Organisational change and the benefits of, and challenges to, neurodivergent team members

My talk to a community 10 July 2024

15–20 percent of the UK population is neurodivergent. That means that 15–20 percent of this group, your workplace and parliament should be neurodivergent. I don’t believe that is the case and we will talk about that.

I am Sharon Dale, I am a coach, I am an ADHDer and autistic and I am mostly pixlz on socials

Here is an image of my brain

Not really, this is what my brain actually looks like. OK, this talk is an hour long and if you have to listen to me for an hour, if I have to listen to me for an hour, it will be very boring and so I have included some interaction. If you would like to join in scan the QR code with your phone camera and click on the URL.

Excellent so a high proportion of people close to someone or neurodivergent themselves.

This slide is a graph showing when the terms were first used and relative use. The time axis starts at 1975. in 1977 there are a very few uses of Neurotypical, it picks up in the mid to late 90s and goes up exponentially. Neurodiverse starts to rise in around 2006 and Neurodivergent in around 2013. This is according to Google Ngram.

In general, neurodivergent people spend a lot of time hiding who we really are. People might not know that they are neurodivergent but are still masking their behaviour even if they don’t realise.

This slide is to give an indication of some of the conditions which come under the term neurodivergent. Conditions may be present from birth or acquired through illness or injury.

I have seen one with a third pane “Who wants to lead change?” Everyone runs away.

In Drive — The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us, Dan Pink says that we are [all] motivated by autonomy, purpose and mastery. Autonomy and purpose are mostly in the gift of managers. Mastery we can develop ourselves to an extent however with too much change e.g. a change to the preferred programming language or change process, we can lose mastery and so that can make things very uncomfortable for anyone, particularly for ND people.

Poll — Skills which are needed to be successful with organisational change. max alt text on image 500 characters

trust, equanimity, perspective, active listening, engagement, flexibility, adaptability, open minded, emotional intelligence, open, respect, accountability, visionary, willingness, growth mentality, leadership, overcoming objections, following up, optimism, patience, flexible, empathy, inclusion, clarity of vision, motivation, agility, understanding, team work, outward looking, flexibility, senior alignment, inter-personal skills, empowerment, biscuits, listening, pragmatic, a sense of humour, pragmatism, responsible, supportive, organisation

Some of the skills reported correlate to innovation and creativity which are really important when we are responding to VUCA* challenges (volatile, uncertain, complex, and ambiguous). As my colleague Anne says, “If you know where A is and you know where B is and you know how to get between them you don’t need us but if you do not, you need a neuro cognitively diverse group”.

One of the ways I have found to explain the difference types of challenges is Cynefin.

Cynefin is a sense-making model created by Dave Snowden. It is made up of five domains with confusion in the centre for things for which we have not yet determined the correct domain.

From the bottom left we have clear for things where cause and effect are obvious, anyone can do it, it either works or it doesn’t and best practices apply. We sense, categorise and respond. An example might be that I want my partner to wash a dress for me so I make a checklist for him of what to do before putting it into the washing machine e.g. empty the pockets, turn it inside out, what detergent to add and how much, what setting to use and what to do when it has finished e.g. put it on a hanger on the shower rail. He *should* be able to follow those instructions.

In the complicated domain the cause and effect are knowable and predictable however in the main some expertise is required, Good practice applies. We sense, analyse and respond. An example of complicated might be my car which needs a new catalytic converter. I will need to take it to an expert and pay them to replace it. They will know what parts and tools are needed and how to do it.

In the complex domain cause and effect can only be partially seen and retrospectively. In order to deal with something which is complex we need to try things and then do it more if it works and stop if it doesn’t — emergent practice. We probe, sense and respond. An example of complex is anything we have no experience of or anything in which the results are not stable e.g. writing software to perform an activity we don’t understand, for people who may or may not want to use it and our future financial performance as a business depends upon this work.

Cause and effect in the chaotic domain is so unpredictable as to appear random. Novel practices apply (anything could make it better). We act, sense and respond. Trained crews might help us e.g. Firefighters or paramedics. Examples of things in the chaotic domain are fires, accidents, flood and the like.

Each domain has relationships with the others and we can move between them e.g. If we do something which is complex we might learn enough about it to become expert and in the future it is merely complicated. If something is chaotic, once it has been brought under control it might then be complicated such as a fire, once out will then turn into a demolition, rebuild or clean up operation.

Cynefin is well worth your time to learn more about it you are involved in change.

Poll of what the participants wanted to note at this point

How can we make the environment better for neurodivergent colleagues? Max alt text 500 characters in image.

Quieter, Allow them to work from home, private break out space, offer noise cancelling headphones, More acceptance/facilitation of working from home, dedicated workspace, A better variety of spaces, interact with them to understand issues, It’s all about individual needs. Maybe have a quiet room they can go to when needed, Smaller quieter places to work, noise controlled areas, We have quiet desks, home working, pods to make call 1:1, closed individual spaces, more comfortable! Be more accepting of the fact not everyone has an official diagnosis, quiet environments when needed, body doubling, reduce distractions, NOISE (less of it), more flexible about wfh — 3 days in office is hard when it’s just a rule not about your diary of tasks or preference, flexible space to allow for quiet, collaborative space, calm space, flexibility around working hours, greenery

In February I attended the launch of a review of autism employment by Sir Robert Buckland KC.

In each case the original question was about autistic people and I have replaced autistic with [neurodivergent]. We discussed training, events and media.

At Neurodiversity in Business there was an organisation who support ND individuals to work in a number of areas in a business which they partner with along with lessons each day with a college which they partner with in order to identify suitable career paths.

We talked about questions being provided before an interview (Post to follow)

Psychological safety, staff neurodivergent networks and visible senior support

Poll — What is your main takeaway(s) from the talk ?

1. Please get in touch via the organisers.
2. Some of the skills which ND people commonly have are useful in a complex environment. We need everyone to understand when a checklist or expertise along will not resolve a challenge.
3. I will write a blog post pulling together information and share it ASAP.

Links to the two documents referred to

Please comment if there is anything else you would like or if you would also be interested in me delivering a version of this talk for your team or community.