Neurodiversity: Buzzword or Breakthrough?

Has there really been an explosion of people who are neurodivergent? In our latest podcast, Dr Nancy Doyle, founder of Genius Within and organisational psychologist, answers our questions.  

Nancy is a social entrepreneur and leading authority on neurodiversity and disability inclusion in the workplace. She created Genius Within – pioneering scalable, evidence-based solutions that empower neurodivergent individuals and transform organisational cultures. Nancy shares her personal experiences about her ADHD diagnosis and how she manages it. 

We explore the possible over-medicalisation and whether being neurodivergent is seen as a ‘cool’ trait. And is being neurodivergent the same as having a disability? As workplaces scramble to adapt, how can employers and the neurodivergent employees make it work?

Interestingly, we begin to see similarities between the more mature disability rights movement and the newer neurodivergent campaigning; striking the right balance between "entitlement" and “agency", where neurodivergent people develop their own strategies and accommodations rather than relying solely on external support. If 15-20% of the population is neurodivergent, how do we see things in the future for this significant minority?

Links

Genius Within

Doctor Nancy Doyle LinkedIn

Nancy Doyle Instagram

Business Disability Forum Neurodiversity Network

Business Disability Form ‘ What is Neurodiversity?’

Transcript

Welcome And Guest Introduction

Announcer 0:10

This is The Way We Roll, presented by Simon Minty and Phil Friend. You can email us at mintyandfriend at gmail.com or just search for Minty and Friend on social media. We're on Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn.

Simon 0:28

Welcome to The Way We Roll with me, Simon Minty.

Phil 0:31

And me, Phil Friend.

Simon 0:33

Our guest this month is Dr. Nancy Doyle. Nancy is a well-recognised organizational psychologist. She's a social entrepreneur and leading authority on neurodiversity and disability inclusion in the workplace.

Phil 0:47

Nancy created Genius Within, a community interest company, a hugely successful organization pioneering scalable, evidence-based solutions that empower neurodivergent individuals and transform organisational cultures.

Simon 1:02

In addition to this, she's a visiting professor at Birkhab University of London, where she co-founded the Centre for Neurodiversity at Work. Her work supports neurodivergent PhD students to further our knowledge around neuroinclusive practice.

Phil 1:19

And on the Genius Within website, it says of you, Nancy, you are a proud neuro minority, passionate about improving the way neurodiversity is treated in the workplace. And we hear neurodiversity in quotes a lot. What does it actually mean in a workplace context? And what is neurominority? So over to you, Nancy. Why don't

Defining Neurodiversity And Neurominority

Phil 1:42

you kick us off by helping us with those two questions?

Nancy Doyle 1:45

I absolutely can. And to be honest, language around any marginalized population is a topic in and of itself, and we could spend an hour talking about it. So I'll give you the brief answer, but I'll also caveat it by saying language and terminology evolve with inclusion movements for very good reasons. And sometimes people get very stuck about whether or not they're using the right word. And this actually holds people back from having conversations. And I think you know, people in the community feel quite strongly about different terms and how they're used, and that's absolutely right, that's their identity. But I think just as a woman can identify as gay, lesbian, or queer, people can identify as they want within the neurodiversity and use the terms about themselves how they want. And I think it's easy, it should be easy for us to just respect that. So I will share the way I understand these terms, and the caveat is if you are if you're interested in inclusion and if you're interested in a big allyship towards the neurodiversity community, pay attention because people do use words differently. But I don't think that's any different to the fact that people use words differently in race inclusion and in LGBTQ inclusion. So neurodiversity as a word is basically a description of humans. Humans are neurodiverse. All of us, the way our brains work, the way our neurocognitive structures manifest, that is diverse. So any two people will have differences in the way that they think, in the way that their brain chemistry works, in the various connections between their brain regions, that diversity exists in the same way that biodiversity is a property of the of the globe, if that makes sense. So in context of work, neurodiversity is a description of the fact that in any organization people will think differently, not people aren't thinking the same way, then we're not automatons. Um so, and and that is of interest. And in fact, a lot of the workplace, uh, a lot of workplace success is devoted to going what kind of thinkers are best for this kind of job, what kind of thought processes suit this project, what kind of expression and communication do we need in order to meet this target, get this sales across the line, um, you know, build this relationship, support this individual. So neurodiversity is always relevant to the world and to the to the workplace, and has always been. Now, within the that that idea of neurodiversity, there is also the idea of neurodivergence, uh, which is where people are um have an unusual neurotype that is quite different from the norm. So there is a there is a sort of normal distribution of cognitive abilities. People are good at uh verbal skills, processing speed, memory, visual spatial reasoning, abstract reasoning, problem solving, writing, numeracy at different levels. The majority of the human population are much of a muchness for all of those different uh abilities. So if you plotted their scores on a graph, it would be a kind of you know, middle of the line, a bit better here at memory, maybe a bit poorer here at literacy, but but much of a muchness. A neurodivergent person is someone who has got big disparities between the things they do really, really well and the things that they struggle with. So, for example, um in my own profile, I'm in the top whatever percent, very high percent of the population for visual spatial reasoning, um, and my working memory is pants. So there's a very big difference between the potential, if I'm using my brain in the way that suits my brain, I can do great things. And if I'm trying to make my brain do something else, I get I fall over and I'm I get really stuck. So the the the level of disparity between those strengths and challenges is what defines someone as neurodivergent, and neurodivergence is associated with uh ADHD, autism, dyslexia, dyspraxia, dyscalculia, dysgraphia, Tourette syndrome, um, but also can be kind of acquired, so you can end up with these big disparities if you are experiencing a significant mental health condition, if you have had a brain injury, or if you've got a chronic health neurological condition, you can end up with big disparities as well. There's no one policing the borders, there's no one that gives you permission to have your neurodivergence card. And then the reason I use neurominority is um because minority is is kind of a it's got a more political association, the idea of fighting for minority rights. We are a minority. Neurodivergent people compromise sort of 15 to 20 percent of the population, so that is a minority, but it's a significant minority. And uh the way that the world is set up isn't for people with spiky profiles, it's for people with flat profiles. So if you think about the way we incentivize schools, you know, we want schools to make sure that everyone gets five A to C grades or five to nine grades, whatever they are now. Um, so we're we're incentivising normality, we're incentivising generalist thinking, and we're promoting and prioritizing generalist thinking, whereas neurodivergent people who aren't going to get five A to C grades, they might get two A stars and three D's, you know, uh, though we are challenged by that world. And so uh the neurodiversity movement is is partially um a movement to argue for, legitimise the rights of people who are who are gonna lose their lose their flow and their joie de vie and their purpose in life if we try and squish them into the 5A to C grades box rather than going, do you know those two A star things that you do? Do that. So that's that's kind of that is the shortest possible answer I can give to the question. We could also write, you know, 5,000-word essays on it, book chapters, you know, etc. etc.

Why Diagnoses Seem To Be Rising

Simon 8:10

Uh it's really helpful as well. I need to apologize to Phil because I said something different when we were prepping for the show. So your your point is neurodiversity is everybody, but neurodivergent is the people it has a significant impact on in, as you said, that sort of um up and down schools. So uh now forgive me because I think this is uh I feel like I'm turning into reform or daily mail, but the the what is perceived as a great increase of people with diagnosis, and the bit that I quite like is the younger people being diagnosed, and then the parents going, Oh, hello, that's me, I didn't realize.

Nancy Doyle 8:44

Um, no, what normally happens is the developmental interview. So the uh the the clinician is saying, So, you know, let's talk about your developmental milestones, let's talk about what you were like as a child, and they're sort of finding out, you know, could you ride a bike, could you tie your shoelaces up? Were you um, you know, buzzing around the place and unable to sit down? And the parents are going, Well, well, yes, they did all those things, but that's completely normal, isn't it? Oh. Oh, it's not completely normal to not use any word other than the word this before you're five. Okay, right.

Simon 9:19

And what do you think, whether it's an increase or just an acknowledgement, what is behind the diagnosis? Is there is there a downside um to this or is it a positive thing?

Nancy Doyle 9:31

Um, I think I've got two questions, and and the so I'd like to get to the positive thing, but can we just start with the with the rising diagnosis thing? I think there's a there's some debunking that needs to go on there. Right. So if you break down the there are there is a huge rise in diagnoses of ADHD and autism, particularly. We're not seeing a huge rise in dyslexia, dyspraxia, dysgraphia, dyscalculia, by the way. Those those are not cool at the moment, and no one's diagnosing them because they're not cool. They were very cool in the 90s, they then autism became very cool, and now ADHD is very cool. So there's some there's some issues there, which are another entire podcast. But um but the the rise in diagnosis of ADHD and autism, um, you know, it is true, numbers have gone up dramatically, but if you break down those numbers demographically, what you will find it is that it is middle-aged women driving a lot of that. And um the reason it is middle-aged women driving a lot of that is because uh women were missed as children, hugely missed as children, and exactly as the little anecdote we all just enjoyed, they're taking their kids and they're getting diagnosed because they're realizing that what their kids are, yeah, etc. So actually, that's the fastest growing group is middle-aged women. There is also a rise in middle-aged men, and there is a rise in in young women as well, because those disparities are now being kind of um edged out of out of the system, those biases are being edged out of the system. There is a small growth if you look at at uh particularly white young boys or um uh young men, that it that is growing as well, but but not very much. Like that growth is really kind of that that growth is the kind of growth where we go, oh yes, we have increased awareness. Um and so actually, no, we can we can see that there are people that we that are kind of edge cases that we would have ignored 20 years ago, 30 years ago. But now what we know is if we ignore those edge cases, they just show up in mental health treatment in their 20s and 30s with substance misuse issues, with with uh you know, uh failed careers, with uh having having completely missed out on an education or really struggling in their social lives. So let's not miss them as young people.

Simon 11:51

It's slightly anecdotal, it's slightly anecdotal, but when I think of some of the businesses and organizations, the employees I work with, they will say the number of graduates who are coming and who are neurodiverse is getting larger. You're saying it's actually Middle Ages the the fastest growing, but it is still at that point as well.

Nancy Doyle 12:08

The edge case, we're getting a lot more of what would have been edge cases. So the way that the diagnostic criteria have widened, what what can kind of meet the clinical threshold for a diagnosis? Um, but there is an end point to this. Like if you you know, if you just think about it logically, if if neurodivergence is divergence from the average, you know, you start to get to 40, you can't get to 40-50%. I I hear this being bandied around, you know, oh by 2040, 50% of Gen Z or Gen Alpha will be neurodivergent. I'm like, no, no, no, no, they won't. Because if 40 to 50 percent of them are neurodivergent, they're no longer neurodivergent, they are now the norm. Yeah, so so so you know, what is changed and what is perfectly logical to be changing, actually, is neurocognitive expression, because our brains are mirrors of the society that we grow up in.

How Modern Life Shapes Brains

Nancy Doyle 13:09

The way our brains form is entirely driven by the experiences we have. And so as the experiences we have have changed, things are going to change, like our attention spans, like our concentration spans, like our ability to sit still and concentrate, like our ability to handle the world. I mean, if you think about sensory sensitivity being one of the driving characteristics of autism, you know, autistic brains basically have higher levels of sensory processing in the somatosensory cortex, um, and then less space in the frontal cortex to make sense of what all of that sensory input is making. So, you know, lots and lots of sensory input, not enough space to work out what it means and sort it out. So, quite kind of startled response uh reactions to over-stimulation. So, if that's what's happening in an autistic brain, that brain in the 80s would have gone to school by walking to school, probably quite quietly. So they would have had a very, you know, a nice quiet walk every morning and every afternoon. Um, they that just the amount of data that they were processing was five percent of what it is now. The number of people living in cities versus the number of people living in kind of quiet rural areas, you know, you you that's going to change the number of people who are struggling with that brain, with that cognitive style. So that in so so our world is driving some of this as well. And as the world changes our neurocognitive expression, I expect that we will start evolving the way we define these conditions. About 15 years ago, I wrote a very challenging blog that I can't find anymore, but um, it was called Um Dyslexia, uh Reading as a Transition Technology, Discuss. And it was the idea that as we get phones that write for us and spell for us, and AI that you can basically now get to compose a letter for you, does dyslexia cease to be an issue? We're spending 12 years of education teaching people to do something that is essentially an obsolete skill.

Simon 15:21

So the

Disability Or Difference In Practice

Simon 15:22

argument that the equivalent is a wheelchair user, as we get more automatic doors, ramps, and level access, the impact is less changes. Sorry, for example.

Phil 15:34

Maybe that that's a seamless link, really, into the kind of question I have, which is so you've really helpfully explained what neurodiversity is, and I'm part of it, you're part of it, everybody's part of that. The neurodivergent community, if there is such a thing as a community, um are they disabled then? I mean the uh our podcast about disability. So are we saying that neurodivergent people are disabled or are they just different? Because one kind of we talked about minority, didn't you? And right. Yes. Um clearly, if you're different from the norm, um then you might qualify to be defined as a disabled person. Um now that's leads to a much bigger question, which is do no neurodivergent people want to be defined as disabled? That's a different ballgame. Oh Phil layers. I love it. We've only got about 40 minutes. I I'm just interested, Nancy, and where you think then disability and neurodivergent people kind of intersect. What's the what's going on there?

Nancy Doyle 16:38

I mean, it's an overlapping ven, um, is the way I would would say that. And and but I think it changes throughout your life and it changes on in the context you're in. I think for many neurodivergent people, we are very much within the social model of disability, which is that if we're in a school, so so let's just take ADHD, because it is this is a great example. So an ADHD is disabled in an environment where they're where they have to sit down and concentrate for six hours. You know, like most schools. Schools are quite disabling for ADHDers. I stopped going to school when I was 14. I used to go on a Monday morning, I'd go and see my teachers, I'd find out what work I had to do for the week, I'd go home and do it. Um, I could not, I could not sit in that school environment. Um, however, the same brain style is absolutely brilliant if you are in the military and you're patrolling an area and your job is to be highly alert and looking out for things that are out of the norm. So, what we call distractability in a school or in an open plan office, in the military, they call it ground force awareness, and it's an advantage. Um, and that's why you find so many ADHDers in the armed forces, but you also find them working as paramedics, working in the police, working in the fire service, so you know, working being in charge of nurseries where you've got to keep your eye on 20 little things that are running around all the time. You know, so you've got this the context is king for a lot of neurodivergent people. That said, there are also a subset of neurodivergent people, and these are the people who would always have been diagnosed 30, 40 years ago before it was cool, where actually, no matter the context, there is still a label level of disablement. And so I actually quite like the way the law treats disability in the Equality Act, where you know it's about your ability to um to you know perform normal normal everyday tasks. What are we calling a normal everyday task? How is that evolving? How is that changing? Um, but for in that within that definition, someone who is diabetic may or may not be disabled. So if it's if it's if they've got peripheral neuropathy and they can't feel their feet anymore, that is dis and and they and they were a driver, that is disabling. They now need an adaptive car. However, if they're if they're diabetic and they don't have any of those issues, they're probably not disabled. And on top of that, I think you do also have you do also have stigma. So you know, neurodivergence is kind of more cool. I don't think it's getting, I think it's I think it's moving past its cool phase, by the way. But anyway, it's been cool. So is that less stigmatizing than disabled? And therefore, do people want to not associate with disability? And that there is probably a pool of people for whom that's true. Um, but I think there's also a lot of people who think they don't deserve to take resources, so that kind of zero-sum game that that workplaces get into about disability. Well, we can't do this for everybody. Um, you know, we have to think about who's who's it's like the the deserving poor of the Victorian era, isn't it? Who are the most deserving disabled people of our support? Um, and so a lot of neurodivergent people feel like they're treading on people's toes if they're asking for support because they're they don't feel that they're as deserving of assistance. Um, and and I think you know that was definitely part of my journey, something I had to come to terms with. Um, and and I have I I can and can't associate, I can some sometimes associate with disability, and interestingly, it was the Shaw Trust's Disability Power 100. Um, the year that uh I that I did the first series of Employable Me, they gave the I was number 10 in their Power 100 or number 9. I think I was number nine and Neil Milliken was number 10. Um, and um the guy from uh The Last Leg had was had won. And I love him, I absolutely love him, and I so was excited to go to the um to the thing. And then when it actually came to the week, I had completely mismanaged my diary, I'd forgotten about some things I'd said yes to. I got to the Wednesday night and I realised I had absolutely no idea how I was going to get myself to London and back. I hadn't planned any childcare, I didn't know when my husband was coming home, I had forgotten to ask him, and I basically was so overwhelmed I couldn't even, and I just went, I'm not going, that's it, I'm not going. So I sat down, I didn't go, and I spent the entire evening going, oh, and being really sad about it and upset about it, but just too overwhelmed to go, which is classic ADHD. And one of my friends said said, and I said, I don't even think I should go, you know. You know, just you know, there's other people in that thing, and you know, do I really deserve to be in this list? And rah, and my friend Kate just said to me, you know, Nancy, that's the thing about disability. Being disabled means you can't do things sometimes. That's literally what it is. And I was like, All right, fair.

Simon 21:45

I remember when I first met you, it was unemployable me. And I remember we talked about disability. It was either me or you, one of us that and you weren't at that disability space right then. It was a professional expert with your new and well they didn't want to.

Nancy Doyle 22:00

To talk about it because I said to them, you know, I what I wanted to say, you know, I am in this gang, I am I'm Adi and IDHD, and they didn't want me to do it, they wanted me to hold a really big separation, and I don't think they'd do that now. I think I think that's one of the things that's changed. So that was 2016, 2015, 16, 17. I think from 2021 onwards, they would have they would have lapped up the fact that I was also an ADHD. Isn't that weird? That's I think that's a big change.

Rethinking Adjustments As Performance Tools

Simon 22:30

And a positive change. I like this isn't an official question, but this was something that when I speak to organizations and they say we've got these people coming in, and there's maybe 20-30% of the people want some sort of adjustments, and it's really tricky because of being neurodivergent. And they're saying it's really tricky because that's not how we work, or if we give them 40 minutes a day, suddenly 30% of our staff taking 40 minutes a day is a real issue. And so I'm I'm challenging, but I'm kind of saying, will we meet a crunch point where work has got to change because it doesn't work for enough people? Or is it going to be that other people who are manure diversion there we're going to try and squeeze them in? I do you have a solution? You must get asked this question a little bit.

Nancy Doyle 23:13

Oh, yeah. I I get asked this question all the time. So, first of all, I'd like to reframe adjustments. So I'm I actually I think reasonable adjustments have become stigmatized, and we need to we need to find some different language. Um, so the the purpose of an adjustment isn't to lower the standards of the work, the purpose of the adjustment is to is to assist that individual to meet the standards of the work, in which case they are productivity gains. So, you know, here's here's the same adjustment frame two other way, two different ways, right? Um I'm I'm an autistic uh dyslexic and I can't read my emails very well. I really struggle to read emails, so um I'm gonna need to always have the corner desk and to have my earphones on, and you're gonna need to give me two hours um three times a week for me to do my emails because otherwise I won't be able to do them because I have these needs. That's way one. Number two, what I've noticed is when um when I when I have some dedicated time to focus on my emails, I get through twice as many in half the time, and I do a much better job of um making contact with our customers, and um my work's much more effective. So um, if it's all right with you, what I'd quite like to do is Monday, Wednesday, and Friday just spend two hours over there with my headphones on and just rattle through them, and then I'll have more attention for the rest of my work and I'll be more effective. Is that all right with you? Um, and it, you know, I'm not saying it's the it's the disabled person's job to do that reframe for the employer. I think it's I think it's the world of work, I think it's a joint process where we go, hold on a second, that's what we're saying here. What we're saying here isn't here, have some favours. What we're saying is, what's what's the best way for you to be effective at your job? How do we create the conditions for you to shine, to thrive? Neurodiversity inclusion was all about going, hold on a second, there's a whole population. This is, I mean, this is why I got into it. This is what this is what really enthused me about neurodiversity. Is I used to I worked with people who were long-term unemployed, um, and I worked for access to work, and I just kept finding brilliant people who were completely under underused, who were completely thwarted in their careers, people who were creative, interesting, funny, um, great problem solvers, who couldn't get past the entry level of a job because there were so many systems and processes that that weren't actually necessary for the job that had blocked them out of it. And it was just such an enormous waste of their potential, um, both for our society and our economies, but also for them as and it just it just felt like like like like utter inefficiency to me. And I just thought this this this this can't be right. You know, people are excluded, they are they are depressed, they are, you know, their lifelong earnings and and financial stability is affected by this. Uh, for the want of some noise-cancelling headphones, can we not please just get this person working properly? So so many of the things that work for neurodivergent people are cheap or free.

Phil 26:23

They're cheap or free. It's very interesting, Nancy, because for the other non-nuro neurodivergent people in that office, they're all given stuff to make them more effective. Yeah. I mean, you you know, imagine you can only type with one hand because we've only got a one-handed keyboard. Well, that would disable half the workforce. I've often thought, and I'd be interested in your thought about this. I I love the idea that we've got to stop seeing reasonable adjustments as a nice to have.

Nancy Doyle 26:54

Or a favourite.

Phil 26:56

Yeah. Rather than saying it releases people's talent, which is a different way of putting it. And I'm I want to just ask you around Simon's point, really, which is is it then up to the organisation? Because I think Simon and I have spent many years of our lives helping disabled people of whatever hue to be more effective at getting what they want. Because I think that's the that's the jewel in the crown. If you've got a boss or an employer that's interested and you are pushy enough and know how to push in a way which is respectful and whatever, so what is the organization supposed to adapt then? Or am I supposed to adapt? Or actually, the obvious bloody answer is we both have to. And and how does that work for a neurodivergent person to become more assertive, more effective, if that isn't their natural way of doing stuff?

Meeting In The Middle At Work

Nancy Doyle 27:49

It's it's hard and and a lot it it neurodivergence as a as a minority rights advocacy community is is in its infancy. And I and I think we're at the we're at the kind of very grumpy, how very dare you have not already done this stage. And I think that's a natural stage as inclusion communities mature and get more effective and develop. You know, we're we're in the you know, think about the seven stages of grief. We're in the anger phase. So there's a lot of kind of, well, you ought to have done this and you should have known, and and you know, these things ought to have been provided for me. And you know, I'm hearing from my HR customers things like how much unprofessional behavior do I have to accept in order to be inclusive? It's like, well, the answer is none, but then the nuance is how are we defining under unprofessional? Um, and you know, I've got an ADHDer who says that they can't possibly meet deadlines or get to work on time because time is an issue for ADHDers. And I've got an autistic person who says that you know, when they lose their temper and they shout at people, that's a meltdown, and that's part of autism. So my colleagues just have to suck it up. And actually, none of those things are true, you know. So you've got you have got people asking and advocating for what they want, and you've also got what they want currently being quite unrealistic for a very for a small but quite vocal minority of neurodivergent people. That narrative is causing is causing a lot of of tension, um, unhappiness. You know, I was I was with an employer yesterday who said that this one case that they had, um, the individual burnt through three line managers, two of whom took time off work with stress, um, and in fact, that their entire team either left or redeployed. So we can't have that. So we do need advocacy, we do need people standing up for their rights, but we also need, we do, you know, it's as you said, Phil, it's it's it's about meeting in the middle. And I and I what the pattern I see in workplaces, and this is not limited to neurodiversity or disability, this is this is this is just general in workplaces, we have a parent child model of management in in Western cultures. So the manager is the parent and the employee is the child. So the manager is either a persecuting parent who demands everything be done their way, or the manager is a rescuing parent who says, Oh, you find that difficult, don't worry, I'll do that bit of your job for you. Um, and then sort of takes it on in a kind of burning martyr style, um, and is essentially doing 25% of that person's job for them because they think that's what they have to do to be helpful and supportive. And then six months later, they completely burn out, they can't keep doing that. They then go to HR and HR go, well, you can't do that, that's ridiculous. Um they then come back to the employee who hasn't had to do any of their own report writing for the last six months and say, Well, I'm sorry, you've got to do this report writing. And the employee is quite rightly going, Well, hold on a second. Uh, where was that made clear to me? Um, and so you know, you've then got a bunch of no no one is happy in any of those circumstances. And that's where Genius Within has been a really interesting experience for me because we are majority neurodivergent. So, in the game of whose pattern wins, is it the employer's pattern or the employees' pattern? What's interesting is is both people in that in that equation um are potentially have a protected condition. So um whose pattern wins can never always be the managers or always be the employees. Um, and even if it's not majority neurodivergent, other people have other needs. You know, I I I had put this to um I do some guest lecturing, quite a lot of guest lecturing, and I put this to an undergrad class. We were doing a they were doing a module on neurodiversity, and I said, whose pattern wins? So if the pattern is about the way you prep for meetings and one and the neurodivergent person wants a lot of preparation for meetings, they want an agenda, they need it two days before the meeting. Um, and if if they deviate from the agenda, um you know that's that that causes a lot of anxiety. So the manager's job is to never deviate from that agenda setting. Um, and the manager doesn't usually work like that. They work, they think much better on their feet and they're quite spontaneous. Whose pattern wins? And they said, Well, the employee's pattern wins. I said, Okay, now it's a hypothetical scenario. The employee is a young, white, neurodivergent but otherwise able-bodied man, living with uh still living at home with his parents, doesn't have any financial difficulties, is saving up to leave home at the moment, building themselves a nice little nest egg, um, no, no other responsibilities. The manager is a single parent, um, at least one of the children that they're parenting is also neurodivergent and um is not in school right now, and they're having a big battle with the school as to whether or not that kid should or shouldn't be going. Um, they've got significant financial difficulties because they're raising disabled children alone. Now, whose pattern wins? And they go, Oh. And that's like it's just not that easy to say the employer must always default to the employee or the manager must always default to the employee. What we what we want is two adults having a conversation where both power parties are allowed to be fallible and where the employee, if they if the if the manager has forgotten to do the meeting prep, the employee can say, Oh, can we just take five minutes at the beginning of this meeting? I just need to be clear. And some of the points, actually, I'm gonna have to go away and think about that. Can I come back to you in two days' time?

The Hard Parts Behind The Strengths

Nancy Doyle 33:43 Simon 33:43

And that's gonna come in, Nancy, because we've run out of time. But I love I like your answer. I I wanted to talk about something that I don't think is spoken enough about. And you you mentioned about it still being in its infancy and maybe the angry state with the social model when that first came in. Some of the objections were all we're doing is blaming society environment, and we're not looking at our own impairment, which has an impact in itself. I was struck, I met someone who had autism, worked for a big corporate, and he said to me, I'm awesome at my job. They'll throw me a set of plans and I can tell them all the issues within 10 minutes, and it's unbelievable. He said, What they never see is when I go home and I have the deepest, darkest, difficult times. He was married with kids, and he said, I don't know if I'd still be around if I didn't have a family, but so this autism gives me a super skill, that's superhuman bit. But he said the darkness and the difficulties I have with my life, yes, and spikes is there a lack of conversation about the the the tough stuff? Is it because often I can see uh neurodivergent people say these are all the extra things that I've got. Am I being a bit facetious?

Nancy Doyle 34:46

No, I think you're articulating it perfectly. You know, it's not are you a is this a superpower, is this a disability, it's both and you know, it's not either or, it's both and. Um, you know, my ability to think clearly and make decisions in a crisis, I've is, you know, it's it's up there with the best of the uh field generals of the world of World War II. Um my ability to get myself to the post office and remember to post something on time is standing, you know, and and the that that might sound like a like a flippant thing, um, but it's actually it's actually quite big for me. I I I kind of I carry this idea that I'm not sensitive, that I'm not um, that I'm not that I that I don't care about people um because I forget birthdays, because I um forget to ask people how they are sometimes, or if someone tells me that they're not okay, I go straight into problem-solving mode and I don't spend time patting them on the head. So as an adult, I've I really I'm I'm quite kind of intentional about remembering people's birthdays and making sure I I send them presents and I I carry this anxiety that my social uh network is dependent on my ability to remember those things and to be nice and to ask those questions and to stay in sympathy mode for a lot longer than I'm comfortable with. And I have to work really, really hard at that. And when I fail at those things, it it actually does have quite a big impact on my mental health. So it sounds flippant to talk about post offices, but I'm putting more effort into remembering people's birthdays and getting things to the post office to post to people than I am to coming up with a crisis management plan to handle the first three months of the pandemic.

Simon 36:35

But that's that's that's the the difficulty with disability or neurodivergent, the sense of failure or the sense of not being able to do something, yes, despite environment attitudes and so on, and that's a real toughie, and that may change.

Nancy Doyle 36:48

So yeah, thank you. Yeah, yeah, and it's an intersection of gender as well. I think the other thing people forget with neurodiversity are the intersections. So I stand at the intersection of female um gender and and whiteness, so there's both privilege and um and discrimination in there. So, you know, as a female, if I don't send my my in-laws birthday presents, I'm the one getting getting the shade, right? My my husband hasn't sent any of his family a birthday present in in our entire marriage. And and we're pretty we're pretty gender swapped in many ways. I can I can read maps and he can listen. Um, he does the ironing and he knows where stuff is. So, you know, but so even in that relationship, it there's such such a high weight on women's ability to be sociable and to set be sensitive and um you know to take care of people. But if you think as well, the the the you know, when I was at school and I didn't go to school for for two years, and I had this agreement where I'd go and pick up my work on a on a on a Monday, do you think that would have happened if I was a black or brown kid? Like, absolutely not. You know, I would have been that would have been uh I would have been up in front of truancy people, they'd have had the council involved, you know, there was there's no way I would have got away with that, and actually that was the only thing that allowed me to get my GCSEs. I got really good GCSEs going to school half a day a week. If I'd had to go to school every day, well I wouldn't, I'd have been in a pupil referral unit, I can tell you that right now. I'd have been throwing things, but but that that so there's so that so I think people's experience of neurodivergence is not equal through society at all. The the the cool superstar power stuff is the white males of the west coast of the USA who've been whose parents have paid for them to go to Standard Stanford. You know, that's that model is great for neurodiversity, but actually there's a there's a whole world out there that is.

Simon 38:52

I think it can be parents who are terrified of acknowledging that their child may have something and they have to couch it as a bit of, you know, we used to call just say people special, maybe special, so it's an equivalent, it's but that's part of infancy and maturity, it is and you can have a little bit of difficulty as well as the good stuff.

The Shift From Entitlement To Agency

Phil 39:11

Yeah, I suppose Nancy, the last couple of minutes we have we've done a I I found this really fascinating, and I'm wondering what you think is next here. What is the next big move that has to be done? You've only got about three minutes to tell me what it is. Um you know, you've been working very hard for a number of years, and we now recognise neurodivergent people in a different way. We don't see it. I mean, I think Simon and I perhaps are in the privileged group who work for a living talking about this stuff. But you've been banging on about it for a long time now, and you have seen a lot of change. Things have improved. I know that to be true. But what's the next big thing, do you think, for the neurodivergent people uh that we've discussed or talked about today that really has to happen, otherwise we're in a real mess.

Nancy Doyle 40:03

I think we've got to move out of the entitlement era into the agency era. So I think, and and I think that's part of demedicalisation. So what I'm still seeing is this situation where you have to prove that you have a medical condition before you can get adjustments, and so it's it's very much in that kind of let's let's let's battle for resources. Um, and I think I think we have to move into a slightly different era where neurodiver are encouraged to develop the skills, strategies, resources, accommodations that they they they can put in place themselves for themselves. And that's certainly what I'm trying to do. The the book I wrote, Learning from Neurodivergent Leaders, is it's a bit of a I'm so sorry, darling, but if you want to do leadership, you are gonna have to work on yourself. So that time blind thing, you you it's not gonna work in in leadership. You have responsibilities to other people, and you you can't simply be um someone who loses their temper a lot and someone who never gets back to people. You have you have to deal with those things and you have to come up with strategies for it. So, so that and then the uh the the technology that I've developed with uh the genius finder and the e-learning, that that's all about self-development. None of it is about here, let me wave a magic wand for you and send you something that's a shortcut to a skill that you don't have. Actually, everything in there is here's how to develop this skill. If you're struggling with sort of self-organization, here's 25 strategies of things you can practice to get better at that. If you're struggling with emotional regulation, here's 30 strategies of things you can practice to get better at that. Um, and I think that that is that's the level of empowerment that I want neurodivergent people to have. I don't want people to feel helpless like they've been given a label that means that they can no longer expect to do any personal progress in certain areas.

Phil 42:03

I think that's a brilliant response, and it and it reminds me very much of some of the things that I hear myself or used to hear myself saying to disabled people. That you know, if it takes you an hour to get dressed in the morning, like for me, for example, that's what it does. I'm a wheelchair user, it takes a long time to get up. I can't arrive an hour late. I have to get up earlier, don't I? Isn't that the deal? But when I get there, there better be a ramp and a toilet, because if there isn't, why did I get dressed? You know, so I I kind of hear echoes of that in the neuro and I do agree with you. I think where neurodivergent people are at is where Simon and I were at 20 years ago, and we've been moving forwards, but uh we've never really known about this. Have we used to call them all a bit eccentric or whatever, you know, in my generation? It's been fascinating, Nancy. I've really enjoyed listening to you, and I think I hope that you've shown a real shone a light on a whole range of things here that that we're all we're all guilty of not accepting what people do and uh we don't have laws. But I've brilliant, thank you so much. It's been a pleasure.

Nancy Doyle 43:06

Thank you for having me. It's a total honor.

Final Thoughts And How To Reach Us

Announcer 43:15

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