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Episode 3: Creating Workplaces Where Every Brain Thrives with Fred Bullock of Irregular Training
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In this episode of Conversations for Change, we sit down with Fred Bullock, co-founder of Irregular Training, to explore how workplaces can better support every kind of mind. Fred shares his journey of discovering ADHD in adulthood, how it reshaped his view of work and identity, and why organizations benefit when they rethink the one-size-fits-all model.
We also dig into the roots of workplace pressure, the habits that hold people back, the power of strengths-based environments, and how leaders can rebuild their teams in a way that helps both neurodivergent and neurotypical folks thrive.
This conversation is honest, energizing, and full of ideas that can spark real change in schools, workplaces, and communities.
Connect with Fred: https://www.linkedin.com/in/fred-bullock-74ba609b/
Learn more about Irregular Training: https://www.linkedin.com/company/irregulartraining/
Special thanks to our podcast editor, Will Calkins.
Connect with Will: https://www.linkedin.com/in/william-calkins/
Music for this episode was created by Brandon Cericola.
Contact Brandon: https://www.linkedin.com/in/brandon-cericola/
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Transcript
Introduction to Podcast and Guest
00:00:02
Speaker
Welcome back to Conversations for Change, a podcast by the Nurturing Tomorrow Foundation. Today we are joined by Fred Bullock, co-founder of Irregular, a workplace neurodiversity training organization.
00:00:16
Speaker
Fred's story of discovering ADHD in adulthood sparked a passion for helping organizations create environments where neurodivergent people and really all people can thrive.
00:00:28
Speaker
As always, a quick note, we are not mental health professionals. This podcast is for educational and advocacy purposes only. Everything we share reflects our personal perspectives and lived experiences.
00:00:40
Speaker
If you're struggling or need support, we strongly encourage you to reach out to a licensed mental health professional. All right, welcome back to the podcast, Conversations for Change.
Discovering ADHD in Adulthood
00:00:51
Speaker
Today, we're diving into a topic that is close to my heart and honestly, at the center of so many conversations.
00:00:59
Speaker
How do we create spaces that every brain can thrive? Our guest, Fred Bullock, knows this question inside out. After his fast-paced career in sales, Fred discovered in his 30s that he had ADHD, a revelation that reframed his entire view of work, mental health, and leadership.
00:01:16
Speaker
um Fred, I am thrilled to have you here. So let's just jump right in. Let's go right to that moment that maybe not when you received the diagnosis, but what led you to get there.
00:01:30
Speaker
Towards the end of my 20s, I'd been working in in sales for quite a long time. I didn't mean to get into sales, but like everyone who works in sales. I can relate. i wanted to be a rock star when I was a kid and Me too. I wanted to be an actress, but same thing, rock star lifestyle, yes. Yeah, yeah. So that's what I wanted to be, and I didn't really care about anything else. But then I got to the age of about 23, and i was broke, and it was starting to become clear that I probably wasn't going to become ah rock star in the immediate future.
00:02:02
Speaker
um And I had to get a job. i didn't have any qualifications. I didn't really have any marketable skills because I dropped out of kind of education when I was about 19. And the only thing I really could do is get a job at a very kind of disreputable telesales, telemarketing operation.
00:02:21
Speaker
But I was kind of able to do well enough at it using my my natural skills, I guess, and my personality. After a few years, I ended up at a company called OpenTable, which I know you guys know quite well ah in in America.
00:02:37
Speaker
and I became a kind of full-blown sales guy, a field sales guy with you know a big salary and earning loads of commission and with a lot of responsibility.
00:02:49
Speaker
and It was absolutely brilliant to start off with. um But then when I was in my late 20s, my daughter was born when I was about 27. And suddenly all of this pressure, if the the pressure went up massively ah just from being just from the the realization that I was a dad and I was responsible for a person.
00:03:13
Speaker
And the pressure of the job, which had started pretty much at that exact time, started to really kind of go up as well. And everything kind of came to a head and I started struggling a little bit with my, well, quite a lot with with my mental health.
00:03:27
Speaker
And it wasn't just that I was struggling on with my mental health. It was just that there felt like there was so much riding on it. Like when you become a father, um it's kind of like, I need to do well at this job because otherwise my kid isn't going to be able to eat, you know, or I'm not going to be able to have a shelter over my head.
00:03:46
Speaker
And it was big and I couldn't deal with it very well.
Impact of ADHD Diagnosis on Self-awareness
00:03:50
Speaker
So anyway, I started going to therapy. I was doing this job at the same time, bringing up a small child with my wife. I wasn't doing it all by myself. um And when I was in therapy after ah after a year or two, ah the therapist said, you ever thought you might have ADHD?
00:04:06
Speaker
And I was like, no, I've literally, that has never occurred to me one time in my entire life. But I went away and I started researching it. And as I'm sure you but you guys may have had a similar experience, you go through the list of, oh my God, oh my God, this explains everything.
00:04:24
Speaker
All the way back to childhood. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And you're like, oh, right, ya okay, right. ah So that kind of that kind of triggered the path, which ended up couple of years later with me getting diagnosed.
00:04:38
Speaker
that happened That same thing happened with me with my autism diagnosis where, you know, I met my wife now about 11 years ago and a couple of years in, she goes, at this point, there was ah Asperger's was still a diagnosis. And, you know, people...
00:04:56
Speaker
My wife says to me, do you, I think you have Asperger's. And I was like, no, I, that's literally never crossed my mind ever. And I remember we were in the car, her parents were driving, we're going somewhere, we're in the backseat and I pulled it up on my phone and I was like, oh no.
00:05:13
Speaker
oh no, like you, there's no question to be asked based on this lit. Like, I don't need, and then you, I don't know. I almost became like angry at that point in a way because I'm like, I've been to so many doctors talking through ah depression, anxiety, everything else. I'm like, how did you guys not see this? Like, it's so crystal clear to me.
00:05:37
Speaker
So I totally feel ah I know exactly how you feel when you looked at that list and said, ah What were some of those like aha moments when you got the diagnosis and you started to look back? Like, were there, are there any in particular that stand out to you?
00:05:54
Speaker
The thing that was causing, the thing that was, you know, internally causing me a lot of trouble at the time was this perception that I was a bit self-sabotaging. There were lots of things like in in my life where I didn't make it easy for myself, you know, with my lifestyle, what what I'd get up to at the weekend, but not just that, like kind of how I'd,
00:06:12
Speaker
you know Sometimes it almost felt like I was looking for trouble or looking for difficulty at work, trying to find points of friction, um you know taking a stand over something pretty insignificant, because probably because I was bored, and causing loads of drama for myself and other other people.
00:06:36
Speaker
But I think, yeah, look looking back, well you know when I was a kid, i was that the narrative of my childhood was Fred's really capable. He's really bright. If only he could you know apply himself, if only he could.
00:06:50
Speaker
And that was like the narrative throughout my entire childhood because i I would be very good at things immediately because they'd interest me. And I'd be able to just you know dive right into it and hyper-focus and you know, get really good results to the point that people would be like, oh my God, like, you know, Fred's like some kind of genius or something. But then later i would have completely lost interest interested in it.
00:07:14
Speaker
And, you know, someone will give me a straightforward task to do. And I just be like, nah, not, I'm not doing that That's not happening. So there was this constant kind of frustration and teachers and parents, and um I think it you know from an early age, it kind of built this thing into my head that I'm like, I've got two parts to me. There's this there's this part of me that should be you know going to the best universities in the land, you know inventing things, finding amazing discoveries, setting insanely high expectations for myself.
00:07:46
Speaker
But then there was this other part of me that was like, but I've got this devil inside me that will always prevent me from doing that. And it created a lot of, yeah, a lot of conflict um going into my, yeah, going into my 20s. And I think it's it's all okay if you're just doing a fairly easy job and you haven't got a child.
00:08:05
Speaker
But I think those two things, suddenly like the pressure goes up. And it's like, you know, i'm not I'm not coping. I think the key thing for me was, um remember reading this description of the kind of physical element of ADHD, which is your prefrontal cortex, which controls your executive function and how you you know what you decide to do and planning and things like that, and the dopamine delivery to that prefrontal cortex.
00:08:31
Speaker
And I was like, I get it. That makes so much sense. I'm in this constant state of understimulation. That explains the low mood. That explains the kind of seeking stimulation, whether it's positive or negative.
00:08:44
Speaker
i I think Fred and I are twins. i was going to say the same thing you wrote. I was like, Fred, you're literally speaking my language. Like, I am feeling like you are speaking directly to my soul.
00:08:55
Speaker
i want to ask really quickly, have you read the book about dopamine addiction called Dopamine Nation? No, I haven't. I think I've heard of it, but I've not read it. Highly recommend if you're just like looking for a read. um i want to throw that out there. Yeah.
00:09:10
Speaker
I want to really take this um conversation into a different direction. And we, you know, we've learned about how this discovery works. understanding your ADH brain. And um I
Mission and Founding of Irregular
00:09:24
Speaker
want to focus that lens on what you're doing at Irregular. So, yeah, Irregular is ah an an organization that I founded with an old friend of mine called Andy, who um I went to college with.
00:09:36
Speaker
Well, what college for us in the UK is like 16, 17, 18, rather than kind of what we call university. And we were really good friends, um but we kind of just drifted apart. and ah But i I did a LinkedIn post recently, which was related to neurodivergence at work, which he responded to. And we got back in touch and in typical kind of neurodivergent fashion.
00:09:58
Speaker
just just it was literally like we'd had no gap in our relationship whatsoever. We just got on a Zoom call and just started having a Zoom call every week from from then onwards. But I think the the thing that really drives me, I know it drives Andy as well, is when I understood that the way that I acted and what I experienced was down to my brain,
00:10:23
Speaker
And I'm not completely um removing personal agency there, but to a great degree, the way that I kind of operate is down to the the physical brain that's in this's in my head.
00:10:34
Speaker
It made me, I mean, the first thing was that I just let myself off the hook big time. A lot of the self-criticism and the self-flagellation kind of hasn't completely gone, but you know I was able to let myself off the hook and start not beating myself up for not being able to do certain things, for not being this kind of all-rounder who could do everything. um I started to understand that the things that I could do really well I kind of, I pay for that and the things that I can't, like i' I'm very, very bad at, right?
00:11:04
Speaker
And that's just the way my brain works. and that's the way everyone's brain works. If you're particularly good in one area, there's going to be something that you're not so good at somewhere else. And i think but by this point, I'd been working at, you pretty big organizations for a long time.
00:11:22
Speaker
And I started to really notice this trend towards standardization and one size fits all in the way that organizations, for want of a better phrase, organize themselves, and particularly the way that they they manage people and the way that they create this employee experience.
00:11:42
Speaker
And I started to see that that's a big reason why neurodivergent people struggle at work. but the But the thing is, is that I really feel that it's not it's also not good for the organization.
00:11:59
Speaker
The more I thought about it, you know I was a pretty successful salesperson and I've you know i've done, despite troubles, i've I've done pretty well in in my career. um And I just started to see all these all these areas where there were just unnecessary barriers being put in place that didn't just make it harder for neurodivergent people to kind of fully invest and give their best, which surely is what every company wants.
00:12:26
Speaker
It's also making it difficult for kind of everyone. It was suboptimal for everyone. and That's the thing that really drives me and Andy. We are a neurodiversity training company, but we don't approach it from a kind of the moral argument.
00:12:41
Speaker
We don't approach it from, look, this is the right thing to do for neurodivergent people. We approach it from the perspective of the way that neurodivergent people struggle in many organizations is a sign that of what needs to change about those organizations to be better for everyone and to allow everybody to part participate participate more fully.
00:13:01
Speaker
And that's going to be better for the individual, the organization and for society as whole. That's amazing. for First and foremost, I love the work that you guys are doing because it as a neurodivergent adult, It's hard when you go into an organization, you hear these presentations from, you know, from the top down and, and they want kind of everybody to act the same way and look the same way and, you know, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. And, you know, I'm a consultant and, you know, most of my colleagues are, you know, wearing button up shirts, depending on the event, suit and tie and,
00:13:37
Speaker
I hate that. I hate that. with like i feel so uncomfortable. It's all I can think about when I'm in those clothes. And so most of the time, I'm um'm wearing a sweatshirt, nurturing tomorrow sweatshirt right now.
00:13:49
Speaker
um And this is what I'm usually wearing because I'm comfortable. And i know when i need to put on my button-up shirt, what meetings it's it's most important for. But you know nobody has really advocated within the workplace for items that improve my comfort more than I have.
00:14:12
Speaker
And i think having having you guys help organizations understand at a broader perspective, what makes everybody happier, work better, et cetera, et cetera, I think is is super important. And especially since, at least in the States, with school, it school kind of sets you up for that one-size-fits-all type thing.
Challenges with Standard Systems for Neurodivergents
00:14:38
Speaker
To what you were talking about before, when when you were in school and you find that item you're super interested in, you hyper-focus on it, the there's not really...
00:14:49
Speaker
a place to set us up to find those items to hyper focus on and be really good at, you know, as you finish school, as you go into university, et cetera, et cetera. It's really lets everybody learn the same way, learn the same amount of, or at the same level across different topics. And if you get bored, then you get bored. And at least for me, when I got bored, I got kicked out of class.
00:15:11
Speaker
but So I i love the the work that you're doing. And it's so funny because Victoria and I have had conversations about doing something similar-ish in the States, but also looking at schools because it's, you know, root cause. If you can help develop people with a strong focus on their their most important ah topics or or whatever, then you can create some really strong adults, um some some superhero adults. so
00:15:45
Speaker
um And I will add, this crossed my mind before, and I didn't say it at the time, but hearing the story about you and Andy ah is so similar to Victoria and I because Victoria and I met What was it, Victoria? You always remember the date, like 10 years ago. and too Yeah, i I can tell you the hour.
00:16:04
Speaker
No, it was 20. 2018 when we met. Yeah. there was So we met in 2018, kind of went our separate ways. And then Victoria posted something on LinkedIn about the school project. And I said, we need to reconnect. And it was the same thing. we hopped on a call.
00:16:22
Speaker
almost immediately and kept hopping on calls. And then it was like, well, what are we going to do here? Andy, hearing you talk about redesigning today's workplace, um really, for me, especially...
00:16:38
Speaker
As a current grad student and as ah as someone who's a lifelong learner and then also hearing what you said, it's so crazy because how that that point of discovery for me getting that diagnosis was because of a a really amazing process.
00:16:53
Speaker
person in a registrar's office who was not a mental health professional, but is also a fellow divergent and an adult with ADHD who was just looking at my transcript and trying to figure it out. He was like, man, like you are just really excelling in some of these classes. Like you're making these really high marks. And he was like, but what's happening over here with these?
00:17:17
Speaker
I'm like, well, like i I just can't pay attention. I can't go. i'm bored. And Without, you know, giving me a diagnosis himself, he really pushed me to go, you know, seek, you know, to two you'd utilize the school's resources. um And that's exactly what I did. So with that being said, i i want to know how you see these ideas really influencing, you know,
00:17:41
Speaker
Our children, as ah as a mother and yourself as a father and a parent and just concerned citizens of humanity, um how do you see the ideas that you guys are really implementing um today and but how we prepare kids and young adults for jobs and educational opportunities ahead?
00:17:59
Speaker
but think it's really interesting what you just said about how this this person was noticing that you were really excelling in certain areas, but then saying, hey, what's going on over here?
00:18:11
Speaker
And I think that often in school and c certain and you you get it in work as well, there's this um received wisdom or this idea that it's about looking at what the person's weak at and like, hey, come on, we need to do something about this.
00:18:27
Speaker
I think especially with neurodiversion people and possibly with everyone, it's you you get more bang for your buck from letting people work on their strengths and follow their strengths than trying to make out that everyone can be an all-rounder because that's just not realistic.
00:18:50
Speaker
you don't You don't get people who are equally good at everything. you know And especially when someone, especially as as I've said already, like if someone's especially good at one thing, inevitably they're not you know there's going to be another area where they' where they're not as good. you know like For example, yes me, my you know my my interpersonal skills, my kind of verbal skills, um my energy, my ability to think about, to kind of understand concepts really, really quickly,
00:19:19
Speaker
They're all quite high percentile, but then I'm very, very disorganized. um'm ah My attention to detail is pretty low. And it's kind of like, if you want the best of me, you have to accept the worst of me. think there's a quote by Marilyn Monroe, something along those lines, like, if you can't handle me at my worst, you don't deserve to have the best.
00:19:42
Speaker
But I think this is this is something which is ah really interesting because... There seems to be this prevalent idea in work and in school where it's almost it almost seems like it's a hangover from the industrial age, like the industrial revolution, where it's kind of like factories.
00:19:58
Speaker
It's like, we want to produce this outcome. And in order to get this outcome, we must control the process as much as possible. And if things start going wrong with the outcome, the answer is we need to control the process more.
00:20:13
Speaker
And I think that this gets ah i'm you know i'm I'm pretty sure that the education system was founded upon this idea. It's like, right, we're going to produce people who will then take part in the in the world of work.
00:20:25
Speaker
And now that's in the world of work, mostly manufacturing, manufacturing things and producing things or mining or taking things out of the earth. The nature of work has completely changed, of course.
00:20:36
Speaker
um But yeah, this this this mentality of like, we want the outcome, let's let's really sweat and control the process in order to get that outcome is still very prevalent at school and in the workplace, in in my opinion.
00:20:52
Speaker
But the problem is is that um you know in a factory, you can completely you can control the environment. In the real world, you can't control the environment. And if that environment is chaotic, the environment changes rapidly, it's extremely dynamic.
00:21:06
Speaker
Like if you imagine a business, other competitors that come into the market, they've no control over that, got no real control over the fluctuations of the economy, um kind of geopolitical things that are happening. so I think that what we need in in this in this world is people who have lots of different skills, not all in in the same person. right We need lots of different skills, we need lots of different experiences, different perspectives.
00:21:33
Speaker
um And we need people that are adaptable. And we need organizations that are adaptable and can change. And I think that this this model of... um Yeah, trying to produce these excellent workers that then go out into the world and kind of produce things.
00:21:50
Speaker
It doesn't make sense anymore. You said something in there, and I forgot exactly what the the wording was that you used, but in the workplace, when you expect everybody to kind of do the same thing or produce the same quality or or kind of just be those little worker bees getting their job done, you have the, you said like,
00:22:14
Speaker
adjusting what that looks like could look be good for everybody and I completely agree because for a neurotypical, let's call it non-ADHD, you know, or right-minded person, yes, they may nod their head and do everything, but they may not be happy doing it.
00:22:33
Speaker
That turns to, you know, low quality turnover, etc., etc., Whereas for neurodivergent folks or ADHD folks, or if you're, if you have both, then you physically can't do those other things. You cannot get your mind to slow down and focus enough on that one topic because on your side screen, you see the five other things you need to work on and something else is shinier and prettier and, and,
00:23:08
Speaker
cooler to work on and gets that dopamine rush that that we've been talking about. So it's like if you if you change kind of the mindset again from the top down, and it doesn't help just the neurodivergent, just the ADHD. It helps everybody.
00:23:26
Speaker
Let's say that the way, because I worked in sales, like the way that a sales team is targeted and what they're asked to do in terms of kind of administration and and connecting with different parts of the company, that that can be very, very important.
00:23:42
Speaker
particular, it can be very intense. It can take up a lot of people's time. And I think a lot of a um salespeople have ADHD, but you're right in that the people that are neurodivergent, they're the ones that literally can't do it.
00:23:56
Speaker
They're like, I cannot do this and I'm not doing it. Or I am going to do it, but it's going to cost me so much in terms of energy. and But you're absolutely right. like it's it's subbo It's probably suboptimal for everybody, right but other people are able to kind of go, all right, I'm i'm going to make myself do it. It's not going to cost me too much.
00:24:17
Speaker
So I think that's a good way of doing it. And that's really a big part of mine and Andy's work is that Neurodivergent experience is kind of like, you know the expression, the canary down the coal mine?
Neurodivergence as a Catalyst for Change
00:24:28
Speaker
when When you use the phrase, the canary down the coal mine, it's like, that's the thing that tells you there's a problem. And I think that the neurodivergent experience, like when neurodivergent people are really struggling with something,
00:24:40
Speaker
The response shouldn't be, i right, we need to find some way of accommodating this person and you know giving them special treatment. the The approach should be, what does that tell us about the process?
00:24:51
Speaker
like what like Is that a sign that the process is not good for everybody? That's so big. And to go back, taking it back to a younger self, you know, thinking about, oh, man, like I needed, even though, you know they just weren't diagnosing in the 90s, they were not diagnosing little girls with ADHD.
00:25:11
Speaker
um And I wasn't in hyper. I was not a hyper child, but I needed extended time. I needed you know, to be in a controlled environment for testing, like the back of someone's head is way too distracting for me.
00:25:24
Speaker
um And it has nothing to do with them. It's got everything that's going on with me. And ah but asking for those accommodations was so frightening to me because it set me apart and not in a fun way. And it and it was very isolating. And I think ah Feeling this way, you know, yesterday we were having a conversation and we were talking about how sometimes ADHD could feel like being on a really lonely island. um And, you know, I had to that point, I said, you know, feeling unique or being unique in that sense can be a very lonely place.
00:26:00
Speaker
And to speak to what you just said, like making those accommodations for everyone, not giving special, because it's not about asking for special treatment, you know, and I think that that was huge. Feeling like you're on an island by yourself. You know, you were talking about it before, fred with...
00:26:18
Speaker
you know, sales and and you had your a daughter was born and you're married, but like in your head, it still felt like you were, you had so much responsibility. You had so much to get done. And even though you have your wife, it it's still seemed to feel to you that you had to figure it out. you as an individual by yourself,
00:26:46
Speaker
ah yeah to figure it out. And I think that's typical for a lot of folks where it's like, I don't, I don't know what, I haven't done enough research to understand exactly how our brains work here, but it like, at least for me, it feels like a puzzle of sorts where it's like, oh, this is going wrong or I haven't hit my quota or haven't hit this deliverable. And i I need to figure out the puzzle to solve for that and get it done. And i don't know, I don't, it's hard for me to ask for help. but
00:27:20
Speaker
Yeah. um Sometimes I think of the example of sports teams, you know, and really, you know, the the the top end of sports teams, um um um I'm not saying organizations are able to do this for everyone, right? But it's an interesting idea.
00:27:37
Speaker
The top end of sports teams will be thinking about the individual characteristics of each person on their team, not just in terms of the different skills they bring the table, which of course is also a great analogy, right? You need different types of people, different skill sets, different physical characteristics.
00:27:53
Speaker
But you know how how long do they take to recover? What's their personality like? How should I deliver feedback to them? All of these things will be taken into account in order to create a truly high performing team.
00:28:05
Speaker
And you often see best performing teams were the ones where there was a coach who had amazing human skills and really knew how to give each person what they needed to be able to thrive in that team.
00:28:17
Speaker
So it's such a big part of high performance. um I think a lot of the time, kind of accommodating for neurodiversion people or any kind of accommodation can be seen as almost anti-growth or anti-performance. That couldn't be further from the truth. It's literally the same thing.
00:28:39
Speaker
If you want people to perform, find out what conditions they need to perform and help them get those conditions, your whole company's going to perform better. With your work at Irregular or even throughout your career, have you seen with leaders specifically, have you gotten through that hump of of apprehension where it's like,
00:29:03
Speaker
getting them to realize that putting some extra effort, some extra time with certain individuals is worth it. Like, and, and I, I asked this from the sense of like, I think about my workplace and on my project team, I have someone from the West coast and who's three hours behind me and he's gotten,
00:29:24
Speaker
ah frequently he's been stuck working East Coast hours. So he could log in at six or 7 his time in the morning. And I know, speaking for myself, I wouldn't like that.
00:29:34
Speaker
So what I try and do with folks on my projects is like understand what gets them to tick, understand working preferences, communication preferences, feedback preferences, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. I spend some time doing that.
00:29:49
Speaker
It's We don't always have the time. We got to kick off a project to move quickly. And, you know, that's something that's potentially going to slow us down. But I've always been the type of leader that believes heavily in like putting the extra time in for your team, because if your team succeeds, then you all succeed. youre you're You're successful at the end of the day.
00:30:09
Speaker
Have you ever had any of those aha moments? with your work. Yeah. I mean, I've worked with lots of different managers and, um, you know, you're the approach that you just outlined there. That just seems like common sense, doesn't it? it seems logical. It seems like, it it. Yeah.
00:30:28
Speaker
I'm sure that there is a big element of, you know, compassion and selflessness, but even if you were completely self-interested, that would still seem like the most logical thing to do. Right. Because then that reflects well on you.
00:30:40
Speaker
and ah Yeah, i've I've had some great managers look and and there's loads of brilliant people out there who who I think probably naturally do what you just did without even thinking about the concept of neurodivergence.
00:30:53
Speaker
um A really great manager I had called Sasha, who was my manager, the longest I've ever had a ah manager for. And he was brilliant at that. And he still is to this day. Like he gets to know each individual on his team and he really sweats.
00:31:08
Speaker
How do I communicate with this person? What do they need? How do I motivate them? What levers can I pull? um I think, so i've i've I've spent a lot of time as a sales trainer and Often when you're a sales trainer in a big organization, there's this kind of machine-like thinking where it's like, right, we need to just get people through the process and we need them to get them to the point where they're making their first sale as quickly as possible.
00:31:35
Speaker
If they can't deal with the training, then they can't deal with working here, right? And my mentality was always, if this person can't handle the kind of online training or they don't understand this aspect of it, let's find out how this works for them. Let's find out how they connect with this.
00:31:54
Speaker
And I had a lot of success with people that had been written off by other parts of the organization by trying to kind of meet them where they were at. So I think that... <unk>s I think it's often seen as something which is kind of prohibitively time consuming. It's kind of like, look, we've got this this process. We can't stop the process for anything, right? We can't give this person special treatment.
00:32:17
Speaker
But actually, when you're willing to slow down a little bit, I think in the long run, you're a lot faster and you're a lot more efficient and you're a lot more effective. Absolutely. And I think within organizations, a lot of times they're thinking about those, you know, short term goals. To your point, let's get this person in goal one, get them through training goal to get the first sale goal three.
00:32:40
Speaker
And they're thinking about those little goals or short-term goals versus the long-term. What's the long-term? Well, we want this person to be a successful salesperson who's trying to sell so much and um develop the team and and grow the team to have extra, ah you know, more people that perform as well as they do. And, you know, maybe they get...
00:33:02
Speaker
great management skills and can support a a sales team themselves doing just the same thing. And like that's kind of long term goal that it takes time to get there. And i i feel like I don't know. At least for me, it feels like in the workplace, sales, not sales, doesn't really matter. that That sense of thinking is missing. I think organizations are thinking about it at the organizational level. We want to hit this much in sales. We want, you know, this much in revenue, whatever.
00:33:38
Speaker
But I don't think they're always thinking about it at the individual level. I tend to think of it kind of like a ah gold the goldfish, you know, when i'm when I'm thinking of people and and situations where, you know, you're you're keeping someone in this small glass bowl, essentially, um that fish is going to stay super for small. and i know this is going to sound like it's so cliche and corny, but, you know, you take that goldfish out of that tiny bowl that you got at the fair and put it into a tank or you know, even a ah larger tank or, whatever.
00:34:13
Speaker
but It's going to, the size changes. And I think that makes it. 100%. I think that's a really good analogy because it's like when you, when, when, when variation is the enemy, right?
00:34:28
Speaker
you You, if you, when you minimize variation, you may succeed in avoiding the absolute troughs, but you sure as hell succeed in avoiding the highs as well. Right? Right. When you're like, nothing can vary, we must you know everything must kind of go like this, steady and predictable.
00:34:44
Speaker
Yeah, all right, you might avoid disasters, but you also avoid the most amazing possibilities as well. I think, like I get it. From ah an organizational standpoint, from a leadership standpoint, variation can be scary because it's harder to forecast when when there's variation. But I also think...
00:35:04
Speaker
there's typically some ah folks aren't thinking about it correctly. And if if we think about, let's go back to feedback, for example, an organization could, because they want to reduce variation, they say managers have to meet with their subordinates once a week.
00:35:19
Speaker
get direct feedback. There has to be court official quarterly reviews, annual reviews that tie into salary, bonuses, commission, whatever. And like they could really standardize all of that, which maybe it doesn't need to be standardized to that level. Maybe it's, okay, you need to have one-on-ones at least on a monthly basis. um you need you know I think there can be flexibility on, yes, these things have to happen, the frequency in which they happen. like
00:35:51
Speaker
At my company, a lot of folks have monthly one-on-ones with their managers. I have... biweekly. Every two weeks I meet with my manager. That's just what works best with me.
00:36:02
Speaker
I also really like my manager. He's a really good guy, so I like talking to him. But from a feedback standpoint, it works out better for me to get feedback in smaller chunks more frequently. i think there's a lot that like if variability is scary for an organization, okay, fair.
00:36:20
Speaker
How can you still standardize just enough to check the boxes, but leave some variability that can work both for the organization as well as the individuals?
00:36:32
Speaker
What you've just described there, that's not easy. But you have to... I think what some people do... Some people... kind of defer to it, it's easier if we just have a one-size-fits-all policy. That's the easiest thing I've got to administer, right?
00:36:50
Speaker
But you kind of have to accept the work of having to balance, right? Of having to go like, where is the right place for this? And you're not always going to get it right. And that can be a bit scary.
00:37:02
Speaker
But I think there's a lot more to be gained from doing that than just saying, that's the process, right? everyone's got to get with it leave.
00:37:14
Speaker
And it it goes back to, like, it's but it takes a little bit more time up front. Fred, how do you see, you know, AI is a huge right now, massive buzzword, um huge things happening.
00:37:30
Speaker
how How do you see this affecting the workplace in the future for neurodivergent, good or bad?
AI and Neurodivergent Support
00:37:38
Speaker
um and How is it already affecting your workflows in ways now and ah or if you are utilizing it? I find it very, very easy to generate ideas.
00:37:50
Speaker
What i find a little bit more challenging sometimes is kind of focusing those ideas into something that's really actionable and something that somebody else can kind of interact with.
00:38:01
Speaker
um So I find AI super, super useful for me to just kind of start from this really big, a warper's place and get to something much more focused.
00:38:14
Speaker
I also find it incredibly useful for basically learning things in the way that I learn things. So if someone sends me an email, if someone sends me a document, I'm I basically get ChaiGPT to translate it into terms and languages and concepts that I can more easily understand.
00:38:32
Speaker
And I quite often find myself saying, can you explain this to me using very simple language? We do! 10th grader. use 10th grader. this to an 11th grader, we'll understand. So I find it super useful. I think there's amazing potential for this to this to help people and in in the workplace and possibly in schools as well.
00:38:53
Speaker
Because... The reality is that everybody is so different in how they experience and how they learn and how they communicate and how they process. And of course, it is hard. you know It is hard to like teach millions of children.
00:39:09
Speaker
you know it's a thing like how do we One teacher to say, I've got this class of 30 people. how do i you know How do I give them the information? the whether They're all very different. How do I make sure they all learn?
00:39:20
Speaker
And I think there is this possibility of AI being able to help individuals learn in the way that they they learn best without it being this unbelievably kind of onerous and time-consuming process for the educators or for the organization? I think also too, well, for myself, um I'm currently studying project management.
00:39:42
Speaker
um And when I discovered... how, you know, what what it takes, like the bones of a project manager, right? Like back just a few years ago, if you were not essentially an engineer in ah in a place where you could code and have that engineering mindset,
00:40:01
Speaker
you It wasn't going to be a place where you're successful. And I think in terms of how roles are are shifting and what kind of people we we will be bringing in to said roles, I think this is how AI will change that because we need the connectors. We need the communicators, those people that have, you know, those interpersonal skills, right? Whereas before these people leading these projects,
00:40:22
Speaker
They may have been, you know, thinking with one side of their brain versus someone who could see it more as a whole. And I think in that, my hopes is is very positive that, you know, there will be no no love lost or job lost there, just only ways that we can reinent reinvent and bring people into a space where it is more inclusive and, um you know,
00:40:46
Speaker
Really working towards the mission, Fred, that you and Andy are already on top of. I wanted to take a moment, Fred, kind of give you the the podium to share or say anything you want about the work you're doing at a regular that you haven't already
Creating Neurodiversity-Friendly Workplaces
00:41:06
Speaker
shared.
00:41:06
Speaker
So we have this kind of big goal that we want to um make work more accepting of of cognitive issues. variation, cognitive diversity, neurodiversity, um we want organizations to make better use of it.
00:41:23
Speaker
you know that's That's the big goal. It's not all about just accommodate us, let us in. It's like make better use of this and it willll benefit it will be beneficial for everybody. But the way we actually work is that's a very big thing to do.
00:41:37
Speaker
But the good thing is is that you can start very, very, very small. You can start by just focusing on one aspect of your workplace. i you could You could focus on something like how we communicate with people or how we measure performance, how we onboard people, even um how we recruit, like how we write our job specs, how we run our interview processes.
00:41:59
Speaker
But it could also be something where... You look at one particular team, like there could be a manager. It's like, I want to look at how my design team is working, or I want to look at how my sales team is operating.
00:42:12
Speaker
And it becomes a little bit more holistic, but focused on ah on a kind of smaller area. So that's kind of how we've started to work with people. um we're not We're not quite yet going in and doing kind of big audits of workplaces, although that is something we're kind of working towards.
00:42:29
Speaker
We're going in and working on one particular thing, and it's very much to do with we're really integrating what are the goals of your business, right? Aside from anything that's happening here, what is your business trying to do?
00:42:46
Speaker
And what obstacles is your business facing? And where might we be able to make some changes to make part of your business more flexible, right? Make a part of your business more innovative or productive or resilient through using the neurodivergent lens.
00:43:03
Speaker
That's the kind of people that we're looking to connect with, like people that work for companies where they think that things are a little bit rigid, things don't seem to be flowing as well as they could. You're doing the hard job right now of changing the mindset and because it's not just changing the process that's written on paper. It's changing the mindset of everybody who touches that process or is touched by that process. So it's it's not just going in and saying, okay, well, instead of...
00:43:35
Speaker
you know, having some, but you know, this interviewee or this candidate have to do this case study. It's okay. You should make sure it's same with, um, job descriptions, like making sure that it's written in a specific way that's clear and understandable, making sure it's shared to ahead of time. So somebody isn't put on the spot and their brain shuts down. They can't think of the, the answer, like, and getting everybody who's touched by that process on the same page. Yeah.
00:44:05
Speaker
That's hard. That is hard. And you and Andy are are doing amazing things. And, you know, I hope. No, let's be more positive than that.
00:44:16
Speaker
I know that you will be able to do great work. Other people will start seeing the great work that you're doing. And hopefully it it not hopefully it will spread like a spider web and touch other organizations that you're working directly with or not working directly with, but there's, you know, they start hearing and seeing the benefits of of the great things that you're doing.
00:44:42
Speaker
I think something really big you said ah just then was that you guys are focusing on small taking, you know making small changes, small, small steps. I've been told a lot that um another expression, you I'm not able to sometimes see the forest through the trees. Right.
00:44:59
Speaker
by Right, right. Yeah. um And I think that focusing and and for me, I i am i am a big picture person. I think of the big picture and then some i get lost in translation a lot. Sean sean knows.
00:45:15
Speaker
He said, let's that's for the backlog, big Victoria. and That's a great idea. That's for the backlog. Yeah. ah But i i've I think back, you know, back to speak to that, that it is it's the the small things that are going to make a difference here. And we're not asking for a complete flip the script overnight, you know, like no one's coming over to shake things up. But, you know, just just that that small effort, um the that that cost benefit, the back to what we were talking about earlier is is huge. the
00:45:49
Speaker
The payout is big. Yeah. Yeah. And it's interesting, you know, cause, um, you know, it sounds like you guys have got perhaps a similar dynamic to, to, to myself and, and Andy, where he's very, very good at getting it done.
00:46:04
Speaker
And I'm very good at coming up with the kind of ideas. Yes. But this is, this is you know, that's instructive to how organizations can start to think. It's like you don't need an individual to bring everything.
00:46:17
Speaker
It's in that harmony. You know, it's in the combination of people that you bring in. That's when where the magic happens. Again, Fred, I want to say thank you so much for joining us
Conclusion and Call to Action
00:46:30
Speaker
today. This conversation truly is near and dear to my heart, and I really appreciate and value you and your time and everything that you guys are doing.
00:46:38
Speaker
For all our listeners, we would love, fred you know, reach out to Fred, LinkedIn, or to learn more about Irregular, go to www.irregulartraining.co.uk. We'll have the link in our show notes as well as the link to Fred's LinkedIn. Thank And if you enjoyed this episode today, please subscribe, share it with a friend and visit NurturingTomorrow.org to stay connected with the foundation.
00:47:03
Speaker
Fred, it has really been an inspiring conversation. Thank you so much for being here. Thank you so much for having me. Thank you, Fred. Thank you.