How does ADHD impact my career?

Yesterday our MD, Alex Speed, wrote a very insightful article about his experiences as an Autistic business leader, and how his autistic traits impact – and benefit – his career. In his piece he pointed out that autism – and neurodiversity as a whole – is still widely misunderstood, and that people often make (usually unflattering) assumptions about neurodiverse people.

Alex mentioned his autism in the article, and that he’s the parent and partner of various neurodivergent people – and I’m that partner: the “leaky water balloon of empathy” with ADHD! Not only am I Alex’s partner in life, I’ve also worked as ASK’s marketing and copywriting lead for close to a decade, so have a lot of experience working with Alex and his team, and Alex has asked me to write this article from my perspective, to talk about how my own ADHD impacts me, particularly in my career. I’ll warn you in advance that I’m a lot wordier than he is!

This is “Neurodiversity Celebration Week” – and any neurodivergent person will agree that it’s so important for there to be more awareness, acceptance and support available for neurodivergent people, in our education systems, our professional environments, and society as a whole! There is still so much stigma, and so little help, because the pathways to diagnosis are hugely underfunded, and facing overwhelming demand. On top of that, the diagnostic criteria for most neurodiverse conditions were built around what those conditions look like in little boys – so anyone who didn’t fit into that narrow perspective has been largely ignored. Women and girls are still massively under diagnosed, because – unsurprisingly – we don’t act like little boys (neurodivergent or otherwise) so the ways our neurodiversity present, and impact us, either gets ignored completely, or labelled as a mental health issue. To be fair, most undiagnosed neurodivergent people do struggle with their mental health – because trying to function in a world, and a society, that isn’t made for you is…agony. Being blamed for failing at things others find easy, doing life on ‘hard mode’, causes anxiety. It causes trauma. And, in a frustrating clash of needs, trauma – or PTSD – presents a lot like autism…so women and girls who try to get help still can’t access the right support or diagnoses!

Though Alex and I are both neurodivergent, our diagnoses – and the traits they come with – couldn’t be more different! There are a lot of ways our traits cause confusion or friction, both in our home life and in the way we each work – but we also both benefit hugely, in our separate ways, from the way that neurodiversity has shaped our brains, our behaviours, and the skills and talents we have.

Like he did in his article, I want to talk about how ADHD impacts the way I work – and not just the challenges it brings, but the ways that I know my ADHD has been a huge benefit. Not in an “ADHD is a Superpower!” way (because ick) – it doesn’t feel super at all, and the trend of toxic positivity (especially online) needs to get in the bin! More of a “when my needs are met, I am capable of excellence” way. Because that’s true for everyone with neurodivergence. When our needs are met, we are capable of excellence.

There’s a much more detailed article about the challenges of ADHD in the workplace here, from CHADD, but I’ll pull out the headlines:

• Distractibility
• Impulsivity
• Hyperactivity*
• Poor Memory
• Boredom Blackouts
• Time Blindness
• Procrastination**
• Difficulties managing long-term projects
• Paperwork / admin / details
• Interpersonal / social skills

Now, that’s not an exhaustive list – but it does give a good overview of the problems people with ADHD tend to have: every single one of them is familiar to me! Tips like “just set a reminder” or “make a list!” drive me demented – because I promise, if there was a diary, a system, a programme or a notebook that would work for more than a month, I’d have found it…I’ve tried them all – and none have yet changed who I fundamentally am as a person, or cured me of neurodiversity!

*Hyperactivity in boys and men tends to be physical: struggling to sit still, fidgeting, running around, getting off their seat at inappropriate times. In women and girls it tends to be internalised, looking more like daydreaming, or talking a lot.

**I’ll speak more about procrastination later in this article, but the main point is that it’s not choosing to be lazy and ignore tasks that need to be done – it’s executive dysfunction and time blindness, and an inability to do something, even when you want to do it.

There is a plus side to having ADHD; this article from ADDITUDE again covers them in more detail, as does this research paper from PubMed, but the headlines are:

• Hyper focus / attention
• Resilience and persistence, with excellent problem-solving skills
• Communication skills, and a genuine curiosity about what makes people tick
• Empathy, compassion and an accepting, tolerant perspective
• Creativity and ingenuity
• A strong sense of fairness, and morality
• Spontaneity, courage and adaptability
• Incredible creativity
• Motivation and enthusiasm that can be very contagious!

I’ve worked in a lot of different environments, and industries, but studied Creative Writing and Contemporary Culture at university (which is a bit like sociology, but with more focus on communications!) and every misstep I took on my meandering career path brought me to where I am today; a Communications Consultant, working both as part of the team at ASK and maintaining some freelance work around that. I’m an excellent writer, a fantastic, creative communicator, I understand how to engage people with authentic messages, and how to grow (and sustain!) a network. I’m creative, enthusiastic, and have always been obsessed with learning new skills and technologies in a way that’s very beneficial to my work. I love social media, so it’s a natural addition to my copywriting work, training clients in building and engaging their own target audience, and I thrive in this flexible model of work far more than I ever could in a more traditional 9-5, because I get to switch focus between my different clients, all the different projects and campaigns that are running, and keep feeding that dopamine monster as I do it!

As a neurodivergent woman – and a late diagnosed one – I really did struggle earlier in my career. I knew what “being a professional” was supposed to look like, and really wanted to be that woman…but I’m not! Despite the pressure to “get a proper job” and establish myself, I had to overcome a lot of barriers when I was trying to get answers for why things others seemed to do effortlessly felt so hard for me – and I got the same misdiagnosis of anxiety, over and over again (with a hefty dose of “you’re just lazy” and “making excuses” to go with it!).

I knew, deep down, that there was more to it, but kept hitting the same walls when I tried to explain that I wasn’t being lazy, or that I forgot things because my brain was so loud, not because they didn’t matter to me…in the end, my path to an ADHD diagnosis is a story a lot of neurodivergent women will recognise. A “gifted” child who “isn’t reaching her full potential”, who is “easily distracted” or “lazy”. I usually got good grades, but not as good as predicted, and got frustrated when people told me I just needed to “try harder”, because I always felt like I did nothing BUT try! Every tool, system, method or practice I tried to put into place would work…for a short time, but quickly fell apart if anything changed, or I got bored (because boredom = no dopamine, and no dopamine = nope, full stop!)

Every deadline I had was a mad panic to complete all the work at the last moment, because to an ADHD brain time exists in only two categories. “Now”, and “NOT now” – with absolutely no grasp of the definitions of how variable “not now” is to everyone else! If I have to do something immediately, I run on all cylinders, and will put my whole self into doing it brilliantly. If I have a month to do it…? Well, that’s “not now” – so it doesn’t matter yet…and no matter how much I get nagged (or even nag myself) there’s absolutely nothing I can do to make it matter until it moves into the “now” category! I know that drives the people around me bonkers (particularly teachers at school, or Managers in employed roles I’ve had…or Alex!) – but I promise, it’s harder for me, because I want to Do The Thing, I know I need to Do The Thing, but until my brain has the dopamine it needs to Do The Thing, I simply cannot Do The Thing.

Like most people with ADHD, I struggled a lot through my early years of working. I changed direction repeatedly, finding that – no matter how excited I was when I started a new role – my performance (and my enjoyment) would eventually reach a point where I couldn’t pull the fraying edges of my brain together enough to focus, and I’d crash into crippling burnout. Every time, I’d be told I just needed to “stop being lazy” or “try harder” – and add a new layer of self-loathing to the pain (and internalised ablism) that shaped my already rather bruised psyche!