The mission of the KTS Success Factor® Podcast for Women is to bring proven ideas female business leaders can use to increase their ability to achieve big goals and become happy, successful, and understood at work. All this in 25 minutes or less. Sarah E. Brown, Ph.D. is an expert on personalizing work to the unique interests, strengths, and needs of the workforce. A former Managing Director at Accenture, she is now on a mission to reach 250,000 women with knowledge of their unique gifts and the tools to be happy, successful and understood at work.
http://sarahebrown.com/podcast
What is Neuro-Divergence? with Laura Matteson
Everyone is different. Someone may work differently than you, and that’s okay!
Being a great leader isn’t just about leading in the workplace, it’s also about making a safe environment for everyone, even those who are neurodivergent and work differently than the rest.
Laura Matteson is a visual translator who helps intuitive leaders take complex or mysterious ideas and organize them into understandable visuals to help them boldly take their next steps forward. She loves helping other neurodivergent humans think and communicate in their own way so they can make an impact in their world.
In this episode, Laura talks about neurodivergence and how you can spot it in your workplace. She also shares some tips on what you can do to make your workplace a safe place for everyone, even those with neurodivergence so that you can maximize everyone’s potential.
What you will learn from this episode:
- Find out what is neurodivergence and how does it look like in the workplace
- Learn more about the power of communicating and speaking out in the workplace
- Understand what are the different changes you can adapt in your workplace that can help neurodivergent people
“Instead of saying that your neurotype is damaged and disordered, it [neuro-divergence] is saying that your neurotype is divergent from the norm, or what's expected.”
- Laura Matteson
Topics Covered:
01:21 - Laura shares about her business and who she helps
02:55 - What does neurodivergence mean?
04:29 - How can a neurodivergent do time management differently?
07:24 - Laura talks about her neurodivergent clients when it comes to handling neurodivergence
09:14 - How can you recognize neurodivergence in people?
12:47 - Can observing help you see if someone is neurodivergent?
13:47 - Laura shares how can you approach and communicate with a neurodivergent as a business leader
18:33 - What are the mistakes people typically make when working with neurodivergent people?
22:37 - Laura’s parting powerful tip: I use the analogy of labels on clothing. So we don't use labels to determine if clothing is worthy or good or going to be useful for the task. We use the labels to tell us how to care for that garment and how it needs to be taken care of.
Key Takeaways:
“Knowing all the different ways that you're different is the first step.” - Laura Matteson
“We're just trying to do fun things all the time and take risks to get dopamine.” - Laura Matteson
“Other people might judge you, but it's not their problem, because you have this different way of doing things. And so do these other people. And so you're not alone.” - Laura Matteson
“Assume that they don't know how to do it if they're not doing it.” - Laura Matteson
“You can be professional and start work later and still do a wonderful job. And everything just needs to be transparent with the other person.” - Laura Matteson
Ways to Connect with Laura Matteson:
- Website: https://www.illustrative.us/
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/illustrative/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/illustrative.us/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/illustrative.us/
Ways to Connect with Sarah E. Brown:
- Website: https://www.sarahebrown.com/
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/knowguides
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sarahebrownphd/