SEND Parenting Podcast

EP 147: Neurodiverse Futures: Work That Works

• Dr. Olivia Kessel

Share episode

So many parents of neurodivergent children lie awake at night wondering the same thing:
 “What will happen when my child enters the workplace?”

In this episode, Dr. Olivia sits down with Jenefer Livings, HR consultant, workplace needs assessor, and mother to a neurodivergent child, to demystify what neurodiversity at work really looks like. Together they explore how shifts in workplace culture, flexible working, and better understanding of executive functioning are transforming what is possible for neurodiverse adults.

You will learn:

  • Why traditional school subjects do not predict your child’s future career success
  • How to identify strengths—not just struggles—in your teenager
  • What reasonable adjustments and Access to Work actually mean
  • How parents can support teens to self-advocate with confidence
  • Why the right workplace can unlock your child’s brilliance (and how to spot the wrong one)
  • The rising opportunities in self-employment and entrepreneurship for differently wired minds

This is a hopeful, practical conversation for any parent wanting to help their child step into adulthood with confidence, clarity, and a sense of possibility.

Click here for Silk Helix

💬 Connect with Us

🌱 Join our SEND Parenting Private WhatsApp Community — a safe space to share, learn, and feel supported by parents who truly understand.

⚡ Ready to go deeper?
Become part of the ADHD Warrior Mum’s Recharge Station — your space for group coaching, expert guidance, real connection, and the calm you deserve.

Dr Olivia:

Welcome to the Send Parenting Podcast. I'm your neurodiverse host, Dr. Olivia Kessel. And more importantly, I'm mother to my wonderfully neurodivergent daughter, Alexandra, who really inspired this podcast. As a veteran in navigating the world of neurodiversity in a UK education system, I've uncovered a wealth of misinformation, alongside many answers and solutions that were never taught to me in medical school or in any of the parenting handbooks. Each week on this podcast, I will be bringing the experts to your ears to empower you on your parenting crusade. It's 2 a.m. You're scrolling again, desperately searching for someone who actually understands what it's like to raise a child of ADHD. School doesn't get it, friends just say be stricter, even family tells you she'll grow out of it. But you know this is different. And you're so tired of fighting this battle completely alone. I'm Dr. Olivia, and as both a medical doctor and a mom of a neurodiverse child, I've built what I desperately needed the ADHD Warrior Mom Recharge Station, a place where you're finally understood. You'll get weekly group coaching when you need support and strategies to use, monthly master classes where you ask the experts your questions, actual self-care strategies that you can implement, and most importantly, a community of mothers who completely get it. Right now I'm opening for just 50 founding members at 29 pounds a month for life. That's 50% off forever. Once these spots are filled, this price will disappear. Stop fighting this alone. You can go to www.sendparenting.com backslash join, or just click on the link in the show notes. In this episode, I'm joined by Jennifer Livings, founder of Silk Helix, HR consultant and specialist in neurodiversity at work. Jennifer's journey as both a parent to a neurodivergent child and a workplace consultant gives her a unique perspective on how home and work life overlap. Together we explore how parents can prepare their children for the transition into the workplace, what true inclusion looks like at work, and why small changes can make a big difference for neurodiverse individuals at work. So, welcome, Jennifer. It is such a pleasure to have you on the Send Parenting podcast today. And we're exploring a topic that hasn't really been touched upon yet in the podcast, which is neurodiversity at work and what that kind of means for our children as they begin to think about what's the right career path for them, what's the right work environment. And you know what? It actually resonates, I would imagine, with a lot of the listeners too, because we're going to unpick what this actually means for neurodivergent parents right now who are navigating their own workplaces and how you know having a neuroaffirming workplace can really make all the difference in terms of your career, your happiness, your well-being. So I'm really excited to talk not only about us, but also our children. But can you start a little bit with sharing with us your personal journey, both as a parent and as a professional, and how the two kind of came together?

Jenefer Livings:

Thank you. And I'm really excited to be here. So to start with kind of my story, and I'll try and keep it brief. So my background professionally is as a H is in HR. I've been a HR consultant for um about 15 years and did internal HR before that. So that's my background. And interestingly, uh neurodiversity never came up. It was never something that I'd heard of, never something that was part of our training or anything like that. And then it did come into my world through being a parent. And through so through parenting, through discovering my child's neurodivergence, then discovering my own, as I think is the case for so many of us at the moment. And that then led me on a path of are you wanting to learn and soak up everything as a parent? So as a parent, you want to figure out what's best for your child, how are you going to deal, how are you going to support them, how are you going to solve the problems that you're experiencing? Because that's why this comes up in the first place. And as I'm learning those things as a parent, I'm relating that to my work as well. And at the time as well, seeing much more questions coming through. I do a lot of management training, so I was getting more and more questions from people. But I was also getting people mentioning that actually they'd had trouble getting their child to school that morning. And these little stories come out, the more you open up and talk about things. And all of that together, kind of the mix of wanting to really understand this for my daughter, my parenting, myself, and also for my work, led me to qualify as a workplace needs assessor, which means I assess the adjustments that somebody will need in the workplace in order to thrive. And to support that, I did a postgraduate certificate in neurodiversity as well, to really understand how this fits not just in the workplace, but also the wider community. So we looked at sort of the criminal justices system, the education system, to really get that kind of wide understanding and also the role that both education and employers play in actually creating healthy environments, as you say, ensuring that we can live the lives that we want to live. So that's how for me it's all kind of ended up together. And I've been fortunate enough to then make a career from really understanding neurodiversity to say going into workplace needs assessments, working with employers to make workplaces healthy, do training with HR departments to give them the knowledge and understanding that so many of us don't have and need to be able to support people at work actually, just like as parents we're doing at home.

Dr Olivia:

Yeah, because it's interesting, you know, that the parenting and kind of that management that they kind of overlap, don't they? Yeah. Can you explain kind of what you mean by that?

Jenefer Livings:

Yeah, I mean, there's huge overlaps. Now, I don't for one minute want to suggest that dealing with people in the workplace is like dealing with children, it's not, but there is a lot of overlap. So things like giving one instruction at a time to we is something we learn for our children, and something you start to realize is actually beneficial to people at work. And things um, so there's those really practical things, things around kind of clean feedback. So again, with parenting, we learned that starting to sort of good girl, good boy aren't that helpful, but actually you did well when you did that, or that was a that particular thing, being really focused. And again, that's good management. And actually, a lot of these things I'd been talking about in management training for years without really realizing why or what impact this has, particularly for neurodiverg for those who are neurodivergent. So there's that side of it, I think, with management, where just some of those skills, being able to adapt our parenting, adapt our management, are both at really crucial, but also recognising in the workplace that this is this is going on and not just neurodivergent, so people who are neurodivergent in the workplace, the adjustments they might need, but also parents are in in the workplace. So parents who are trying to navigate the education system, who are trying to deal with all the challenges that that we know about, they're also trying to get to work, they're trying to do a job, they're trying to earn a living, and actually how we can support those people as well. So it that's kind of where a lot of the overlaps and mixed sort of learnings come together.

Dr Olivia:

It's interesting because it is it is multifactorial, and it's interesting what you what you raised there. It's kind of like you know, looking at those executive functioning skills that we look at in our children and make appropriate kind of what we expect from them at home and also at school too, and put the right supports in place can really make a huge difference for someone who's struggling with their executive functioning at work because it's kind of just a given that you have those strategies and those abilities to multitask and do all these things, you know, being able to help people who are struggling with that within the workplace can really make a the difference of being able to stay in a position or not stay in a position.

Jenefer Livings:

Absolutely. And it is these things that we just assume people have got, and we assume people don't need tools for that often we do. And fortunately, you know, there are so many tools to help us. Um, but again, people don't know, they're not aware of what is out there, what they can use. And a lot of it is that is is discovering what is available for support. Um, but also then, yeah, how we do help and support people, and actually for workplaces, how we rethink how we create work and how what we what we're doing at work. So we expect that people have the range from sort of the basic organizational skills right up to the executive skills that that some of these sort of senior leadership things like that may have. And years ago, a lot of that executive function was taken away from senior leaderships with people like PAs and things, and of course, as technology is developed, we've lost a lot of those kind of PA secretarial type roles. I think even things like that have highlighted some of the challenges that people are experiencing in the workplace actually before they weren't, because they had that support worker, although that's not what they were calling it. And again, it's the same we've seen with as the education system shifts, we see different people struggle as as we shift in what we expect of people.

Dr Olivia:

Yeah, no, that's so true. And you know, it's interesting because I used to be medical director for Ingius, which provided for the access to work contract, and how you know you just mentioned support there, and part of that support that they give to all tor all sorts of different uh accommodations that need to be made at work where they'll give a support person. So my um my the the solicitor that I hired for my tribunal, he's very severely dyslexic. So access to work has an individual who actually manages his emails, reads through them, and is you know, takes that role off him. He's got a brilliant mind, he's great being a solicitor, and so it enables him to do his job. But without that, he would really struggle.

Jenefer Livings:

Yeah. And it's and employers are beginning to realize that as well and realize the benefits of that, that if you try and make people do the things they struggle with, then you're not giving them the headspace to do the things that actually add value, the things that they are really good at. And access to work, you've just you've mentioned there is a really good resource for employers. And it's really important to know about this one because this means that we've when we've got adjustments that are needed that go beyond reasonable, so employers have to have to make a judgment as to what is a reasonable adjustment.

Dr Olivia:

Um give us an example.

Jenefer Livings:

Um so a reasonable adjustment, and it's going to vary business to business, person to person, but if it's relatively low cost, the software nowadays is relatively low cost. Um, so um a recent workplace needs assessment I did, I recommended a range of software options to a client, and they came back saying that most of them they could get on free tiers for their for what they needed. And I think they ended up paying 16 pounds a month for software. And then other things were adjustments to how the manager writes their emails, how the um whether the manager puts things into writing or also things verbally, things like that. They're all going to be reasonable because they're low cost, they're having low impact. The example you've just given, needing a support worker. So this is where an employer is going to be looking to need to employ somebody else, that's probably going to go beyond what's considered reasonable. And therefore, access to work, that's what access to work is there for, to provide that additional support. And there are some softwares that are much more expensive, although they are coming down in price. Access to work again will jump in and provide those types of supports. And also whether the degree to what access to work will provide varies on size of organization and things like that, because reasonable does too. So if you're in a big organization with big resources, then you're going to be expected to spend more money than a smaller one. But equally, smaller organizations tend to have a little bit more flexibility. And in some for some people, they they they suit people better anyway, just because by nature they've got that flexibility.

Dr Olivia:

Yeah, absolutely. And that that brings up to my mind the second point that you brought up, which is if someone's struggling because they have a neurodiverse child, and so you know, maybe they have a meltdown in the morning. And I actually had a uh a guest a couple months ago actually from SENPRETEC, and she was describing, you know, she was a financial advisor, and her employer just did not, you know, didn't want to be flexible or couldn't be flexible, and you know, she had to leave that position. And then she got another job and really in the interview told what her situation was, and they listened and were able to give her the right kind of environment where if her child was having, you know, unable to go to school or anything like that, she could work from home and was really flexible. And you know, they've got now a loyal employee who is really happy in their role.

Jenefer Livings:

Yeah, exactly. And it is these simple changes that make a huge difference, like flexibility, being able to work from home because you your child you can't get your child to school that morning, is these these are the things that are really important, and it does it's an employer's mindset as to whether or not they will do that. For parents of children with disabilities or neurodivergent children, there's no legal entitlement to reasonable adjustments in those situations. There is entitlement to carers' leave. A lot of parents don't realise that they may actually come under the carer's leave where where the care they're providing goes beyond normal parenting and the child is is registered disabled. Um, so there may be that. But other than that, um, there's time off for dependence for unexpected incidents. But of course, if a child is regularly having these struggles in the morning, it starts to not become an unexpected incident anymore. And employers can start to say, well, actually, we need something else. Well, as you rightly say, that something else is flexible working. And if you've got that and you you do gain really loyal employees because once as a parent you know that you're in a situation where you've you're earning the money you need and it's fitting around your lifestyle and you can be the support your child needs, you're not going to give that job up very quickly. Like that you've got that loyalty, so yeah, it it does come down to to employers to support, and and in that respect, it's a chairing in the interview. It's often been said, don't tell people in the interview, you might get discriminated against. And it's true, and there is an element of privilege to being able to disclose whether you are neurodivergent yourself in an interview or whether you've got a neurodivergent child. But ultimately, if you're able to choose your employer, then uh choosing an employer that gets it and is going to support you is going to make life a lot lot easier to deal with, and therefore is it is worth sort of being discriminated against effectively and saying to an employer and going it finding out that they're not going to support you.

Dr Olivia:

Well, absolutely. You you know, it it I always view it like when you're having an interview, and I know you know when you don't have a job and you really need to find a job, and I've been there, it's hard, you know. But actually the interview process isn't just about them interviewing you, it's about you interviewing them. You know, I went I was flown to Amsterdam for an interview. I was interviewed with no no water, no toilet break by eight hours by all these people. And you know, at the end of the day, I got the job. And you know what I said to them? I said, no, I do not want the job because the way you treated me, and this is the honeymoon period, was not fair. And I said, it's not, and it's just gonna get worse from here. So, you know what? I'm gonna find another job. Yes, you know, and and that's that's my own prerogative to do and my own risk to do. And I know that it's it's scary, but really you want to find out and you want to test your employer as well in terms of how, and you don't even have to make it personal, but how they would react to, you know, what is your policy on neurodiversity? What is your policy on flexible working? You don't need to make it personal to yourself, but you want to find you don't want to jump from the frying pan into the fire if you're in that situation. Yeah, um, because it's just gonna end up in the same situation again. So um I would encourage people to to to make sure the fit is right for them. Yeah.

Jenefer Livings:

Oh, I absolutely would, because I think we when you're when you're parenting and and especially parenting your diregent child, it can be incredibly stressful at home. The last thing you want is your job, adding that stress. And so, yeah, finding the right employer is is crucial. And increasing the employers are becoming aware they're not all. Um, so it is worth, as you say, using that interview as that two-way process to to test whether this is somebody that you can work for as much as they're judging you.

Dr Olivia:

And you know what, it actually goes, you know, I've been in senior uh leadership. It it you know, someone who has the hutzfa or the confidence to do that, me as an employer, that shows, wow, this is someone I want on my team too, because you know what, you're advocating for yourself, and that is something that is valued. Um, I think you know, that's what what what you want. You want a strong individual, a good candidate. So you you are showing those qualities. So um it's it's not all negative. But this this brings us to the the broader kind of question is we have our children who are now, you know, at school looking for what they want to do as they move forward into the workforce. What advice or what, you know, um, I know we've spoken about this before, like, you know, it's English, it's math, it's you know, it doesn't really give us a good guidance of what's the right career for our kids. Um, how would you address that?

Jenefer Livings:

Yeah, it it's a really it's a big question to start with, isn't it? Because I think, yes, as we've spoken about, schools do have a tendency to focus on, well, are you good at this subject or that subject and and focus like that? And actually, the world of work doesn't generally work like that. There's few jobs where you home in on a subject like like a school subject. So, and and actually for for many of our children, there's challenges across school anyway. School isn't always going to be the place that they're going to thrive. Yeah, but I think there's a few things to look at. I think firstly, we have a huge challenge as parents anyway, regardless of whether our children are neurodirigent or not, doing well in school or not. And that is that the jobs that exist right now are not all going to exist in the future and the very near future, and the and new jobs are going to exist. And I think that's one of the big challenges we've got. It's really hard to see what the climate's going to actually look like for our children coming and coming out of school. So I so for me, I think it's around looking really focusing on where areas of strength are. And particularly for our neurodivergent children, is so not looking, are you good at English? But if there's a particular thing within that subject, even so is it that actually digging into um talking about sort of stories about people, for example, is that bit particularly interesting? Does actually when you look at that across subjects, maybe that comes up when you talk about history or geography, that it's the people bit that that appeals to you, or it it or is it the problem solving? Is it the creativity? But also thinking about what these words really mean. So I came out of school believing I wasn't creative. Now, what that actually meant was I was rubbish at art because I am a really creative problem solver, but I'm rubbish at art. But at school I was told I wasn't creative because the creative people were good at art. And so I and so I believed until I went into work, and actually somebody said to me, You say you're not creative, but you are. That really got me thinking. And then I also have to, when I'm doing training with employers, I get them to think about words that they use and what they really mean. So flexibility, for example, and I'll give you another personal story. Flexibility. I am really good at pivoting where my business needs to be, responding to what what's going on in the market, what I need to change. I'm really good in a crisis. Crisis happens in front of me, I will change everything to solve that crisis. But you say to me, we're going out for lunch today and we're going to restaurant X, and just as we're leaving the door, you say, Oh, actually, well, fancy why now. No, I'm not coping with that, right? I'm going to really struggle with that. So am I flexible or am I not flexible? Well, in the right situations, I am. And I had and I'm talking when I talk to employers, I talk about this. Like, don't use words like flexibility because nobody actually knows what it means. And I'll stand at the front of a training and go, I've seen your job advertising, you're looking for flexible people who are flexible. What do you mean by that? And they look at me and I'm like, Well, if you don't know what you mean by it, how do the people applying for jobs know what they mean by it? And it's something on on the flip side, as parents, it it's worth us really working with our children to say where are your strengths, and actually to look even into words like flexibility and say, okay, look, our child does struggle if we change our minds on what restaurant we're going to. But let's not rule out where we can see flexibility elsewhere and see what they might be good at. And then you can start, I think from there to look into what kind of careers that that might suit, where that might, where that might go, but also just looking at what they're interested in as well, and the careers that come from that. I think that's also really important is there there are the sort of traditional careers, children would still, the research shows us, tell us kind of a top 10 jobs that they want, and they're the jobs that they can see teacher, lawyer, firefighter, those types of jobs. But actually, so many more people are employed in other jobs that often we don't see. And so digging into those and their interests, if their interest is gaming, for example, let look at the world of creating gaming, influences around gaming, selling gaming, all of those things, the things are part of that industry, and I think that's worth exploring too.

Dr Olivia:

I think that's you know, those are such wise words because you know, a lot of our children really can hyperfocus and like you know, if they are really interested in something, then somehow the skills come to the play. You know what I mean? Like my daughter's working memory is really bad, but she loves drama, so she can memorize an entire chapter, she can memorize scripts, she can't, you know, do it in other things, but with in something she's really interested in, she can. So it's kind of finding what that passion is, and then can is there a role within that passion that fits their strengths as well, once you've explored what's what's out there? And there's a lot of searching, and as you say, the landscape is changing with technology and with everything as well. So, you know, I know my daughter's not going to be a lawyer or a doctor, you know, or or any of those kind of traditional careers, but it's looking to see what she can do and where she can excel, you know. Uh, and I think that's what parents need to focus on. And they might not get that from schools because it's not just, oh, she's good at English or math, you know, um, or what is it, math and science, engineer, English and this, this, you know, how they traditionally kind of do it. It's really tapping into that passion and then also looking at, and I would say we've talked about strengths, but also looking at weaknesses and being able to recognize that. Like, so for example, my attention to detail, I'm dyslexic, probably undiagnosed ADHD, and I cannot, I am not good at detail. It is not my strength. This weekend I set out sent out messages to people introducing a community I'm I'm opening up, ADHD warrior moms. And I'm very excited about it, so excited to get these text messages out that I didn't look at it properly, okay? So instead I put the price of the the later membership, not the founding member membership. And I sent it out to all these people. And it wasn't until someone came and told me, you know what, you sent out the wrong price, it doesn't match the one on the website. I was like, oh, okay, but that's not my strength. So I have to, I need to double check or have someone check things for me. So a job that was really detail-oriented would not be something that I should go into. You know, it's my weakness. So I think you need to know your weaknesses and your strengths.

Jenefer Livings:

Yeah, absolutely agree. And some of those is knowing where your weaknesses can be supported. So where you can still go into those jobs because there is certainly enough support out there that will cover up your weaknesses, you can deal with it. And others is yeah, accepting that actually that that probably isn't the best place for me to be. And partly that it's not going to be healthy if the pressure, pressure is on that.

Dr Olivia:

Well, it's not enjoyable, is it? I mean, it's it's not it's not enjoy. I can do it if I really try hard. And I, you know, it it's painful, you know. So um it's it's playing to your strengths, which I think is so important, and seeing exactly as you said, how you can support your weaknesses, but probably not have a job that's completely embedded in your weaknesses.

Jenefer Livings:

Yeah, absolutely. And unfortunately, we are seeing adults in that situation, and I think because so many of us weren't aware of this when we were we were at school, and it's and also it's encouraged to hide your weaknesses. Even now we see I've I've got one that's going into GCSEs and they're talking about careers and things in school and the advice coming out, and it's and it's like, well, you answer the what's your weaknesses question with I'm a perfectionist because I can turn that into a positive. That's an awful way to answer that question. I don't even know why employers ask it, like what's the point? Because that's the only answer you're ever gonna get. Um, I've done enough interviews, heard that answer so many times. And employers don't know why they're asking that question. The question needs to be really asked to say, like to be advocating and things like that. Because actually, if you know your weaknesses, you're not gonna go into the job that I mean, I can't sing, I'm not gonna apply to be a singer, am I? Like, what do you want me to say in this situation? And I think it is that that thing of we're told to kind of hide away our wit weaknesses or turn them into a positive, and actually sometimes, as you say, we've gotta embrace them, but also I've had effectively the same job in two different companies, and in one company thrived and my and had people like talking about how I've got a no-problem attitude, how I'm creative, I come up with new ideas, and they've really um sung my praises for that. And then in another one where I've got a manager who is very hot on spending and grammar, who's homed in on that, and ri and I've ended up being in performance meetings about that. Because the and it's effectively the same job, they were both um HR consultants for other company roles, and it it just shows actually the same person in a different environment, but even in the same job, depending on what you focus in on, is has a has a huge difference. And and that time it's before I knew I was dyslexic, so I didn't have that answer to come back with. I was just I knew I couldn't spell, but um I probably didn't realise it was as bad as it was. But we are seeing through like when I do the workplace needs assessments, we're seeing so many people who have gone into careers and now are stuck with children and a mortgage, probably in the wrong job and the wrong career, and they're not in a position to be able to change it easily. Um, and I think our children where diagnosis and things is being identified a lot younger, I think hopefully we'll be in a better position in the workplace to go in already understanding themselves. And I think that that's a big, big part of it.

Dr Olivia:

Yeah, and being able to advocate for themselves as well, and and you know, asking those questions and being able to, you know, and and and also you know, there's a learning curve for the working environment too, to realize that you know you've got to tap into people's strengths, and then you know, you that's where the magic happens because they don't want high turnovers either. Uh but uh there's also you know an argument because you know, as you say, the landscape is changing because there's a whole you know, entrepreneurship, self-employment, that's the route I've gone down, it's the route you've gone down. Um that kind of changes the landscape as well.

Jenefer Livings:

It does change the landscape as well, and it's so much more accessible now than it was back then. I think it's important that we encourage it. Um, I at school as a teenager said I want to be an entrepreneur, and it was just laughed at um, probably because I was a girl. Um, but it was just like, no, you think of find yourself a sensible job, sensible career. Um, and actually that wasn't for me. I was always going to struggle to be in an office. I was always gonna struggle to um be following somebody else's rules.

Dr Olivia:

Um, you're you're speaking, it's it's as if my mind is coming out of your mouth.

Jenefer Livings:

It's and and this is the reality, is sometimes we have to face it and say, do you know what the conventional way of working isn't gonna work for me? And so it for me, it yeah, working for myself and um being able to work across lots of different organizations with lots of different people, have that variety, that that's what I need. And I think that for our again, for our young people, there's so much more access to it. It is so much easier, and of course, if they can start those and and test and try out with the support of their parents before they get to points where the as they've got children and uh and a mortgage to pay, and then you're kind of stuck with with um some boundaries onto the risks you can take and things like that, I think it it's a really good opportunity. But there's also a lot more information out there. So the internet gives us a way to put ourselves out there and to sell ourselves and to to be able to create. Various types of jobs and entrepreneurship and things from that, but also to learn about it as well, because there's so many people out there putting the content and the information out there. I think it's not the things you're gonna learn in school, even in a business studies classroom. You're not gonna learn what you're gonna learn from other people that are already doing it.

Dr Olivia:

Yeah, absolutely. And that's why I mean I think following your passion is a real key point in that because it's um it doesn't feel like work anymore when you, you know, like doing this podcast is a pleasure for me. I love the people I meet, I love doing this, you know what I mean? Um I don't make any money doing it, okay, but that's okay. I love doing it. And you know, there there you find other ways to make money, but within your hyper focus or within what you love to do, you will be successful, I think, because you're gonna put the time in and because you enjoy it, you know. And I think our kids, that's gonna be the route that they can take because oftentimes, I don't know about you your daughter, but the GCSCs might not be an actuality. I mean, it's it's something to aim towards, but because they have neurodevelopmental delays and it, you know, they might be ready to take the GCSEs in three, five years from when their neurotypical peers are. Well, that's not an option in our school system, you know. Um yeah, so they have to think out of the box.

Jenefer Livings:

This is it, absolutely. And it's interesting because I work with um sort of business owners, I work with middle managers, and the amount of people that tell me, especially business owners, that they haven't got GCSEs, they didn't do well at school. But even in middle management positions, I hear that as well. And this idea we were told at school of GCSEs were the be or and end or if you didn't pass that was your life over, like it it's not true. There's I work with so many successful people who would quite happily put school behind them, and um and it's not it's not where they thrived. And also, and again nowadays, there is if we're not dependent on people, and I think that's one of the things with getting jobs is you're dependent on people's judgments. And unfortunately, there is a lazy, simple judgment, which is have you got GCSEs, which proves that you can supposedly do maths and English and supposedly at the level that that job needs. Um and if if you can find ways to to demonstrate your skills in other ways, um, whether that is to get into a job because you've got somebody who can who believes in you, you've been able to sell yourself to somebody, or whether it is going through entrepreneurship, finding ways to just getting out there and like washing cars, doing the simple thing to start with. These are ways you can really learn from the ground up. Um and there are easy access sort of routes to be able to be able to do that. And GCSE's a few years down the line, and everyone's forgotten what they they did at GCSE anyway. It but it's yeah, the pressure on kids to it's insane.

Dr Olivia:

I mean, my daughter it's not until next year for her, and she's already going to bed. Say, Mommy, I'm so worried about them. And I'm the kind of mom who's like, don't worry about them, it doesn't matter what happens. You know, and I said, it's a good work ethic to learn, like, okay, you're gonna study and you're gonna do this. And that's all really, you know, that's that's good discipline. But I said at the end of the day, it doesn't really matter. But it's that pressure that they put and the messages that they get, even in specialist independent school from their teachers about how important this is. I said, sweetie, do you realize that one third of kids fail and that's considered a good GCSE result? That's a third. Let's look at pizza. If we cut a third of those kids away, that's and she's like, wow. And I said, so it's it's not the end-all. And you know what? Those kids can go on to be very, very successful, as you've illustrated with the, you know, the people that you work with and the people that we see, but it can really impact an individual's self-worth. And that's the most knocking, not the failed GCSE, it's the pressure and the mental anguish that goes with it that really takes its bite out of a child as their brain is still developing and they're becoming young adults. That we need to kind of balance out and as parents and as people who are in the workforce, you know, understand that it's not the be all and I would fail my English GCSEs because like you, I cannot spell. Yeah. 50% of it is spelling.

Jenefer Livings:

Yeah, I this and that, I think that's the thing, is that that I mean, I I certainly went into parenting with all those beliefs about GCSEs. And I was one, I that that fortunately, the education system, I think at the time I went through it, it kind of worked for me. Um, and I look at how it is now, and and things are so much different that I think that I don't I think I would have struggled a lot more now than I did back then. And and so I was fortunate, but it also meant that I did go through with those attitudes of this is important, and I was that parent that was like moved to the right school location and and things like that. And actually, I've learned so much through my children and and had to reflect and say, actually, this isn't right. And actually, when I've then hit a point in my career where employment wasn't going to work for me anymore, I've gone out on my own, that's where I've started to meet people, and it opened my mind up to this world that uh to me either wasn't there or I was too scared to see or look at. But I think that's a big thing for us as a parents is opening our minds to the fact that our children could go down a whole range of routes that aren't the ones that we thought we would be going down or we thought they would be going down.

Dr Olivia:

Yeah, it's so true. It's like it's looking beyond that curtain that you didn't even know there was a whole world that existed behind there.

Jenefer Livings:

Absolutely. Yeah, definitely.

Dr Olivia:

A Wizard of Oz experience. Yeah. Well, it's been really, really great uh speaking with you, Jennifer, and I appre appreciate all the advice you've given. But are there can you give like maybe three top tips for kind of parents whose kids are kind of in that teenager where you're where your kids are and my mine is as well, and they're approaching that kind of we're gonna start to need to be thinking about getting a job. What tips, what three top tips would you give parents to take away with them?

Jenefer Livings:

Okay, so probably start with look at strengths, really understanding what their strengths are, and as you mentioned, alongside that, their their weaknesses, their challenges as well, but really focusing on what their strengths are and make sure they believe that as well. Because certainly in the workplace, the big thing that I see is where is the self-belief makes a huge difference. And you're gonna have to sell yourself, whether that's a job interview or entrepreneurship, you're gonna have to sell yourself. So believing in those strengths and being able to talk about them, I think is really crucial. And I think that's something that we as parents have to battle against schools and things who possibly aren't doing so much of that to really make sure our children do believe in themselves and their strengths. Um, I think from a practical point of view, um exposure to the workplace is really important, whether that's um volunteering, work experience, um, but also things like looking at documentaries, TV programmes that go into the behind the scenes. I mean, if if your child wants to be the next YouTuber, Mr. Beast has got a whole load of content out there about what it took to become what he's become, use that, use those resources. You use people who are in the industries that you're your child's into. You you talked about acting and Hannah Lau there's one on TikTok that's putting out lots of content about what is it like going to auditions, what's it like behind the scenes.

Dr Olivia:

And so that kind of exposure I think is a is good for I'm gonna make a note of that and I don't let her go on TikTok, but um maybe we can watch it together online.

Jenefer Livings:

Um Yeah, that well that's it, even if it is finding things yourself to share, yeah, share with them. I think it's it's a good it's a way of behind the scenes and actually a way of learning yourself for a parent to be able because yeah, I mean, I wouldn't know where to start with some of these things of guiding cut sort into specific careers. So I think that there's a lot of information out there and it is worth really sort of digging in and seeing what what there is and what you can share with with children. But then from that and certainly from understanding those strengths and weaknesses, and you've mentioned it around advocating, is giving our children the independence to advocate for themselves, to really understand themselves so they can advocate for themselves when they do go into the workplace, they do advocate for themselves and positively ask for adjustments. So go into it with look, these are my strengths, these are things I'm really good at. But to get that best out of me, I need these things to support me as well. And so being able to advocate and and if you don't know what those things are, then asking your employer for a workplace needs assessment so that somebody can support you to understand what they are and understanding that actually employers have a duty to do that. Employers have a duty to proactively support you to make reasonable adjustments and going in with that knowledge, that understanding, that confidence to advocate for yourself, I think is really important as well.

Dr Olivia:

Yeah, I agree. And and you know, even if you reframe it in your mind, it's not like you're asking for something, it's also to help them. You know what I mean? Like it you're coming at it from a collaborative approach, is that I want to be the best person I can in this role, and therefore we need to work together, you know. And I think it's kind of changing the lens that we think of it. It's not like, you know, asking for something that other people don't get. No, it's it's actually asking for something that you need, like someone who needs glasses or needs, you know, uh a wheelchair. It's asking for something that you need to be able to do the job in the best way that you can, because that's what you're really motivated to do for them. And then that changes the kind of the lens, hopefully, that the conversation goes in.

Jenefer Livings:

Absolutely. And some of these things we've seen them rolled out across companies, we've seen software being introduced for one person and realizing actually this will help everybody and rolling it out across the organization. So, yeah, there's a lot of the time it it does help. It helps the business, whether it's just helping you to do your job and perform well, or whether it's something that they can use for other people.

Dr Olivia:

Yeah, and I think those are wonderful, wonderful tips. And I really appreciate you coming on the podcast today to discuss something we haven't discussed before, which is but which is so important because we spend most of our life at work.

Jenefer Livings:

No, I really enjoyed being here. Thank you very much.

Dr Olivia:

Thank you for listening, Send Parenting Tribe. Remember, you don't have to do this alone. Join as one of the 50 founding members at 29 pounds a month for life. Cancel anytime. Link is in the show notes. Next week we'll be looking at neurodiversity at work, what it means now, and what it means for our children as they approach the age where they enter the workforce. Looking forward to having you join us then.