Neurodivergence in the Workplace and Leaders: Engineers, Clinicians, Musicians and Billionaires
What is neurodivergence and why does it matter?
People are different and so are the brains they tote around with them. Let’s get a definition of a normal brain or what we will call “neurotypical.” This means your brain performs in ways that are usual or expected. Neurodivergence means in a large bucket way “your brain is differently abled.”
Mine is. Let’s break it down.
Did you know these people were neurodivergent?
Neurodivergence is a non-medical term for us folks with non-typical brains. Australian sociologist Judy Singer, coined this term to signal a recognition of a new disability and social movement. Judy had a mama who was mildly autistic and a daughter with Asperger's. She noticed issues with how her mom interpreted the world and in kind, the world to her mother.
As a thought leader, she had to battle with everyone jumping on the “Autism is Trendy” bus, which is dangerous, misleading and worse, not responsive to the needs of our diverse atypical brain population.
Judy wants you to know the term neurodivergence is about a spectrum of brain issues, not profound autism, which is also particularly important. I have a first cousin (let’s call him Bart for privacy) with profound autism, who is nonverbal and cannot care for himself. Miss Judy would like you to know that this is not neurodivergence.
Anything touching him can kickstart a severe reaction, and clothes can very much bother him. Bart will remove his clothing at family dinners while the turkey is being carved.
Profound autism caretaking needs are nonstop, 24/7 care with detailed systems to keep them whole. This is not what we are discussing here.
Temple Grandin IS an example of neurodivergence.
Temple is groundbreaking for her work and insights into cattle. She's also autistic and has published pieces about how her brain works. She sees in the form of pictures. Atypical brains can produce results others cannot see.
Judy coined the term “Neurodivergent” for those of us who may have brains that run atypical and include ADD, ADHD, PTSD, DOWNS, social anxiety, Tourette’s and the list goes on. Their social behavior can also be atypical, like ignoring normal social cues such as being polite or having an overly harsh voice, but it means zero emotionally.
Guess what? These issues reside in the brains of leaders. A neurodivergent brain is the center of all massive things getting done today. An atypical brain is an engineer, CEO, mom, doctor, teacher and even scientist.
Ever worked inside a healthcare startup? Plenty of brain power, plenty of struggle with communication, planning, budgets and human resources as atypical brains are drawn to this environment.
What if the CIO is neurodivergent and speaks in the form of pictures? She is tasked with writing the protocol for product workflow. Brilliance stops as the brain freezes.
The visual that the CIO sees in her head is that “the product is a purse with a hole in it.” The picture/image gets presented repeatedly to the neurodivergent CIO in her HEAD, she can visually see a hole. She’s right, she has found a problem with the product, the workflow won’t work as it was written and she can see that immediately. Can she write a document about the product and get to the Take Home Point (what matters to the team) in this century? Nope.
The CIO misses her deadline, and the startup CEO is mad and won’t hand her any more projects.
Cue leader whining here.
Did she tell you your IT product’s butt looks big in those jeans? Yes, and you can’t place a value on that insight a typical brain won’t find as soon or as succinctly. Most of you just develop the product incorrectly, find the hole later or never. Limp along as we do!
This is a snapshot of the C Suite of a Healthcare IT startup.
Challenge: What does a Monday morning meeting look like with these brainiacs going after product development and forecasting where the market will be in three months? These are atypical brains with a typical brain: Marie is dealing with a divorce, someone else is a caretaker for an aging parent, Quan’s nanny is sick and Joe’s WIFI is down.
And y’all wrote “world domination” as your current goal. Uh-huh.
No one knows WTF Joe is talking about, and the music on the call has a 3-count beat for all of us OCD’ers, causing Marie to twitch because she started to count.
These people are brilliant; how are we doing on execution or even basic understanding of what is up in this meeting?
This beautiful bucket of brain issues is behind giant and small decisions worldwide. Check out this in-depth article about atypical brains from the Cleveland Clinic.
I have flooded three separate kitchens and burned 102,022 meals since 2001.
I can’t find my phone, glasses or car keys on the reg. Sound matters to me.
I don’t have “in-between background noise.” Music, for better or worse, can kill or save me. Same with texture.
I may be a giant weirdo at work and in life; so are my colleagues.
What are we doing to address how lovely and weird we are; are we getting any ROI out of atypical brains besides breakthroughs without execution, weariness and a market bolt to AI?
It’s imperative to harness brains that view things differently when we are all drowning in our markets and current systems because we can’t change. And more of the same thinking.
We must get better at wringing out all our brains for the good stuff; we have problems everywhere.
The boxes of ideals society created will simply not work anymore.
Even in a labor and “an idea short” market. We must harness these talents, cultivate environments for these brains and start creating.
This brilliant article was written in 2017 and talks about how leading companies such as SAP and Microsoft are taking charge of neurodivergence inclusion. However, this article is several years old now and not a lot is available about whether it's working. Pandemic et al.
Labor is upended and is going to stay this way. We have huge problems coming for us. Energy, healthcare, housing and education are biggies. Neurodivergent brains don’t see things the way others do. This is exciting as this is our future and about 15-20% of the population has atypical brains.
These folks are leading now, Elon Musk is in your cabinet, and more will be invited into the mix just based on the prevalence of atypical leaders and thinkers.
There are all sorts of quirks when collaborating with neurodivergent leaders and people. And all kinds of crazy ass combos like ADHD with autism. This is messy, y'all!
Insights of a Neurodivergent Clinician
Thank God for Dr. Megan Anna Neff who is a neurodivergent clinician. She found out late that her brain was atypical and went to work on this vast subject. She distributed a newsletter the week of the U.S. election about how atypical brains will show up under stress like checking the poll numbers every three seconds.
See how a neurodivergent leader’s tic could overrun a major decision involving lives? This happens all day y’all.
ADHD: Difference, disability, or both? Whoa. Sister Sledge has a point.
I am here to say you have these issues in the main men’s brains calling shots in the White House, with satellites and war. Most importantly, our lives.
If you’re anywhere near clinicians, engineers, software developers, etc., you’re sitting on atypical brains unharvested in a labor and idea short market. These atypical brains and personalities can also make existing and progess in the world, neighborhood, HOA, family and the office challenging.
Startups, and now sadly after the pandemic, lots of companies of all sizes, are traditionally light on HR. The scalability of meeting the needs of a diverse workforce has been the block along with neurodivergent humans. (I have worked with brilliance, and the shoes of a dude didn’t match. No, I really mean shoes, not socks. One blue and one brown shoe at a pitch meeting.)
Current HR says that said dude can’t be hired, looking at his mix matched shoes, even though he can see healthcare utilization rates by age and gender, just by gazing at enormous numbers in a database. (Hint, we need this guy as he can tell you what health plan to buy for your family by LOOKING at shit tons of data.)
A good HR says he’s neurodivergent and we support him in all his needs – it’s not hard. Call him and remind him about the meeting and to lay out his suits, shoes and socks ahead of time. Boom!
How to Nurture & Harvest Your Neurodivergent Leaders
Make it safe. All y’all are going to be challenged here. Culture is a verb. Are your cultures safe? Can you say, Leader, what needs to be said any time? If you answered no, then the culture is not safe.
Test leaders. Once you make it safe and there are no other issues afoot, no one is a weirdo. Test so the leaders know who they are. Dr. Neff didn’t know, I didn’t know, Einstein didn’t know but his wife did, she pinned the grocery list notes to his shirt.
Mentor weirdo to weirdo. You heard me – the potential here is massive. What’s the specific glitch in the leader? OCD with autism? ADHD with anxiety and med resistance? Pair up as it’s safe. Get real about the glitch as leaders. There isn’t tons of information on fringe people, and we will be deriving this kind of information the old-fashioned way. Slowly with intention and not running over any humans.
Focus on communication glitches first. Most of the battle with both typical and atypical brains is that we don’t listen to each other.
Identify issues. What’s an issue for a neurodivergent leader will be issues for the population within the firm or startup.
Find subject matter experts. Seek partners for what you don’t know like Dr. Neff or Dr. Alex Korb.
Train. Create a training resource for your leadership team and managers.
Adjust your interviewing process. Overhaul your HR interviewing based on neurodivergent people in the firm today.
Practice. Constantly own your damn people and refine your process of what’s working and what isn’t. It's a pain in the glutes to do this work and we forgot how. The only way this works is to practice, practice, document and practice.
FYI, it took me one month to write a 2-day blog on neurodivergence due to brain issues. See the graphic below.
