Navigating neurodiversity at work - with Kristen Carder of I Have ADHD

#192: Kristen Carder is host of the I Have ADHD podcast and a coach who has supported thousands of people with neurodiversity.  She explains what neurodiversity means, common workplace challenges neurodivergent people face, and how we can improve the workplace for neurodivergent people.

What you’ll learn

• [01:38] What you need to understand about neurodiversity.
• [02:46] How to define neurodiversity.
• [03:30] What it means to be neurotypical.
• [05:02] The challenge of getting a neurodiversity diagnosis and when to reach out.
• [08:02] How to know if your struggles are due to being neurodivergent.
• [10:38] The challenges for neurodivergent people in the workplace.
• [13:11] The variety within neurodiversity.
• [14:10] The challenges autistic people have in understanding implicit meanings.
• [16:11] The positive attributes people with ADHD and autism have.
• [18:23] How coaching can help people who are neurodivergent.
• [19:43] How to disclose your neurodiversity in the workplace.
• [21:45] The pros and cons of disclosing your neurodiversity at work.
• [23:25] How to assess how accepting your workplace is.
• [26:06] Strategies to deal with workplace conflicts.
• [29:14] The common misconceptions about neurodiversity in the workplace.
• [31:48] Techniques to dispel myths around neurodivergence in the workplace.
• [34:26] How a neurotypical person can support their neurodivergent colleagues.
• [39:03] What shame does to you and how to overcome it.

Resources mentioned in this episode
Please note that some of these are affiliate links and we may get a commission in the event that you make a purchase.  This helps us to cover our expenses and is at no additional cost to you.

• Tara Brach RAIN Technique
• Megan Brown Enya @ADHDatwork
• Two exercises to help you find career happiness

For the show notes for this episode, including a full transcript and links to all the resources mentioned, visit:

https://changeworklife.com/navigating-neurodiversity-at-work/

Re-assessing your career?  Know you need a change but don't really know where to start?  Check out these two exercises to start the journey of working out what career is right for you!

Transcript

0:00

What does it mean to be neurodiverse in the workplace? If you identify as being neurodiverse, how do you figure out what might best support you in the workplace? And how do you go about communicating that to your colleagues? And if you have a neurodiverse colleague at work, what are the ways that you can best support them? That's what we're going to find out in this week's episode. I'm Jeremy Cline, and this is Change Work Life. Hello and welcome to Change Work Life, the show that's all about beating the Sunday evening blues and enjoying Mondays again. If you want to know how you can enjoy a more satisfying and fulfilling working life, you're in the right place. Earlier this year, I did a course on neurodiversity and coaching, and my most immediate takeaway was how little I knew about the subject. Of course, I'd heard of autism and ADHD and dyslexia and so on. But what did they actually mean? And more specifically, what impact could neurodiversity have on someone in the workplace? To introduce us to this subject, I'm joined this week by Kristen Carder. Kristen is a mindset coach and host of the I Have ADHD podcast, the number one, top-rated podcast for adult ADHD. Kristen, welcome to the show. Hello. Thank you so much for having me. So, I have a lot of questions to ask, but this is a really big subject. So, the first thing I wanted to ask you is, for someone who's heard of neurodiversity but doesn't really know a lot about it, what's the single most important thing you'd like them to take away today? It's a very broad question, but I will do my best to answer. And I think the most important thing that someone could walk away with is just an understanding that not everyone's brain functions exactly like yours. Not everyone's brain is the same. And there's a wide variety of the way that brains work. And I think that for someone who's neurotypical, it's really easy to just assume that everyone's brain functions the same way. But as someone who is neurodivergent, neurodiversity is near and dear to my heart because my people and I are a little different, and we want to be included in the workplace, we want to do a good job at our jobs, but we might get to that end a little bit differently. I think you've probably just done a pretty good job of doing so already, but how would you define neurodiversity? Again, it's a broad question, but I think it can be answered in many ways. Truly, it's just a divergence from the, quote-unquote, 'norm'. So, it is something outside of what we as a society view as typical. And for some, that's a beautiful and creative and wonderful thing. And for others, it truly is a disability that impairs their ability to function within a workplace or a family system, but it is just any variation on what is considered normal or typical. So, you've mentioned the term neurotypical there alongside neurodiverse. I mean, is everyone neurodiverse in their own way, but it's just that you're looking at the extremes to determine whether or not it is neurodiversity rather than neurotypicality? I think that's a fair question. And I wonder if the answer is above my pay grade. Because I have an opinion, and my opinion is that it's important for us to have a baseline measure of what is typical. I think we function best as a society when we do have that baseline of what is, quote-unquote, 'normal', so that we can notice when there's a variation to that, and perhaps accommodate when necessary, when there is a variation to that. But humans are complex, and we bring a lot of nuance and creativity and past history and trauma. And I just think that there are so many things that affect how we present ourselves in the world. And so, maybe probably is my answer. Maybe. I'm not sure. I realised I forgot to say at the start of this episode that this is a subject which is possibly not well-researched or well-understood. So, for anyone listening who hears my questions and is offended by the implications or the assumptions that I make, then please do forgive me. It's all asked from a question of curiosity, or it's all asked from a place of curiosity. My understanding is that getting a diagnosis for a particular neurodiversity or a combination of neurodiversity can be extremely hard. So, when might someone choose to take steps to determine whether they have a neurodiversity without formally going to seek medical advice on the subject? It can be very difficult, and it especially does depend on where you are in the world, as to how easy it is to find someone who will assess you, make a correct assessment, and then after, give you a diagnosis and possible treatment for any particular neurodivergence that you may have. And I think it's also important that we mention, not everyone has access, not everyone has money, not everyone has insurance, all of that as well. What I tell my people, what I tell my clients and my podcast listeners, is that if you are struggling, and you are needing to work harder than your peers, if you are just having, and we can talk about it in the context of the workplace, when you look around at your colleagues, and you see that they are getting their work done, they're functioning rather easily, and you're having to put in twice as much work, or the behind the scenes of what you are doing is so chaotic and difficult, and you're having to pull all-nighters, that is a great time to reach out and say, 'I wonder if there's something going on. I wonder if there's some sort of neurodivergence happening.' Because as an adult, you're not in the school environment where a teacher may recognise that you're struggling. You have to advocate for yourself. And I'm an expert in ADHD, I don't necessarily speak for every single person with ADHD, but I do know that we carry a lot of shame. Because we've spent so long not measuring up, not fitting in, having to work twice as hard, hiding the mess behind the scenes. And I always encourage people that, you're labelling yourself anyway. You're probably labelling yourself lazy, unorganised, unmotivated, unable to keep up, it might be kinder to receive a label that gives you more information, a label like autistic or Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder, or some sort of label like that can answer a lot of questions and dispel some of that shame. This may fall into the questions that I probably shouldn't ask or may regret asking, but I'm thinking of the person who is struggling at work, and part of it could be the reasons that you've just described, but it could also be that they're just in the wrong place. I don't know, the person who's been pressurised by their family to study medicine, because all the family is doctors, and they should all do it. And so, they go and study medicine, and they get good grades and all that kind of thing. But they really don't like it. And it's all a bit of a struggle. So, yeah, I don't know if you can talk to, I don't know, identifying the difference there. For sure. There is a measure, I think, for all humans that when we are trying to force ourselves to do something that we hate, we're going to struggle. There's no getting out of that, right? And some people can hang longer than others in that type of scenario. But let's take the context of someone going to medical school, and they're really not meant to be a doctor, but their parents are encouraging them to do it, et cetera. We can still look at what was medical school like for you compared to your peers, and what the behind the scenes looks like. It's so important that we don't measure neurodiversity based on achievement or accomplishment. I've heard stories, I have the privilege of engaging with thousands of people with ADHD, and it's so incredible. And the stories that I hear, the way in which psychologists and clinicians speak to them, they'll say things like, 'Well, you can't have ADHD, you went to law school, you're a lawyer. You can't have ADHD, you went to Harvard. You can't have ADHD, you're too accomplished.' And it's so important to note that it's not the outside accomplishment that we need to look at, it's the behind the scenes of what it takes to get there. Is it comparative to your colleagues, to your fellow peers in school, or is it so much harder? Are you pulling all-nighters? Are you late on everything? Is it just so chaotic behind the scenes? And, yeah, I mean, someone with ADHD is very much going to struggle. And I would also say likely autism is going to really struggle if they're in the wrong environment. But when your brain is functioning at a typical level, there is a longer endurance that you can have in that environment, it seems, something that I've observed, as compared to someone who's not functioning at a typical level. In that case, it's usually a disaster. What are some of the challenges for someone who is neurodiverse in the workplace? How long do we have, Jeremy, to discuss this? Hours or a couple of minutes? I would say, I've already noted that things are just more difficult across the board than their colleagues. I would say the primary challenges that I hear from clients is that they struggle to meet deadlines on time. They struggle with mundane tasks that they view as stupid, that the company views as important. So, maybe that would be like filling out an expense report, right? And so, the ADHD employee looks at this expense report, and it's like, 'This is just busy work, I don't feel like doing this, this is dumb.' The company needs the expense report. The ADHD-er looks at it like, this is not something that I think matters, and therefore, our brain prioritises it at a much less level of importance, and it just doesn't get done, and then it piles up. And then, at the end of the month, whether it's expense reports or notes for clinicians or whatever the case may be, there's this backlog that now is just this insurmountable mountain that needs to be climbed. And that can be really, really difficult. Not only meeting deadlines and a chaotic behind-the-scenes, but also interpersonal relationships with colleagues can be really difficult. People with autism and ADHD struggle to self-regulate their emotions. That's actually one of our deficient executive functioning skills. And what that means is that, oh, dear, we can be really explosive, we can get really angry really fast, we have trouble self-soothing. When a colleague makes a comment that is offensive to us, we have a hard time letting it go. It might distract us for the entire day, and we might not get anything done. So, interpersonal relationships can be really difficult for us, too. And I think this is a good time to also mention that we, neurodivergent folks, struggle with a high level of rejection sensitivity. And so, while we're the ones that struggle to manage our emotions, we also struggle if we perceive that we might be being rejected. And so, that really goes into difficulty when it comes to relationships with employers or colleagues. It can make things really difficult for us. And when you describe all these things, I mean, presumably, these will come to varying or greater, lesser degrees, maybe not even at all, maybe some will present themselves really strongly, and some barely at all. Absolutely. Yeah. And that is one of the things that makes neurodiversity, even just diagnosing, really difficult. Because both autism and ADHD are spectrum disorders, and no one person's experience is exactly the same as another's. And our symptoms can vary depending on our history, our brain chemistry, just our trauma, how much self-development work we have done or have not done, whether or not we're treated, those types of things. So, yeah, there's definitely a spectrum and a varying degree to which we struggle. And I think it's in the context of autism, one of the things I've heard is things that other people might take us for granted, sort of societal norms or terms of phrase which just implicitly mean something, that might not necessarily mean the same thing to someone who's autistic. My autistic friends, I just love them so much. And many times, what I hear from autistic or AuDHD clients, those are clients with both autism and ADHD, that they're taking things very literally. And it's almost as if everyone else has this rule book or this playbook that the neurodivergent person just didn't get. And so, it's very overwhelming, is what I hear from people. It's very overwhelming to try to figure out what someone means all of the time. I have a sister who is autistic; I have a son who is autistic. And I notice in both of them as well that they spend a lot of their energy in social situations figuring out what people are trying to communicate. And my son will say to me, I feel very blessed because we've created a fairly safe environment and continue to try to make it safer and safer, and he'll say things to me like, 'Stop, I don't know what you mean. You need to speak more clearly. I don't understand what you're trying to tell me.' He'll even say things like, 'Mom, what does that face mean? I don't know what your face means.' I mean, imagine if we could do that in the workplace. What a beautiful, wonderful thing that would be if a colleague could say to you, 'Jeremy, I don't know what your face means. Can you use words to tell me what you're trying to communicate? Because I don't understand that face.' That would be so wonderful, and maybe we'll get there. I think we are on our way, but we're absolutely not there yet. I want to touch on that sort of advocacy a little bit later on. We talked about challenges. What about opportunities? It really depends on the person. Again, it's a spectrum, and whether we're discussing ADHD or autism, these are spectrum disorders, and also, each person is carrying their own level of cognitive function and creativity. So, it's not fair to say everyone with ADHD is really creative. That's not necessarily the case. But there are some people with ADHD who are wildly creative. There are some people with autism that are wildly creative. And so, there are many opportunities. I feel more comfortable speaking the language of ADHD, since I know a lot about autism, but I don't consider myself an expert. So, if we speak in the context of ADHD, if someone is functioning at a fairly high cognitive level, and especially if they are a hyperactive type, they will likely bring a ton of energy and creativity and fun to your team in the workplace. They're the kind of people that you want to have around. They always keep things interesting. They're going to think outside of the box. They're going to move at a really fast pace. You might have to kind of clean up the trail that they leave behind them. But they will still bring so much good to the table. If we speak in the case of autism, maybe that would be like an incredible operations manager, somebody who's amazing at systems, someone who just sees the process and can assess efficiency in a way that no neurotypical would be able to do. And so, there are these beautiful gifts that we can bring to the table. But again, it's so important to remember that people with ADHD and people with autism will often have co-occurring disorders like anxiety, depression, and learning disabilities, and so it just really is going to depend on the person whether or not they are functioning at a level that those gifts can really, really shine. And this is presumably where things like the coaching that you do can come into it. Yeah. I mean, what a privilege to be able to walk alongside of people who see the world in the same way that I do, and be able to coach and encourage. And these executive function deficiencies that both autistic people and ADHD people struggle with, they can be improved. And that's a little known fact. The brain is willing to change. We know that through the concept of neuroplasticity. And so, when we target specific executive functions, we learn about them, we understand how they impact our lives, and we say, okay, this is something that I'm going to focus on improving. That change can happen. It doesn't happen overnight, which as an ADHD-er, I'm opposed to, I want it to happen immediately, but it can change. And I can speak for myself and my clients to say like, for me personally, my life has changed dramatically in 10 years, and I see that in my clients as well, that slowly but surely through coaching, therapy, self-development, and just targeted work on these executive functions, they do improve. So, let's go back to the workplace. So, if you've got someone who identifies as neurodiverse, and whether that's diagnosed or not, but it's not something that they have raised before in the workplace. What are some of the conversations that they could start to have? And what would they be looking to achieve with those conversations? The first thing that I want to make very clear is that you never, ever have to disclose your diagnosis, ever. You may choose to, and that's completely a personal decision, but that information is yours to do what you want with it. However, if you begin to get to know yourself, what you're good at, and where your weak areas are, you can start to have conversations around asking, whether it's your superiors or your colleagues, to allow you to spend as much time as possible in your areas of strength, and as little time as possible in your areas of weakness. And truly, that is the best way for a neurodivergent person to be able to flourish, is to really identify what are the five things that I bring to the table that I can do so well, that I can make contributions to my team, to my company, what are the five things that I can do very best, what are the five things that I put off, procrastinate, am always late on, that I'm terrible at, what are the five things that I spend so much time, energy and capacity on, they just drain me. But if I were to be able to take the capacity and spend it on the five things that I'm great at, that would change everything for me. And so, to start to have conversations around how can we support these weak areas, and how can I spend as much time as possible in these areas of strength. You mentioned there how it's very much a personal decision what to disclose and whether to disclose. Could you talk to some of the pros and cons either way? So, pros of disclosing versus not disclosing, and cons of the same. It's such a tricky conversation, Jeremy, because some work environments are simply not safe to disclose. And some work environments truly will, how do I want to say this, will actually make it harder for you if you do disclose. And there's even potential fallout. And so, I think that what we have to test is the safety of the environment. Do your colleagues, do your superiors have a history of being safe? And what I mean by safe is, are you able to share with them without getting gaslit, without getting pushback, without getting a ton of conflict? Are you able to actually bring up conflict and have reasonable discussions with them? Or are they really defensive? Are they unable to look at their own weaknesses? I mean, it's just really important that we don't just waltz in and say like,'Announcement, everyone! Just so you know, I have ADHD!', and blah, blah. It's just really important that we first assess the safety of the environment and make sure that this is a place that has a proven track record of being safe. If it doesn't, then what I would highly suggest is that you keep the information close to your heart, but do begin to notice your weaknesses and ask for support in those areas. I'm just wondering how practically someone can assess the safety or otherwise of the place where they work. Well, in America, ADHD, I'm actually not sure about autism, so I'm sorry that I can't speak to that, but ADHD is covered under the Americans with Disabilities Act. And there is a lot of information that you can find online if you Google ADHD and the American Disabilities Act. And so, it is a protected disability, but that doesn't necessarily mean that your workplace is going to be acting in an ethical manner. And so, it's very tricky. It really is a tricky conversation around whether or not you might want to disclose. But again, I think that the most important thing is to know your specific weaknesses and to be willing to ask for support and be honest about them. Hey, you know those expense reports? I never do them on time. I'm always working at the last minute. Can we set up meetings in the middle of the month, so that at least I have a deadline on 15th, and not only one deadline on the 30th? Can we set up two deadlines rather than one deadline? Things like that to add in additional accommodations. I'm not saying get out of your work, but I'm saying add in accommodations so that you can get your work done more efficiently. And that is in line with that old adage about not presenting problems but presenting solutions. And it's interesting what you were saying there about ADHD being protected, because I suppose one aspect of it, and this is my former lawyer background coming up, but if a neurodiversity affects your performance, and you don't disclose it, then you can't necessarily complain if consequences result from that, be it poor appraisal grades or even losing your job. Yes. And that's why this is such a tricky and nuanced conversation. Absolutely. Can you tell that I am very wary and very hesitant to give pointed advice? Because I would never want to put someone in harm's way in their workplace. I would never, ever, ever want to give advice that might jeopardise someone's position. So, I think that it really depends on where you are in the world, do a lot of research, talk to your human resources department, talk to other colleagues that may have disclosed their diagnoses, and just see what the company policy is, see what the company track record is, and yeah, make the best decision for your nuanced individual situation. You mentioned earlier workplace conflict, which I could imagine, given some of the things we've talked about, could be a really difficult area for someone who has a neurodiversity to deal with. Setting aside for the moment that everyone is different, are there some strategies that people can employ to deal with those sorts of tricky situations, which, I mean, frankly, most people find that sort of situation tricky? For sure. I mean, I think just as a human being, conflict is one of the scariest and hardest things that we have to deal with. The best advice I believe that I can give is to learn how to regulate your emotions.

So, that's number one: 26:50

learn how to regulate your emotions. How do you do that? You're going to have to find resources to help you to learn techniques such as the rain, like Tara Brach's RAIN technique, or other techniques to figure out how to calm down. I have several episodes of my podcast on this, that's a free resource if you want it. But if you have a therapist or someone else that can help you learn to self-regulate, figure out how to calm your body down. Because here's what happens, especially with someone who is perhaps diagnosed with ADHD. We are hot-headed, meaning that we get really emotional, and then, we're also impulsive. And the combination of that is very difficult when it comes to workplace conflict. Because not only is my body exploding on the inside, but I'm also dealing with a brain that does not have a set of breaks. Well, I'm just going fast. Okay? And so, if I combine a body that is freaking out on the inside and this impulsivity, we often say things that we completely regret. And so, the number one thing I can say is, learn how to calm down your emotions. And then, number two, never have a conversation or write an email or send a Slack message when you are feeling those intense emotions. You must press pause. You must wait. You must delay, even if it is inconvenient to the other person. I promise you, it is not as inconvenient as saying something horrible to them. It is not as inconvenient as that. So, even if you say, 'I definitely understand that we need to have this meeting, but I need to delay this for an hour so that I can calm down and make sure that I write down key points that I want to communicate, and make sure that I have my emotions under control so that I am not impulsive. And I definitely want to stay professional and not say something that I do not mean.' I'm going to ask another question which I suspect could lead to a much longer answer than we have time for. What are some of the common misconceptions about neurodiversity that someone who is neurodiverse might encounter in the workplace, and how can they address them? In the context of the workplace, that makes the conversation very interesting. I can speak to it just out in the wild, because the common misconceptions are, well, aren't we all little ADHD? Like, I understand. Like, sure. Like, you have ADHD, but like, aren't we all little ADHD? And that's an interesting thing to navigate, because no, we are not all a little ADHD. Next, I would say that very well-meaning people will often say, 'Well, that's a superpower. You're so like, this is wonderful. You have a superpower.' And try telling that to someone who's having to work two to three times harder than their colleagues? That's really difficult to hear sometimes, that it's a superpower. It doesn't feel like a superpower when I have to work twice as hard to achieve the same outcome. Other misconceptions are that it is affecting intelligence. There's no correlation between intelligence and neurodiversity. Of course, as I mentioned earlier, ADHD and autism sometimes are coupled with intellectual disabilities or learning disabilities, but not always. And intelligence can be very, very, very high with neurodiversity. And so, I think that's really, really important to hold very top of mind that the person that you are encountering, whether it's a colleague or someone in your workplace, if they mention that they're autistic or they have ADHD, that is not indicative of their intelligence. So, you can still count on them to be super smart, super engaged, working at a high level. It's just, there are going to be some things that are more difficult for them. What else? I think those are the top three. So, when it comes to advocating for yourself, so maybe you hear things like that in the workplace, what are some techniques that someone can use gently to dispel these myths with their neurotypical colleagues? Such a beautiful question. And I think that what we need to work on first is accepting our own neurodivergence. That is step number one. Do I really understand my own neurodivergence and how it impacts me? Am I working on dealing with the shame that I've carried for two, three, four, five, six decades? Am I really dealing with my own internal experience of this neurodivergence? That is the foundation for then being able to externalise that with our colleagues, to be able to externalise that and say, 'Actually, no, we're not all a little ADHD. I have a clinical diagnosis, and you know, maybe we don't say things like that.' But without first having really understood and accepted our own experience of the disorders, it's very unlikely that we're going to be able to keep our cool and gently help our colleagues to accept us as well. Something that I really have noticed in the neurodivergent community, it's something that I'm really trying to work with my clients on is, it's really unfair to ask someone else to accept you when you have not first accepted yourself. The work first is to truly accept who you are, to truly know yourself, to truly understand your own neurodivergence. And once that happens, it does naturally become externalised, and you will be able to have these conversations in a way that's not triggering or activating, or where you're noticing that you're getting really heated or saying things that you later regret. It's like, if I have this baseline of groundedness in who I am and in my neurodivergence, I naturally externalise that to others. And so, that takes some deep work. That is not easy. And many of us did not grow up in systems, in families, in churches, in schools that helped us to understand who we are in our own neurodiversity. And so, yeah, that's kind of the work of our lives, I believe, is to truly accept ourselves and then gently externalise that to others. I want to spend the last few minutes flipping it round the other way and talking to the person who is, let's say that they are neurotypical, or that they don't identify as being neurodivergent, but they have one or more neurodiverse colleagues, that person, they've listened to you, and they're thinking,'I'd quite like to support my colleagues, I'd like to make sure that they feel comfortable, safe, well supported, but I don't have a clue where to start. Kristen, help.' First of all, just your willingness and your desire to offer support is so beautiful. It's so needed, and it's so welcomed. So, on behalf of your neurodivergent colleague, thank you. That's such a wonderful thing. And I think that because we are talking about neurodiversity, there is such a large spectrum, the best way to do this is to just ask, 'Hey, I noticed you're struggling. What can I do to help? What do you need? What would make it easier for you?' So, in my company, I have employees, and things that I will often say when I notice someone is struggling or not missing a deadline is like, what's going on here? How can we help you? I think what often happens in a work environment is just this like punitive, shame-based conversation around like, you didn't meet the deadline, you're going to get penalised, what's wrong with you? Instead of like, hey, I know that you want to do well, so what was the obstacle here, and how can we help you to tweak it for next time? What got in the way this time? When someone is late on a project, especially someone with ADHD, they are feeling horrible about it. They're feeling all kinds of shame and blame and self-judgment. And so, a great way to come alongside them is to say like, 'I noticed that this was late, what's going on with that? How can I help you with that? What do we need to do for next time? What deadlines could we maybe put in place that would get you to do the work earlier?' As a colleague, you can just be a friend and say, 'Hey, I know you mentioned that you're autistic. What does that mean to you? What does that mean to you here in the workplace? How can I support you? Is there anything extra that I can do to support you?' Just straightforward conversations. I'm going to speak in generality here, and this is not true for absolutely everyone, but we don't mind if you're just straightforward with us. I'm not embarrassed about ADHD. Generally speaking, an autistic person is not embarrassed about being autistic. And to be asked about our own experience is so beautiful. Everyone wants to be known. This is human nature. Everyone wants to be seen. Everyone wants to be understood. And so, as a colleague, to ask someone, 'What's your experience like and how can I support you?', what a beautiful question to ask. And what I love about what you were just saying was that it can apply even if you're talking to someone, and you're not aware of whether or not they have a neurodiversity, they may not be aware. They just may think that they struggle with things. But just being that supportive person, asking what help they need, I mean, that's something that anyone can do with any colleague. Absolutely. And if you have the margin to be able to get curious about your colleagues, what an amazing support you'll be able to give to just your workplace environment as a whole. And if everyone can just take a measure of that and get a little bit curious, instead of getting annoyed, get curious. Instead of being judgmental, get curious. I wonder what's going on here. I wonder why this is hard for them. It's easy for me. I wonder why it's hard for them. And get curious about that. I think there's a lot of workplaces that could do with learning this lesson. What haven't we covered? I mean, I'm sure there's an awful lot that we haven't covered. But anything which comes to mind, which you're going to think, 'Oh, I'd be really disappointed if we didn't cover this.' I think that we've really covered a wide range of this conversation. There's no stone left unturned, I don't think. But I do want to say that if you are a neurodivergent person listening, and you do feel that shame, I want you to understand, that is a pretty universal experience. You're not the only one. And so, being able to explore that with a therapist or a coach or a friend or a trusted partner, and say like, 'Gosh, I'm feeling so much shame.' Because what shame does is it keeps us hiding, and it keeps us avoiding. And so, if you're feeling shame, it will impact your work performance. You will continue to hide from those expense reports or whatever the case may be. You will continue to avoid, because shame keeps us in the darkness. And I think, as someone who's neurotypical, if you're listening, and you're wondering, 'How can I support?', I think it's just bringing those shaming topics to light in a way that's not judgmental or harmful, but just saying like, 'Hey, I'm noticing this, I want to be a support to you. How can I help?' And bring those shameful things to light, because shame cannot live in the light. It wants to hide in the darkness. And so, having those conversations can really improve performance across the board. Apart from your podcast, if someone wants to find out more about this subject, what resources can you suggest that they might look into? I have a client that is also a community manager in my programme, who I adore. Her name is Meghan Brown-Enyia, and she's on Instagram. Her handle on Instagram is @adhdatwork. And she knows so much about workplace accommodations, about how to navigate the workplace as a human with ADHD. I'm not positive if she works also with other neurodivergences, but she would be an amazing person to go follow and check out. Again, her handle on Instagram is @adhdatwork, and her name is Meghan Brown-Enyia. And she is incredibly intelligent. She adds a lot of nuance to the conversation, and she can be really, really helpful to you if you are a neurodivergent person in the workplace, or if you're just curious about the experience of the neurodivergent person in the workplace, she'd be a great person to engage with. And people who want more of you, where should they go? I think the best place is my free podcast, the I Have ADHD podcast. You could find it on all podcast platforms, wherever you love listening to your podcasts. And then, if you love that, and you want to check out the work that I do, you can go to ihaveadhd.com and learn more there. And I also like to hang out on Instagram, and my handle is@i.have.adhd.podcast. I will put links to those in the show notes. Kristen, what can I say other than thank you so much for coming on the show and introducing the topic. Pleasure to be here. Thanks, Jeremy. Okay. Hope you enjoyed that interview with Kristen Carder, host of the I Have ADHD podcast. I learned a lot from this interview, but the thing that really stood out for me doesn't really have anything to do with neurodiversity at all. It was what Kristen said about checking in and getting curious about what's going on for your colleagues. You might have no idea why someone is struggling at work or reacts in a particular way to something. So, instead of ignoring it or making assumptions, why not just ask? If you approach someone from a place of genuine curiosity and a willingness to help and say to them something like, 'Seems like you might be finding this a little bit difficult. Is that something you'd like to talk about?', then provided there's an element of psychological safety in your workplace, I think there's a good chance that they will open up to you. I've seen too often how things are either ignored, or people, particularly management, make assumptions about what's going on. And I would love that narrative to be flipped. If people came at things from a place of curiosity and service, I just think working life would be an awful lot better all around. The other piece that hit home for me was when Kristen said that you can't ask others to accept you if you don't accept yourself. And that's a really valid point. Doing that work on yourself and understanding yourself is so important. If you don't understand yourself, how can you expect other people to? Visit the website for full show notes for this episode. They're at changeworklife.com/192, that's changeworklife.com/192. And on the subject of knowing yourself, what a great segue that was, make sure you visit changeworklife.com/happy. That's changeworklife.com/happy. I have a couple of exercises there which will help you to get to know yourself. One of them encourages you to look back at your career history and take out the themes which you learned, which can lead you to realise something about your values and beliefs and the sort of work generally that you enjoy. And then, there's a second exercise which encourages you to project yourself into the future and figure out what would you like life to look like. And for the brave of you, there is a third bonus exercise which involves you going out and asking other people what they think about you. Sounds scary, but my goodness, it can yield some really interesting data. The link to get those exercises again at changeworklife.com/happy. There's more great interviews coming up as we start to close out the year, so make sure that you subscribe to the show if you haven't already, and I can't wait to see you next time. Cheers. Bye.