Laura Jobson delivers training to businesses and organisations around neurodiversity in the workplace. Here, Laura talks about adjustments and allowances and the impact they can have on individuals, teams and entire workforces.
It can be pretty lonely being neurodivergent in a neurotypical world, and the constant undercurrent of being misunderstood and feeling unacceptable – being ‘othered’ – is a huge contributing factor.
So what can we do about it?
The first step is to learn about neurodiversity and provide an environment of empathy. Show people that they’re safe to be open about their challenges. If you do that, you’ll then be able to strategise together about what actions to take.
When taking action and arranging adjustments, the support someone needs will depend upon their particular challenges, but it’s often the more holistic adjustments that make the most significant impact, for example:
- A person who struggles to read social cues may miss their opportunity to interject in meetings, meaning their creative and thoughtful ideas are missed. So, can we offer the option of putting hands up to speak at the start of the meeting so that everyone who wants to put their hand up can do it without judgment?
- A person who is sensitive to light may experience severe sensory distress under the fluorescent lights of a shared office. Can we provide them with a lamp, an alternative space to work or opportunities to be away from that room?
- A person who is hyperfocused and working hard may forget to eat or drink. Can we check on them intermittently and remind them to hydrate?
- A person who struggles to regulate their emotions may find it difficult to concentrate on a work task. Can we provide them an opportunity to talk it through with a trusted person while they work, or take a walk at lunchtime to regulate together?
- Actively engaging in strategising around these types of adjustments sends a powerful message:
You are understood. You’re important to us. We want to help.
YOU’RE MAKING ADJUSTMENTS, SO WHAT?
It’s not ‘pandering’ – it’s empathy.
So what? Yes, this is an Impact Report and it’s easy for me to get lost in the “why” and not the “what”. Well, the impact I’ve seen is invaluable and often pretty much immeasurable.
Whilst delivering training…
- I’ve seen teams who were struggling to understand each other embrace open conversations about their challenges.
- I’ve watched the relief on the face of a lady I trained when she realised she wasn’t the only person in the room who struggled to speak and make eye contact.
- I’ve seen teams realise their ways of working weren’t inclusive and heard the transformative, empathetic conversations that followed.
- I’ve seen a group of 40 come to the collective realisation that for some people, social communication is an intensely draining balancing act, and then heard their fantastic ideas for communicating more intentionally while they liaise with colleagues.
ONCE YOU KNOW, YOU KNOW….
A case study in the making:
I recently trained a small team and the owner of the business asked to be excluded. At first, I was disappointed and a little confused.
Then it all started to make sense. I talked to the team about executive functioning and we worked on How To Work With Me documents. But the owner had asked me to give the team an introduction to RSD. Rejection Sensitive Dysphoria can be – and for this team’s boss is – debilitating. It can cause and was causing conflict. And the mood in the room shifted completely when I started to talk about this. A moment of “oh sh*t now this is starting to make sense,” for them and for me.
To cut a long story short, a week later the business owner told me that one of the employees had stopped RSD in its tracks by immediately spotting the pattern and stepping in to remedy it. That was followed up with “I’m just putting into practice what Laura taught us.”