How to educate managers and colleagues about ADHD & Dyslexia
Use My Free Blueprint Google Doc!
TLDR: I created an ADHD and Dyslexia Blueprint Template to help share information with managers and colleagues about how ADHD and dyslexic brains work. My last manager and I worked well together thanks to my blueprint. I left my old answers as a reference. Feel free to use the template however you like by copying and pasting it to another doc.
Link here: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1xNMIzLP-lej9BfHrqUViwHSwujHffgXxcnsiKigRwDA/edit?usp=sharing
Like many of you, I’ve had problems with managers in past stints of employment because of my ADHD and dyslexia. As a result, I started to look inward to see what I did to contribute to the problem.
I started to think about how information is shared and what I learned from my master’s thesis on health literacy. Health literacy is about how “individuals have the ability to find, understand, and use information and services to inform health-related decisions and actions for themselves and others” (What Is Health Literacy? | Health Literacy | CDC).
Thus, I began to frame ADHD as a “health literacy” problem, because it would then imply that the correct solution is rooted in education. So, how do I then leverage education to build a better working relationship with others?
Well, I needed to tell anyone I work with how I function. Using my product management brain, I iterated on a template to help explain an individual’s ADHD and dyslexia to others and how to work with someone like me.
I am happy to report my blueprint works well! My last manager and I had a great relationship because she understood me, all thanks to the blueprint that served as a foundation for any of our conversations.
However, I think the best part of my blueprint was how it also transformed into an introspective tool. As I educate others about how my brain works, I in turn, am given insight into what I am looking for in future opportunities, which is a win-win for everyone.
Hope my blueprint template gives some of you reprieve with your working relationships as it did for me.
Feel free to DM me on LinkedIn if you want to chat about ADHD and how I live a life with no medication. I plan to create more content on how to use “product thinking” to manage ADHD. I’ve become disenchanted and jaded by the modern take on ADHD, it’s mostly self-destructive consumption culture. It’s time for a change.
