Red Camera showing Zooming out on neurodiversity

Zooming out on neurodiversity

Have you ever attended a drawing class? I have, and as someone who is particularly bad at drawing, it surprised me. We visited the Eden Project, where an incredible local artist taught us to draw more effectively. It turns out that it has little to do with how well you hold a pencil and a lot to do with how often you stand back and look at your drawing from a distance. I created artwork that resembled the object I was attempting to draw. It was a huge surprise and impressed the little girl sitting next to me. This got me thinking about zooming out on neurodiversity!

When integrating neurodiversity into organisations, we are often tempted to make many small changes. These can be beneficial, but if we don’t take a step back and look at the big picture of what’s happening in the organisation, we risk a disjointed, ineffective approach.

This is especially true when discussing the subject of awareness. I facilitate a lot of neurodiversity awareness-training sessions, which are always well attended with very engaged interactive audiences. Still, there is a risk that if all you do is raise awareness, nothing changes, and you end up having a very informative meeting accompanied by lovely biscuits.

Professor Amanda Kirby highlights the dangers of oversimplification, stereotyping, tokenism, cause blindness, pinup people and becoming a broken record. Neurodiversity is not simple! Neurodiversity is very complicated because each individual will present their neurodivergent traits differently. There is a temptation to simplify neurodiversity to make it more accessible and understandable for everyone. Still, we must treat each person individually and provide a tailored solution to their struggles.

Raising awareness can create new stereotypes of how people behave. For example, I frequently get asked, “what should we be looking out for?” And “how will we know if someone has a neurodivergent trait?” I don’t think this is always helpful because it is more important to ask the individual what is beneficial for them and not put them into a box so we allow them to progress and then flourish.

Tokenism

(We all love a bandwagon and going along with the crowd). It was recently Neurodiversity Week, which is fantastic, but if all it does is make noise, it is ineffective; nothing changes for the people who need it the most, and our organisations suffer from not embracing and engaging with different thinking styles to help with innovation.

Cause blindness

People will become bored if we continue to bang the drum but make no progress. You must act, even if it is only a tiny action, or you risk nothing effective happening.

Poster people

It’s common to hear the same stories about the same people. Richard Branson is an excellent role model but is not the world’s only dyslexic entrepreneur. Love him or hate him, Elon Musk is not the only autistic entrepreneur; there are many brilliant people with neurodivergent traits who have done outstanding work. You need to think more broadly and not just roll out the same old pinups.

Broken records

Whether you like it or not, our world history has some challenging lessons for us to learn. Taking a person’s humanity and labelling them can dehumanise them. You must ensure that you focus on the individual and learn from mistakes in the past.

As we stand back and take a look at what it means to be inclusive within our organisations, I think it’s helpful to consider some of the following areas.

The issue we’re attempting to resolve by zooming out on neurodiversity

Instead of raising awareness and avoiding it, let’s get real and address it. Is it about recruiting, retaining employees, or something else? Let’s be clear about the problem and ensure our efforts are directed towards resolving it. Sometimes more data will be required, while other times, it will simply be a question of what should happen next.

Communicate with others

We frequently make assumptions about what is required. We must have an open and safe conversation about what and how change needs to occur. This conversation must be sensitive to specific cultural backgrounds or thinking styles, but it must happen.

Collaborate with others

It is beneficial to collaborate with other organisations that can assist you in moving forward with solving the problems you’ve identified. They may provide specialised knowledge or simply the ability to step outside the situation. This does not need to be a general label but a specific response to a problem you are attempting to solve.

Think carefully about your goals

SMART Goals aren’t the be-all and end-all, but they can help you figure out what you want to do and ensure it’s realistic and time-bound. This is critical because it allows you to assess your progress and determine whether your actions are effective or if something needs to be changed.

Taking action by zooming out on neurodiversity

This will not occur unless we take the first step forward. Moving forward may entail collaborating with an outside organisation to help you achieve your goals or forming an employee group. What matters is that you do not postpone this until tomorrow. Take the first step and figure out what you need to do next.

Measure what’s going on

You’ll never know if your changes have had any beneficial impact unless you measure their outcomes. Before you measure the outcome, it’s always helpful to take a baseline of where you are before you start otherwise, you will never know if anything you’ve done has made a difference. I would encourage you to consider ways to measure and understand the changes you have made easily.

Keep going by zooming out on neurodiversity

Moving inclusion forward, particularly in neurodiversity, requires a sustained effort. Many leaders will need to be involved in moving your efforts forward, and the organisation must buy into the entire process. If you want long-term change, you must ensure that you have the energy and drive to continue this effort for an extended period.

Would a conversation on zooming out be helpful? – Contact us here.

neurodiverse

Neurodivergent Traits at Work: How to Retain and Empower Your Team

Research from the British Dyslexia Association estimates that at least 15% of the working population has neurodivergent traits. That means in a team of twenty, at least three people are likely to be navigating the workplace through a different lens. Some will know it. Many will not. Most will have spent years developing strategies to manage in environments that were not designed with them in mind.

For managers and HR leaders, neurodivergent traits are not a problem to manage. They are a resource to understand. The organisations that get this right retain talented people, unlock genuine performance, and build cultures where more people can do their best work.

TL;DR: Neurodivergent traits are the characteristics associated with conditions like ADHD, dyslexia, autism, and dyspraxia. They include significant strengths as well as genuine challenges. This post explains what those traits look like in practice, how they affect performance, and what managers can do to support neurodivergent employees effectively.

What are neurodivergent traits?

Neurodivergent traits are the characteristics associated with neurological conditions including dyslexia, ADHD, autism, dyspraxia, and dyscalculia, as well as acquired conditions such as PTSD and migraines. Crucially, research by Professor Amanda Kirby shows that co-occurring traits are more common than single-condition profiles. Most neurodivergent individuals carry traits from several different conditions in combination, which means no two people present in the same way.

This matters for managers. If you have met one person with neurodivergent traits, you have met one person. Applying a single solution to a varied population will not work. What works is understanding the individual.

Neurodivergent traits that benefit your organisation

A strengths-based approach to neurodivergent traits is not just good for wellbeing. It is good for business. The traits that create challenges in some contexts are often the same traits that drive exceptional performance in others.

Creativity and lateral thinking: Many neurodivergent people think differently by default. They make connections that others miss and find solutions that a more linear thinker would not reach. In environments that value innovation, this is a competitive advantage.

Hyperfocus and depth: When interest and motivation align, many people with ADHD or autism can achieve extraordinary depth of focus. The challenge is creating conditions where that focus can be directed productively.

Pattern recognition: Many neurodivergent individuals are exceptional at identifying patterns in data, systems, or behaviour, skills that are highly valuable in analytical, technical, and strategic roles.

Emotional intelligence and empathy: Particularly common in autistic people, a heightened awareness of fairness, ethics, and the experiences of others can make neurodivergent employees exceptionally valuable in client-facing, coaching, and leadership roles.

Persistence and resilience: Having navigated systems that were not designed for them, many neurodivergent employees bring an ingrained resilience and a capacity to persist through difficulty that neurotypical colleagues may not have been required to develop.

Common challenges and what they mean in practice

Understanding neurodivergent strengths is only half the picture. The other half is understanding where the workplace creates unnecessary difficulty, and what can be done about it.

Memory and information processing: Many neurodivergent individuals have limited short-term memory capacity. Think of a bookshelf that holds three books instead of nine: when a new book arrives, an old one falls off. In environments where information is shared verbally, in long meetings, or without written follow-up, this creates a significant and entirely unnecessary disadvantage. Written agendas, follow-up notes, and the option to record meetings are low-cost adjustments that make a material difference. For more on how technology can support this, read Is Being Technology Agnostic Important? (https://theneurodivergentcoach.co.uk/neurodiversity-and-being-technology-agnostic/)

Organisation and process: Many neurodivergent employees find it hard to navigate organisational systems that rely on implicit knowledge. Knowing when to prep for a meeting, how to manage a shared calendar, and how to build buffers into a working day are skills that neurotypical employees may have absorbed unconsciously. Co-building processes with the individual, rather than assuming they will work out how, makes the difference between someone struggling and someone thriving.

Time management: Time blindness is common in ADHD and affects some autistic people too. It is not poor attitude or a lack of professionalism. It is a neurological difference in how time is perceived. Practical adjustments like alarms, visual timers, and clearly structured working days reduce the cognitive load significantly without requiring the individual to do something their brain is not wired to do. Read more about this in Time Mastery for Neurodivergent Executives (https://theneurodivergentcoach.co.uk/time-mastery-for-neurodivergent-executives/).

Masking and wellbeing: Many neurodivergent employees spend significant energy appearing neurotypical at work. This is known as masking, and its cumulative effect on mental health and performance is substantial. An employee who masks heavily may appear to be coping well while working twice as hard as their colleagues just to keep pace. When change happens, that person has no reserves left to adapt. Understanding masking is one of the most important things a manager can do. Loneliness and Masking:

What HR Leaders Need to Know (https://theneurodivergentcoach.co.uk/masking-loneliness-and-neurodiversity-at-work-what-hr-leaders-need-to-know/) goes deeper on this.

What good support looks like

Support for neurodivergent employees is not about sticking plasters. It is about building an environment where people do not need them.

That starts with awareness, but awareness alone is not enough. Training needs to be supported by practical processes, accessible to everyone, and embedded in day-to-day management rather than buried in a policy document.

Good support means employees know where to go for help, what to expect when they ask, and that asking will not be held against them. It means reasonable adjustments are straightforward to request and reliably followed through. For guidance on what reasonable adjustment actually means, read Reasonable Adjustments: So What Is Reasonable? (https://theneurodivergentcoach.co.uk/reasonable-adjustments-so-what-is-reasonable/)

For many organisations, a Workplace Needs Assessment is the most effective starting point. It gives the individual and their manager a shared, structured understanding of what is needed and why. Read more about the manager’s role in a Workplace Needs Assessment (https://theneurodivergentcoach.co.uk/manager-role-in-workplace-needs-assessment/).

The organisations that do this well do not just retain neurodivergent employees. They create the conditions where those employees can contribute at their highest level. The costs of not doing it are real: attrition of talented people, legal risk under the Equality Act 2010, and the loss of the competitive advantage that genuine cognitive diversity brings.

If you would like to explore how to build better support for neurodivergent employees in your organisation, get in touch (https://theneurodivergentcoach.co.uk/contact/).

Related reading

Reasonable Adjustments: So What Is Reasonable? – Find out more here

The practical follow-up to this post. What reasonable adjustment actually means, what it does not mean, and how managers can act on it confidently.

Loneliness and Masking: What HR Leaders Need to Know – Find out more here

Understanding masking is an essential context for any manager supporting neurodivergent employees. This post explains what it is and why it matters.

Manager Role in Workplace Needs Assessment – Find out more here

If this post has raised questions about how to support a specific employee, a Workplace Needs Assessment is the structured next step.

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

Neurodiversity through the lens of intersectionality: lost opportunities and goldfish

A considerable number of people are still arriving in adulthood without any diagnosis or understanding of their neurodivergent traits (ASC, DCD, dyslexia, dysgraphia or other neurodivergent conditions).

There is often an assumption that people know what they need and know how to access it. The reality is not everyone has access to the support and insight that is needed to help them identify their neurodivergent traits.

Read the full article here.

Broom and dustpan in Cupboard

Project neurodiversity sorting out the broom cupboard

John Chambers, former CEO of Cisco Systems says “25% of CEOs are dyslexic, but many don’t want to talk about it”. There is an argument that if leaders self-identify as neurodivergent the rest of the workforce will feel more comfortable coming forward and having a conversation about neurodiversity.

Organisations can thrive instead of survive if they embrace neurodiversity. The current situation looks like there is a lot of noise, good ideas and goodwill in helping individuals become more effective in the workplace. The reality is that many of these initiatives are disjointed, not bespoke, and fragmented, so organisations are running many different special projects at the same time. This creates a substantial operational overhead that can detrimentally impact the organisation’s effectiveness.

This is a big problem that is not going to go away unless we start to think more holistically and in a project-orientated way across our organisations to help support neurodiversity. We have to think about the constraints we have to operate in. What is the scope of what we are trying to do? How long is it going to take? Do we have the resources to deliver it? And most importantly, how will we know what success looks like?

The project management approach is just as relevant to individuals. In my experience, many individuals have had a very fragmented and disjointed approach to support. To help them manage more effectively I would argue we need to treat neurodivergent support far more like a project.

Project Mindset

It is often easy to get baffled and confused by the potential solutions and lose sight of the problem we are trying to solve. Are we taking a project mindset to neurodiversity in the workplace? Are we focusing on what the problem is?

As an example, John needed support with task management. His company provided him with a robust task management app. The app allowed him to connect tasks across applications and distribute them throughout the organisation. John required a simple solution to help him understand what he needed to do and the priority that should be assigned to each task. As a result of the solution, John became obsessed with making sure he was fully utilising the app rather than focusing on solving the problem. He became stressed, anxious, and guilty about not using the app completely, which distracted him from the problem at hand, which was effectively prioritising his workload.

John’s situation is true for many individuals, as often incorrect solutions are provided that often create additional problems instead of solving the original issue.

Adjustments and support fall into two models which are, The Medical Model, which is about fixing the individual and The Social Model which looks at the social/organisational factors that disable the individual from working effectively.

Often the easy answer is to try and fix the individual by providing an off-the-shelf solution, but there needs to be experimentation, open dialogue and possible coaching.  Then a solid process can be written down and used going forward.  This needs to be led by the individual with support from the organisation. When we look at this in a project way, it means taking a step back and thinking about the impacts of what’s going on within the organisation.

The broom cupboard

Another example: I worked with Toni, who had recently been diagnosed with ADHD and was dealing with work overload and unhelpful organisational behaviours. Toni enjoyed teaching and was successful in the classroom, but her administrative abilities let her down. Furthermore, there was bureaucracy within the organisation, which meant that basic administrative tasks were assigned to senior staff.

We began with small wins to gain momentum, such as examining how Toni could better complete her administration. We set up a distraction-free environment in a broom cupboard for her to complete her administrative tasks. Toni’s mood improved dramatically as a result of a simple change that was inexpensive and quick to implement. Then we altered the way classes were assigned, allowing Toni to have breaks and time for administration between teaching. This was a more difficult organisational issue that required leadership support. The changes were made one at a time and were evaluated based on their impact and usefulness to the individual and the organisation.

In this particular case, it was helpful to get quick wins before working on more challenging adjustments. This allowed Toni to build trust and gain confidence in what was being implemented to make sure the solutions met her needs.

Action is key on Project Neurodiversity

“Often movement is the most important thing.”

Claire Pedrick

We are often afraid to begin, but to determine what is useful, it is critical to ask the individual and the teams involved what the problem is and how we can begin to solve it together.

Toni was overwhelmed in the previous example because she couldn’t see a way to begin solving the problem. What worked was solving one problem, reviewing the solution to ensure that it resolved the issue in the short and long term, and then moving on to the next. Action will frequently involve challenging the status quo, but I would argue that well-thought-out systematic changes will often benefit not only the individual but also the larger organisation.

Creating workplace adjustments should be viewed as a project that should be implemented, but be prepared to roll it back if it doesn’t work. The process should be structured, and documented and any changes made need to be communicated, recorded and approved by all stakeholders who use the process.

I hope the information above has helped you think about neurodiversity and how to use the concept of a project to make changes more effectively. I’d love to hear more about your experiences in making your work environment become more neuroinclusive.

Bucket full to capacity

What is capacity, and why is it important?

Capacity can be a scary word and one that employers, supervisors and managers can find concerning. It can be helpful to think about this area through the frame of “assume individuals are together enough to deal with their own stuff until they’re not” (Credit Claire Pendrick).

That means dealing with the individual where they are right now and asking them what you need to do to make the space safe enough for them to do their work. Experience shows that asking that question helps most individuals feel safe enough to move forward. The fact that the question has been asked is all that’s needed to make it safe enough. If there is no response or the individual completely avoids the question, this can sometimes indicate that they are not in a position to have the conversation.

Capacity can be complicated, especially when we start talking about the medical definitions of someone having the capacity to make a decision. In a coaching conversation, two people are having a conversation about one person where that person is getting insights into their stuff so they can make leaps forward or understand things better.

Sometimes the coach plays a role in capacity. What I mean by this is, have they created a safe enough space for this person to do the work they need to do? If they haven’t, they may have reduced the thinker’s capacity, and as a result, the thinker can’t do the work. This reflects on the space the coach has created, which may mean they’re just not the right coach for the thinker; often, there is no way to know this. 

So an excellent way to keep the space safe is to have a single coaching session so the thinker and the coach can work this out. Then the thinker can decide if the coaching is working for them.

If you’re trying to work out what to do and are concerned about capacity, it’s well worth considering a coaching single-session to find out what would be worth doing next. 

What to know more? Please get in touch.

broken arrows

Broken Trust at Work: How to Rebuild Team Relationships

When the USA has an accident with a nuclear weapon, they call it a broken arrow. Broken trust in the workplace follows a similar pattern. Something goes wrong, quietly, often incrementally, and by the time anyone names it, the damage is already hard to undo.

This happens in every organisation. However, when a neurodivergent employee is involved, broken trust can arrive faster, run deeper, and be harder to spot until it is too late. This post is for managers who sense something is off and want to understand what happened and what to do next.

TL;DR: Trust follows a formula: credibility, reliability, and intimacy, divided by self-orientation. When any one of those breaks down, the working relationship suffers. For neurodivergent employees, there are specific and often unrecognised ways this happens. This post explains what to watch for and how managers can start to rebuild.

Broken trust at work: why neurodivergent employees are at higher risk

Trust does not usually collapse in one dramatic moment. Instead, it erodes.

A manager who promised reasonable adjustments and never followed through. A performance conversation that missed how executive function difficulties affect consistency. Public feedback that landed far harder than the manager intended.

Neurodivergent employees often carry extra weight into these situations. Employers, schools, and systems have let many of them down before. By the time they are sitting across from you, some have already developed a finely tuned radar for when trust is about to break. And many are masking so effectively that you would never know.

As a result, what looks like disengagement, withdrawal, or inconsistent performance may actually be a broken arrow: a signal that trust has already broken down and that nobody has yet started the conversation.

The trust equation

A useful framework here is the trust equation:

Trust = (Credibility + Reliability + Intimacy) / Self-orientation

It sounds clinical, but it maps directly onto the moments that matter.

Credibility: Do you do what you say you will do? For example, if you commit to a reasonable adjustment and it does not happen, credibility takes a hit. This is especially damaging for neurodivergent employees who may already be uncertain about whether the organisation is genuinely on their side.

Reliability: Are you consistent? Changing how you communicate, altering expectations without warning, or giving feedback in formats that do not work for the individual all chip away at reliability. For someone with ADHD, dyslexia, or autism, inconsistency is not just frustrating. It can be genuinely destabilising.

Intimacy: This is about psychological safety. Does the person feel safe enough to be honest about what is and is not working? For many neurodivergent employees, intimacy is the hardest part of the equation. Masking (the effort of appearing neurotypical at work) actively prevents it. However, if someone cannot take off their mask with their manager, real trust is not possible.

Self-orientation: This is the divisor, so it carries the greatest power to undermine everything else. If an employee believes their manager is more interested in team metrics and optics than in their actual well-being, trust collapses. It does not matter how credible or reliable the manager appears to be.

Triggers managers might not recognise

Most broken arrows in neurodivergent workplaces are unintentional. Here are the situations that most often cause them.

Reasonable adjustments were agreed upon but never implemented. The gap between what a manager promised and what happened is one of the fastest ways to break trust. If adjustments have stalled, that gap needs to be addressed directly.

Performance processes that ignore neurodivergent traits. Measuring someone against standards that nobody designed with neurodivergent employees in mind will always create friction. Consistency, punctuality, response times, and communication style all look different through a neurodivergent lens.

Inconsistent communication. Changing format, channel, or tone without warning is disorienting. For practical guidance on communicating inclusively, Neuroinclusive Meetings: What an Excellent Recipe Looks Like is a good starting point.

Public criticism that lands badly. Often unintentional, but particularly damaging for employees with rejection sensitivity dysphoria. What a manager intends as a light-touch observation can register as a serious personal failure.

Disclosure handled badly. Once an employee shares their diagnosis, the way managers receive it shapes the entire relationship going forward. If the employee senses their disclosure has changed how they are perceived, even subtly, trust can break quickly and quietly.

How to start the conversation

Rebuilding broken trust starts with a conversation. Not a formal review, not a performance discussion. A genuine human conversation about the relationship and what has gone wrong.

That conversation needs three things.

Acknowledgement. Something has gone wrong. Name it, without defensiveness and without minimising it. This does not require blame. It requires honesty.

Curiosity. Ask what the person needs, not what you think they need. Neurodivergent employees often have a clear sense of what would help if they feel safe enough to say it. The question is never really the question. It is the space you create for an honest answer.

Commitment. Agree on something small and specific that you will do differently, and then do it. You rebuild trust through small, kept promises. Not grand gestures.

The hardest part is usually starting. The longer the broken trust goes unaddressed, the harder it becomes to approach. If you are not sure how to open the conversation, a Workplace Needs Assessment can provide a structured, supported way in.

Practical steps for managers

Audit your adjustments. Make a list of everything you agreed to do and check whether it happened. If not, either follow through or revisit the agreement honestly with the employee.

Check your communication. Is the way you communicate working for this person? Do not assume. Ask directly, and be prepared to change.

Read the signals. Withdrawal, inconsistency, and over-performance are all signs that something is off.

Be patient. Trust that has broken down over months does not rebuild in a single conversation. It requires consistent effort over time.

Think about the environment, not just the relationship. Sometimes broken trust is a symptom of a workplace that never had the right foundations for neurodivergent employees.

When to bring in support

Sometimes broken trust is too embedded for a manager to fix alone. The relationship has drifted too far, or organisational systems are getting in the way of progress.

In those situations, a Workplace Needs Assessment can provide an independent, structured look at what is and is not working. It gives both the manager and the employee a shared starting point for rebuilding, without either party having to carry the weight of the conversation alone.

If you would like to explore how we can support your team, get in touch.

Related reading

Loneliness and Masking: What HR Leaders Need to Know

Many broken arrows start with masking. This post explains why trust problems often stay invisible, and what that means for managers who want to get ahead of them.

Reasonable Adjustments: So What Is Reasonable?

If unmet adjustments are at the root of the broken trust, this is the place to start. Clear guidance on what reasonable actually means in practice.

Manager Role in Workplace Needs Assessment

When the conversation feels too hard to start alone, a Workplace Needs Assessment gives both manager and employee a structured, supported way in.

Stay connected

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

 

reasonable adjustments

Six reasonable adjustment examples

Have you ever wondered what a reasonable adjustment is?

Here are six recent examples from The Neurodivergent Coach’s work. To protect identities, names have been changed.

1. Dealing with overwhelm – reasonable adjustment

Alex was utterly overwhelmed. His main complaint was that he was overwhelmed daily, with too much to do and no idea where to start.

Working with Alex revealed that he required regular breaks in his routine to reset, as he learned to manage his energy levels and begin to approach tasks confidently. This developed into how he managed his calendar, scheduling extra time at the end of meetings to recharge and making this time non-negotiable. This allowed him to fully reset and be his best, most present self, especially when feeling overwhelmed.

2. Fogettory – reasonable adjustment

The most common trait I hear when assessing neurodivergent individuals is their struggle with short-term memory.

I recently worked with Paula, who had an influential job at a UK university. Her role involved interacting with different people and producing detailed reports on academic papers. Paula explained that she often forgot what was on one screen when she flicked to another. Paula had been working on her laptop for extended periods and found it frustrating and exhausting to remember what was on the previous screen. For Paula, the solution was to increase the number of available screens. She started with one extra screen and then rapidly grew to two, meaning she could lay out all the information she was working on simultaneously without printing it. She could highlight and reword areas without fear of losing where she was.

Screen real estate matters!

3. Meetings, meetings, meetings

John described how he spent most of his time in meetings and often came away stressed, frustrated and unable to see how he had contributed well to the meeting.

Working with John, it became clear that it was not John’s issue. The problem was in the structure of the meetings in which he was being asked to participate.

Often these meetings were ad hoc without a clear agenda, and from John’s perspective, he didn’t understand why he was there. Working with John and his line manager, we created a new process where the organisation implemented structured meetings that included an agenda and a clear indication of what was expected of everyone who attended.

This helped John feel confident about why he was there and what he would be expected to do. Interestingly, fewer meetings took place as an additional benefit, and fewer people were involved because the meeting organisers were forced to take a long hard look at who needed to be there and why.

This example highlights why neuroinclusive workplaces are better for everyone.

4. No place like home

Alice hated doing detailed work in the office as too many distractions took her away from the task she had to do. This ultimately meant she was not present when she needed to do her work. This was compounded by the expectation that she should be sociable in the office.

Working with Alice quickly revealed that she required a dedicated space to complete her work when she needed to concentrate. She also needed to know what was expected of her when she went into the office so that she could prepare to interact with colleagues and participate more actively. This looked like agreeing to three days working at home and two days in the office with the flexibility to change based on business requirements.

We discussed this with her manager to find out what the expectations were when she was in the office, as there were a lot of unwritten rules about the company culture. It was agreed that Alice would arrange to catch up with two colleagues when she came into the office. These meetings could be set up in advance with a clear outline of what they would discuss. In Alice’s case, it gave her a natural springboard to be her best at work.

Rules of engagement are essential!

5. Open plan is sometimes like having no walls on your toilet

Adrian worked in an open plan office as part of a large county council. His work was quite often sensitive, and Adrian often used dictation as part of his work. He also experienced distractions from people moving around and from conversations in the office. Adrian described being in an open-plan office as, “going to the toilet and there being no walls”. He felt unable to be his most effective work.

The adjustments for Adrian included working part of his week at home, and when he was in the office, there would be a space available where he could work quietly — enabling Adrian to do his best work.

Open-plan offices have their place, but if you’re easily distracted or need to undertake sensitive work and use tools like Dragon Dictate, they can be an incredibly noisy and unpleasant place to work for neurodivergent individuals.

6. Changing the communication channel – reasonable adjustment

Sarah worked in a busy publishing house where she was in charge of a large team. Because of the high turnover of staff and the complexity and types of projects she had to interact with her large team regularly, helping them understand what to do next.

Often a request would come in over Messenger, which would end up as a lengthy conversation where the other party still didn’t understand what to do. Sarah recognised that many of these conversations would be better over video or face-to-face. However, the organisation’s culture didn’t seem to make this accessible. Sarah’s adjustment was to clarify what questions needed a video or face-to-face conversation.  Then to give herself and her team permission to communicate clearly that they needed to have a physical meeting instead of chatting over Messenger. They could switch back to another channel if a conversation wasn’t necessary.

Changing channels with permission was crucial to ensuring they understood their tasks and improved communication.

These are some of the recent reasonable adjustments I’ve seen through my work. I’ve not mentioned specific conditions because cooccurrence is the rule rather than the exception, meaning that someone with ADHD has a high probability of having autistic or dyslexic traits. It doesn’t matter what your diagnosis is, because each individual is different, and everyone will need a different adjustment depending on their strengths and difficulties. This can only be achieved through conversation, trust and willingness to learn and grow from the individual and the organisation.

If you want to know more about how to support your people in your workplace, drop me a line.

If you are wondering were to start, a good place can be a Workplace Needs Assessment.

Find out more here.

Set of red lips

Processes matter

I worked with a teacher recently, and they described how they made their class accountable for setting homework. They did this by taking advantage of the school merit system, awarding five points to the young person who reminded them to set the homework. What a great processes!

Was this bribery or a great process created in partnership?

Much of my work around neurodiversity is about helping individuals build processes that enable them to amplify their strengths and manage the things they find difficult. It’s rather like taking your car for a service. Yes, your car runs fine, but could it run better…probably?

Well, that’s very much like human beings and the processes we use to do everyday life.

It could be how:

  • You manage your workload
  • Relationships with colleagues
  • Relationships with customers
  • Project delivery
  • Or just how you manage to get to work.

All these things are processes, and as we learn how to do them well, we must write them down or record them to reflect on what’s working and what’s not.

Could you write the process down?

Once we’ve written it down, it allows us to evaluate what’s working when our metaphorical wheels come off the rails.

Once we have a process recorded, we can evaluate how well it works and manage how we can improve it.

Sounds a bit like a project?

I’d argue that this is a project that helps us and our team’s function more effectively. But we can only do this successfully if we understand where we’re starting, and to understand where we’re starting, we need to record our starting point.

As with all good projects, scope creep* can make them undeliverable. For individuals, that’s about adding too many tasks and creating too much complexity in their processes. The same is true for teams who create overly complex ways of interacting and communicating with each other.

Add change control to processes

Consider a change control process to help manage this situation to stop you and your team from becoming overwhelmed. This is as simple as not introducing new tasks until you have tested the existing ones, ensuring they have a benefit. Testing is particularly relevant to technology and applications.

We live in a world where many things can potentially solve our problems. Still, in doing so, they often add additional complexity that can negatively impact us in ways that far outweigh the original problem. It’s vital that we consider this before implementing new working methods into our processes.

K.I.S.S.

In my first CDT (Craft Design and Technology) lesson at school, a rather large man with a beard stood up and said K.I.S.S., to which we all looked utterly perplexed.

He then explained that K.I.S.S. means Keep It Simple Stupid (not sure he could get away with this saying in a school these days), but ‘it’s particularly relevant when relooking at our processes. We must keep things simple and replicable so they will ultimately be helpful for us, including taking processes away that are no longer useful in the drive for simplicity.

P.P.P. = P.P.P. – the secret source to making processes work

Piss Poor Planning equals Piss Poor Performance. We need to plan what ‘we’re doing and build usable, simple and robust processes.

If ‘you’d like to know more about building processes for yourself or your team, ‘I’d love to work with you.

Contact me here.

*Scope creep in project management refers to changes, continuous or uncontrolled growth in a project’s scope at any point after the project begins.

Scales weighing up the reasonable adjustments with one side lower than the other.

Reasonable adjustments, so what is reasonable ?

Reasonable adjustments are subjective and the term is often overused; well, I think it is!

Let me give you an example. I recently worked with someone who thought it reasonable that her employer makes sure she feels in a good mood when she goes home. Now on the surface, that might sound reasonable, but let’s think about it. What is entailed in making sure someone is in a good mood has many variables. This could include interactions within the workplace, conversations and even things that that individual has brought into the workplace. Suddenly that doesn’t sound like a reasonable adjustment; it sounds like a dream!

The equality act gives us some guidance on what reasonable is, but even this isn’t enough as we try and work out what is helpful in the workplace. So here are some of my thoughts on how we can get to reasonable:

It needs to be effective in removing a barrier!

So will the reasonable adjustments remove the barrier, and will it do it for the long-term? In being effective, there is another question, will it work with the rest of the organisation? This is a wise argument as it might be effective for the individual but not for the employer.

Real-world example, I worked with a teacher struggling to keep their equipment together. She worked across ten different classrooms, and because of her short-term memory, her equipment was never in the right place. Several reasonable adjustments were considered, including an electronic calendar and some creative processes to ensure her equipment was moved to the right place at the right time. Along with several other exciting and innovative options on the surface which all seemed great, but they were on the complicated side. Would you agree?

Ultimately, the changes involved giving that teacher a fixed classroom so that her equipment didn’t need to move.

It turned out to be a brilliant adjustment because it was simple and solved the problem. This problem could have been solved in far more complicated way that would have ultimately broken down and put more significant strain on everyone.

Don’t let the solution become part of the problem with reasonable adjustments!

It’s got to be practical!

Being practical matters. If it’s not, we all end up in a big mess.

Being practical means it needs to be practical to implement and practical to use both for the individual and the organisation. Perspective is critical because what is practical for the individual may not be practical for the organisation. In the same way, what is practical for the organisation may not be practical for the individual.

I hope your head is not spinning with the word practical now!

So to work out what this means, we must have conversations and not throw lists of stuff over fences metaphorically because reasonable adjustments are about including people, not putting additional barriers up.

Real-world example:

I worked with an individual with anxiety issues around understanding what they needed to do and when. The organisation conducted an assessment that suggested several interventions, including using whiteboards, apps and other to-do list-style reminders. Giving credit to the individual and the organisation, they’d worked through several different solutions and finally came to the one they felt best: the to-do list app. The app itself worked fine. Things got tricky when multiple managers used the same account to set tasks, and the individual was confused about who she was accountable to and for what.

This is an excellent example of something that started off incredibly practical, but became impractical because the process around it got confusing. In this situation, there was a simple remedy of using initials for each manager. This illustrates that we have to keep reviewing what’s going on; otherwise, we will likely make adjustments to the problem.

Though I say, the remedy was simple, getting the individual managers involved to buy into it and implement it is still an ongoing process.

Never forget the people element of change.

How much are these reasonable adjustments going to cost?

Cost is significant, especially in our current economic climate. Many adjustments are not expensive, particularly for neurodivergent individuals. Often they are about process changes that positively impact individuals across the organisation. There are also grants and schemes available to support equipment purchases, potential coaching, and other ongoing support.

I think it’s helpful to approach adjustments like a project, considering their merits and impact on the individual and the business.

We often don’t know how an adjustment will work until it’s tested.

When it’s tested, it’s essential to understand what needs to be modified and the fitness of the adjustment to perform the task. There can sometimes be a train of thought from the individual that suggests this is being paid for me, so I have to use it regardless of if it adds benefit. This isn’t helpful and can sometimes result in individuals creating additional obstacles for themselves to use something unsuitable.

Real-world example:

I worked with someone recently who was given dictation software as part of a reasonable adjustment. On spending time with them, it became apparent that they were a touch typists who was very comfortable with writing at speed and accuracy, but they felt obliged to the organisation to use the software that ultimately slowed them down and didn’t allow them to operate at their best.

We need to talk to people, not just provide vanilla solutions, because we think we understand them.

In the long term, it’s essential to keep adjustments as simple as possible and actively remove the ones that no longer serve a purpose.

All adjustments need to have a review-by date built in.

Do they still work, or does something need to be done differently? Otherwise, we risk assuming that we did something once and that it will last for a lifetime.

I was thinking about my car. Would I seriously take my vehicle for one service in its lifetime and have one MOT and never have another?

Once we’ve looked at this, there is an implication that if we conclude something is reasonable, there is a legal obligation to do it. Don’t forget to make sure solving the problem is a reasonable adjustment.

Note: The Equality Acts linchpin is that once an adjustment has been deemed reasonable, it is unlawful not to implement it. That’s why it’s essential to consider what is reasonable as part of the implementation, then build reviews and document conversations that will allow you to respond to the individual’s needs and business requirements.

It’s about trust and an ongoing conversation about what works and what doesn’t.

No one needs adjustments that don’t work for them or the business, so ensure you keep this alive and real.

If you need help navigating this, don’t hesitate to contact me at The Neurodivergent Coach.

The loaded 'thank you'

The loaded ‘thank you’

As I went for my run this lunchtime, I put on my gear, got ready to go, and went out the door. The initial part was hard my legs were stiff and really hurt. As I ran along my normal route I approached a couple walking in the other direction, I nodded, and then I heard it, the loaded “thank you”! It shook me a little because I thought had done enough to acknowledge that they had moved out the way, but clearly I hadn’t. This sat with me for the rest of the run –  the loaded ‘thank you’ or rather the thank you that says F U.

So why is The loaded ‘thank you’ important? 

When we communicate we make huge amounts of assumptions about what other people are doing and where they are in space and time. Working with individuals who have neurodivergent traits often means that their view of the world is slightly different. That doesn’t mean that you feel any less, or that you care any less, but it does sometimes mean that you communicate differently. This situation often means that there are misunderstandings that can lead to a huge amount of anxiety and stress.

The problem with this is?

If it isn’t addressed and we are not educated in how to create space to understand other people, we can make poor choices about how we communicate with them. This can lead to teams that don’t work functionally, office places that become toxic and hostile and ultimately individuals that could add huge value to organisations not staying.

The implication of this is?

Quite simply organisations will not be as effective or as inclusive as we would like them to be and as a result, we will spend money, time and effort trying to recruit people that ultimately will not stay. This has implications for how well organisations run as well as what other people think of them and how well they engage with them in what is becoming an increasingly challenging marketplace to obtain and retain talent.

The need is quite simple, we must think about how we communicate and the assumptions we make about the people we are communicating with. 

The people I ran past had no idea what was going on in my head. For all they know I could have lost someone dear to me or I could be experiencing extreme trauma. They made me feel that my nod wasn’t good enough and in a small way that matters!

So what do you think about the loaded ‘thank you’?

When have you felt like giving a loaded ‘thank you’ to someone?