Neurodiversity in the Workforce: Victoria Cumberbatch On Why It’s Important To Include Neurodiverse Employees & How To Make Your Workplace More Neuro-Inclusive

An Interview With Eric Pines

Adjust the hiring norms to remove the ‘invisible disability’ question without context, to include time for conversing about accommodation needs and destigmatizing in the actual interview.

Research suggests that up to 15–20% of the U.S. population is neurodivergent. There has been a slow but vitally important rise in companies embracing neurodiversity. How can companies support neurodiversity in the workplace? What are some benefits of including neurodiverse employees? To address these questions, we are talking to successful business leaders who can share stories and insights from their experience about “Neurodiversity in the Workforce”. As a part of this series, we had the pleasure of interviewing Victoria Cumberbatch.

Following a decade in online community building, Victoria has pivoted to curating community in person. She’s a leadership coach living in Denver USA, where she brings people from living in states of TENSION to living in a state of INTENTION. She blends a decade of experience in crafting community, cultural awareness from traveling to over 65 countries, and a lifetime of asking the harder existential questions into her offerings. Her neuro friendly & trauma informed lens aims to support people through coaching, breathwork and communal events.

Thank you so much for joining us in this interview series! Before we dive in, our readers would love to “get to know you” a bit better. Can you tell us a bit about your ‘backstory’ and how you ended up where you are?

Here’s a snippet about me [but I invite you to explore more by viewing some of my blogs, which go in depth!], I am a Leadership Coach for the Neurodivergent Crew, those that tend to struggle with the endless web of have tos and shoulds when an intentional life is within reach. I view it as, working with people wanting to migrate from tension and into intention.

I got here after a few rounds of a group transformational program where I participated and then returned as a coach, it changed me, my outlook, and my relationships quicker than any other work.

So in 2023, I decided to pivot from community building to coaching + embodiment work. Combining these two worlds, personally, integrated all my mindset learnings in a way that truly felt like they would stick. With ADHD, that felt like I got the cheat code [because, well, nothing tends to stick]. So, I created 2 coaching frameworks around leadership coaching [through an ontological lens] and embodiment. I’ve truly, never felt more aligned with how I show up in the world than right now.

You are a successful leader. Which three character traits do you think were most instrumental to your success? Can you please share a story or example for each?

Relentlessness, or how I typically view it as ‘it’s always a no if you don’t ask.’ As I was finishing up my breathwork facilitator training, I knew I wanted to do group breath in the community. I was fairly new to Denver, certainly didn’t know anyone that had a big enough space, and didn’t want to drop too many dollars just yet. So I randomly decided on a session for myself to do at a new location and toward the end of my session, I thought, ‘why don’t I ask how I can facilitate in this space?’ By the end of that week, I was on the schedule for the next three months as a beta test and now it’s been long enough that I have a few regulars! I could have easily thought the thought and kept it moving, never asking due to fear of rejection. But the thing my dad always told me was, with every rejection is another door opening up more fully.

Curiosity is always a solid one because having a curious mindset, allows the chance for everything to be an experiment. If everything is an experiment, then there is no right/wrong or good/bad, therefore, it makes no sense for me to berate myself if/when something doesn’t go to plan. Which, this is still a work in progress, but the mindset shift has given me the chance to pivot more quickly from ‘wow, I’m absolutely terrible, as usual’ to ‘okay well, this particular set up didn’t work this time, what can I change next time?’ Empowering.

Being integrous, or showing up with integrity, is vital. Integrity is a hot word right now, but personally it’s about simply, showing up as wholly and juicy as often as possible. A big example of how this looks for me, was shifting from a time management perspective to an energy management one. Especially with ADHD, I have to almost catch the moment when I’m in optimal form to work/pay attention/create/etc, so this can’t be scheduled. From as young as I can recall, there were schedules that were there to bucket my time in an efficient way, which is simply a status quo in society for a litany of reasons that we won’t delve into now. However, the combination of my own coaching + embodiment work + ancestral understanding, allowed me to open up space for the idea that maybe the way I’d been doing it, actually doesn’t work for me. And with that same thought, maybe I’m not as bad as I think in my head, I’ve simply needed to adjust how I do the things I do to work better for me. Time and scheduling have been, by far, the most impactful changes I’ve ever made. I lived and died by the google calendar for example, color coded, all tasks within it, filled to the brim; providing endless anxiety, overwhelm, and inferiority. I created my own system, so I could change it too. So I have, I love it and now I coach it to my own clients. Now, people can perceive that I walk my talk. That’s integrity.

Can you share a story about one of your greatest work-related struggles? Can you share what you did to overcome it?

I have to say, it was working for someone else. It took me, what felt like forever, to get my first ‘big girl job’ and it was the full monty. Cubicle, landline calls, lots of emails, people that had worked there for decades. Within six months, I felt trapped, truly like I was in a straight jacket. I had a great apartment in Brooklyn, but I was so south that no one ever came to visit me because I was the second to last stop on the R [I don’t blame them]. I told myself, I had to make it one full year and then I could do something else. And the same routine followed for the ensuing three jobs. I was just, unable to stay put, working for someone else’s dream [most of these experiences were start ups]. When I finally, took a more serious pivot to working for myself, I realized that in fact, I am able to work [which I kept berating myself for being unable to do like everyone else]. So, I pivoted from my greatest challenge which was that of working typically, to overcoming that by becoming a true do it yourselfer!

What are some of the most interesting or exciting projects you are working on now?

I just finished up creating a behemoth of a workbook, called the RezKit, which is an inspirational and interactive resilience toolkit. It took a full season to ideate, create, and glean feedback on that I’m now thrilled that it’s nearing launch [by the time you read this, it’ll be launched and available in my online store!]

Fantastic. Let’s now shift to our discussion about neurodiversity in the workforce. Can you tell our readers a bit about your experience working with initiatives to include neurodiverse employees? Can you share a story with us?

Neurodiversity awareness became apparent in my world in about 2017. I was managing a budding online community, when I started to notice several colleagues booking unexpected calls with me to talk about their struggles at work. Things from deep feelings of imposter syndrome, rejection sensitivity, feeling misunderstood, feeling like they consistently misunderstand directives, and so on. I started to put the pieces together, that maybe, something forreal was happening here and not just ‘work culture.’ Without my asking, these peers slowly let me know that they were living with neurodivergence and that this was a bigger, more prevalent thing than I [many of us] had given credence to. By that point, I hadn’t been diagnosed yet myself, so I was just piecing things together from what I was being told.

This may be obvious to you, but it will be helpful to spell this out. Can you articulate to our readers a few reasons why it is so important for a business or organization to have an inclusive work culture?

It’s not obvious, or everyone would be doing it :) Here’s my take on this: with a nod to a long history of patriarchal thinking, an industrialist mindset for education & training, sexism, capitalism, systemic oppression and so on, it’s evident that those aspects have been the status quo. Particularly in the professional and academic realms. Add to this layer cake that science only added the subdivision of Neuroscience to its arsenal in the mid twentieth century and we have a seven layer cake that is only being dissected right now. Never before have people allowed anything viewed as ‘different’ to take up such space as neurodivergent awareness has. Think about it, coming from a long history of ‘survival of the fittest’ thinking, it’s not surprising that for a few generations, no one wanted to hear or consider or think about the idea that they may be different. Why? Because historically, what has it meant to be considered different, particularly when self avowed? It could have meant ostracization at a bare minimum, to literal wounding and beyond on the other end of that spectrum.

With all that being said, plus the knowledge that up to 20% of the population is working with neurodivergence, in order to be the change that many of us say we want to see in the world, then this is a solid start. Let’s be real, if those stats are accurate, then we can surmise that many of the cool apps, products, services, and entertainment that you enjoy were created by those with neurodivergence. With my background in community, I am positive that the aspects that can change the game for any group are that the feelings of belonging, trust, and respect are woven throughout. These seemingly innocuous feelings are substantial. They allow people to take up more space with their ideas, their innovative suggestions, their unique creativity streaks and so on. If we nurtured space for these aspects to be driven up, imagine the world we’d truly start to see. Societal gaps being filled, environmental woes being bridged, diseases lessened.

Can you share a few examples of ideas that were implemented at your workplace to help include neurodiverse employees? Can you share with us how the work culture was affected as a result?

Absolutely, also as an aside, I have a stand alone quickie masterclass in my store that gives a 101 overview of neurodivergence as a space holder, facilitator, or manager.

Okay, here are a few ideas for inclusivity:

• Leniency with cameras off, Captioning On, DMs, Reasonable Tardiness when it comes to virtual meetings.
• Know that typical goal settings + jargon simply doesn’t work [IE. eat the frog or SMART goals], so be ready to open up the floor for suggestions and/or give space for people to determine their preferred methods.
• If all else fails, open up professional development stipends so these employees can get professional coaching.
• Incorporate embodiment and/or creative recharges to give eyes a rest & engage other senses
• Showing can be a Mt Everest to climb, so definitely have a hard start for meetings et al, yet make it known that people can join up to 10 mins early to get themselves settled.
• Be open to reiterating

These are just a few of the many options! Neurodivergent people are driven by INCUP, an acronym and ideology created by psychologist William Dodson; Interest, Novelty, Challenge, Urgency, and Passion. By keeping these in mind as a manager or HR leader, you can rest assured that you are working toward inclusivity by simply expanding your mindset on that which is different from you and allowing that to blossom as it will. Honestly, this is what works best for neurodivergent people; sweet sweet freedom of movement, thinking, and creating.

What are some of the challenges or obstacles to including neurodivergent employees? What needs to be done to address those obstacles?

With hiring, people may often feel that the question of ‘are you dealing with an invisible disability’ is both stigmatizing and can trap them into a label that doesn’t feel right. If they click that box, will they be rejected outright? Will they have a black mark on their application in some way? From my perspective, I’d rid this question from the written application and include it in some way in the verbal portion, such as ‘do you envision needing any sort of accommodations for this role? And before you answer, let me just share that we are an inclusive organization and for us that means….’ Wow, if I’d have heard this from an interviewer and given the chance to have a short conversation around it, I’d feel significantly less inferior, confident, and supported.

Workplace culture and norms can be tough, so overall I’d say, offering most things as suggestions. Such as, ‘I’d appreciate it if you all shared your vision around this idea by Friday and share it in whichever format works best for you. Type up a proposal, create a mindmap, walk me through a 2min. Video; whatever you like as long as it’s cohesive and clear.’ Big difference from ‘I want a one page summary and proposal from everyone by Friday.’

Another one is communication styles, especially as many of us are now working remotely. Working remotely is a bittersweet affair because yes we may have freedom one way, yet many of us with neurodivergence succumb to overworking, burn out, and taking most inbound communication as urgent + stressful. Super low hanging fruits to get ahead of this are things like: noting ‘urgent or not urgent’ in subject lines or at the top of Slack/Teams messages, being diligent with Slack/Teams away messaging, being clear with when everyone needs to be ‘on’ and actually model that behavior.

How do you and your organization educate yourselves and your teams on the concept of neurodiversity and the needs of neurodivergent employees? Are there any resources, training, or workshops that you have found particularly helpful?

Aside from having a neurodivergent friendly approach to my own coaching and offering resources, there are a few I’d recommend. Education goes beyond a workshop or two from a consultant, but really would be best if it included some form of integration afterward. The best way would be to have a series of workshops that people can attend, followed by team or individual coaching for maybe a season to ensure the sticky bits actually, stick.

Offering something like an amazon list of possible neurodivergent friendly things that people can buy for their workspaces with the stipend. Also offering the opportunity for people to body double, with an app like FLOWN for example.

Having an ERG is low hanging fruit and would be best if that chosen leader is compensated for their energy into holding that group space.

Can you please share five best practices that can make a business place feel more welcoming and inclusive of people who are neurodivergent?

1 . Adjust the hiring norms to remove the ‘invisible disability’ question without context, to include time for conversing about accommodation needs and destigmatizing in the actual interview.

2 . Foster open, honest, brave dialogue with meetings and capacity to speak with managers about preferred ways of working. IE. As long as a developer overlaps at least 2 working hours with the company’s main working hours, that developer can work any hours within a 24H cycle that they find optimal.

3 . Normalize and model time boundaries, how best to request time off et al, using the ‘urgent’ and ‘not urgent’ message starter.

4 . Hire professional coaches to fill in the gaps via leadership coaching, workshops, or even bring them into company retreats.

5 . If you’re a company that offers workspace stipends [please consider it if not], then prepare and offer a ‘starter list’ that includes very functional, practical and sustainable items that can be great for both the neurodiverse community and beyond. These can include: noise canceling headphones, fidget things, mug warmer, tactile timers, ergonomic mouses and such.

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share a story about how that was relevant in your own life?

What you’re walking this life with when it comes to trauma, neurodivergence, disability and beyond is not your fault. Yet, how you choose to work with these aspects that paint your life, is fully your responsibility. Ignorance isn’t bliss for long.

This became clearest to me when I was doubly diagnosed with ADHD and PCOS within the same month. Turns out, I’d been navigating the world blind and now, I had data that allowed me to see. What was I going to do with this information? That, my friends, becomes the most honest question we get to ask ourselves.

You are a person of enormous influence. If you could inspire a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be? You never know what your idea can trigger. :-)

Offering spaces for seriously accessible and affordable coaching and/or healing sessions. If hurt people, hurt people, then what can we envision if more people were healing their woes and acted from their empathy and compassion versus their projections?

How can our readers further follow your work online?

Website: adventuresofcommunity.com

Newsletter: tinyurl.com/aicnewz

Podcast: tinyurl.com/aitpod

Store: adventuresofcommunity.com/store

This was very inspiring. Thank you so much for the time you spent with this. We wish you continued success and good health!

About the Interviewer: Eric L. Pines is a nationally recognized federal employment lawyer, mediator, and attorney business coach. He represents federal employees and acts as in-house counsel for over fifty thousand federal employees through his work as a federal employee labor union representative. A formal federal employee himself, Mr. Pines began his federal employment law career as in-house counsel for AFGE Local 1923 which is in Social Security Administration’s headquarters and is the largest federal union local in the world. He presently serves as AFGE 1923’s Chief Counsel as well as in-house counsel for all FEMA bargaining unit employees and numerous Department of Defense and Veteran Affairs unions.

While he and his firm specialize in representing federal employees from all federal agencies and in reference to virtually all federal employee matters, his firm has placed special attention on representing Veteran Affairs doctors and nurses hired under the authority of Title. He and his firm have a particular passion in representing disabled federal employees with their requests for medical and religious reasonable accommodations when those accommodations are warranted under the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 (ADA). He also represents them with their requests for Federal Employee Disability Retirement (OPM) when an accommodation would not be possible.

Mr. Pines has also served as a mediator for numerous federal agencies including serving a year as the Library of Congress’ in-house EEO Mediator. He has also served as an expert witness in federal court for federal employee matters. He has also worked as an EEO technical writer drafting hundreds of Final Agency Decisions for the federal sector.

Mr. Pines’ firm is headquartered in Houston, Texas and has offices in Baltimore, Maryland and Atlanta, Georgia. His first passion is his wife and five children. He plays classical and rock guitar and enjoys playing ice hockey, running, and biking. Please visit his websites at www.pinesfederal.com and www.toughinjurylawyers.com. He can also be reached at eric@pinesfederal.com.