autistic work environment

If you want to know which changes would make the most difference for your specific autistic employees, a Workplace Needs Assessment is the most efficient first step. It surfaces the environmental factors costing the most energy and produces recommendations the employee and manager can act on together.

For broader cultural awareness across your team, Talks and Workshops build the shared understanding that makes adjustments easier to land and stick.

The Microsoft experience

The Apple experience

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Why your reasonable adjustments process matters more than you think

A question worth sitting with

Work with us

The tank is built in the back room.

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When boundaries break down, look at the system

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Is ADHD Being Overdiagnosed?

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A Balanced Approach to ADHD Support

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Why this matters for neurodivergent women at work

The science in brief

How cycles interact with neurodivergent traits for neurodivergent women at work

What helps: practical steps for the individual

What helps: practical steps for managers and HR

The intersection of authenticity and professionalism

Where to start with support for neurodivergent women at work

Stay connected

Tone policing in Neurodivergent Communication: When authenticity Is mistaken for aggression

What tone policing looks like

Why does this happen: The linguistic layer

The emotional layer: When safety feels unsafe

Recognising what’s going on

Building healthier communication habits

What leaders can learn

What next

Stay connected

Your Project Neurodiversity scope:

What’s in scope? – Your personal experiences, specific needs and individual goals.

What’s out of scope? – Comparing yourself to others, meeting societal expectations and trying to fit into a one-size-fits-all approach.

Daily and long-term strategies

Your Project Neurodiversity support ecosystem

Your Project Neurodiversity Risk Management

Continuous improvement

Investing in your success through Project Neurodiversity

The launch and ongoing iteration

Does a name make it special?

What AuDHD can feel like

Meeting the individual where they are

Why this sits across everything else we write

Bringing this into your workplace

Related reading

Stay connected

What an autistic work environment actually means

Sensory load: the silent tax on autistic performance

Predictability: the autistic work environment needs structure

Communication clarity: written, specific, direct