Neurodiversity as a Competitive Advantage
Meet John. He is a wizard in data analytics. His exceptional skill of combining mathematics with software development is a rare find. His CV lists two different master's degrees; he graduated from both with honors. Just the kind of person a technology company would snap up, right?
Until recently, that was not the case. John remained unemployed for two years until he came across a company experimenting with alternative approaches to talent. The other companies he spoke with also needed his skills. However, John could not make it through the hiring process.
If you observe John for a while, you can see why. How to put it: he looks a bit different. He keeps his headphones on all day and does not look people in the eye when speaking with them. Every 10 minutes he leans forward to tighten his shoelaces; if his laces are loose he simply cannot concentrate. John works hard and does not want to take breaks. Even though the workplace 'buddy' the company assigned him eventually convinces him, John does not appear to enjoy it.
'John' is a composite of people with Autism Spectrum Disorder whose privacy we want to protect. He is a representative of a practice that pioneering companies have launched to find 'neurodivergent' talent.
There are many people like John. Data from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention indicate that autism is found in one of every 42 boys and one of every 189 girls. And although corporate programs have mainly focused on people with autism, it is possible to extend them to dyspraxia, dyslexia, ADHD (Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder), anxiety disorders and other conditions. Many people with these conditions possess above-average skills. Research shows that some conditions such as autism and dyslexia come with special abilities in pattern recognition, memory and mathematics. However, those who live with these conditions often struggle to match the profile that employers seek.
To improve the performance of most neurodivergent individuals, fixed items such as headphones to limit auditory overstimulation are often required. These individuals can sometimes display extremely challenging idiosyncrasies. In many cases, both the fixed items and the challenging elements are manageable, while business-beneficial outcomes also emerge. But for companies to realize these benefits, they need to advance their hiring, selection and career development policies and define talent more broadly.
A growing number of major companies have renewed their HR processes to reach neurodivergent talent. Among these companies are SAP, Hewlett Packard Enterprise, Microsoft, Willis Towers Watson, Ford and EY. In addition, companies such as Caterpillar, Dell Technologies, Deloitte, IBM, JPMorgan Chase and UBS have launched initiatives in this direction. We gained detailed access to the neurodiversity programs at SAP, HPE and Specialisterne (the Danish consultancy that first launched such programs). We also spoke with people at Microsoft, Willis Towers Watson and EY.
Although these programs are still in their early days (even SAP's program, the longest-running among major companies, is only four years old), managers say these programs contribute to their companies beyond reputation. These contributions include rising productivity and innovative capability, improvement in quality, and increased dialogue among employees. Nick Wilson, General Manager of HPE South Pacific, who runs one of the largest of these programs, says no other initiative at his company has contributed so much across so many categories.
Perhaps the most beneficial aspect of this work was that it led managers to think more deeply in order to bring out employee skills and approach individual needs with greater sensitivity. Silvio Bessa, senior vice president of digital business services at SAP, says the program 'forces you to know your employees better and therefore teaches you how to manage them,' adding: 'This has definitely made me a much better manager.'
WHY DOES NEURODIVERSITY OFFER OPPORTUNITIES?
John Elder Robison, who blogs for Psychology Today and co-chairs the Neurodiversity Working Group at the College of William & Mary, says: 'Neurodiversity is the name given to the idea that neurological differences such as autism and ADHD are the result of normal and natural variation in the human genome.' Robison, who himself has Asperger's Syndrome, continues: 'Many people who embrace the concept of neurodiversity believe that people with genuine differences need help and acceptance rather than treatment. We completely agree with this idea.
Everyone has different abilities on a spectrum (a definition neurodivergent individuals appreciate); because we are all born and raised differently. Both the underlying 'machine' that is our nature and the experiences that 'program' us shape how we think.
Many managers are aware that differences in background, disciplinary training, gender, culture and other characteristics benefit their companies. The benefits of neurodiversity are similar; but much more direct. Because neurodivergent people are different from 'neurotypical' people, they can bring new perspectives to a company's efforts to create and assign value.
Neurodivergent software testers at HPE observed that a client's projects always experienced a crisis before going to market. Because they had no tolerance for disorder, they continually questioned how the company accepted this disorder. This led the client company to realize that it was being overly tolerant of these crises, and thanks to the software testers, it redesigned its pre-launch process. At SAP, a neurodivergent customer support analyst noticed that customers could solve a frequently encountered problem on their own. Thousands of customers benefited from the resources this employee created.
Still, the neurodivergent population largely lives on as untapped talent. Unemployment reaches as high as 80 percent (this figure includes people whose more serious conditions make them unable to work and who do not fit neurodiversity programs). Even highly capable people often work in positions below what they deserve. Program participants told us that despite having excellent CVs and backgrounds, they had previously worked in jobs given to high school graduates. When SAP launched the Autism at Work program, applicants included people with master's degrees in electrical engineering, biostatistics, economic statistics and anthropology. Likewise, their undergraduate degrees came from fields such as computer engineering, applied sciences, computational mathematics, electrical engineering and engineering physics. Some had even completed double majors. Many of these individuals had high grades; they had graduated with honors or other distinctions. One even held their own patent.
Unsurprisingly, autistic individuals with such qualifications can be competent, even brilliant, in their work. HPE's program has placed more than 30 participants in software testing assignments at Australia's Department of Human Services (DHS) over the past two years. Initial results show that test teams composed of neurodivergent individuals at the agency are 30 percent more productive than others.
Impressed by the success at DHS, Australia's Department of Defence is establishing a neurodiversity program in cybersecurity together with HPE. Participants will use their extraordinary pattern recognition and detection abilities to review logs and other sources to see if unauthorized entries or attacks have occurred. Detection methods adopted from the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) showed that candidates' relevant skills were 'out of the ordinary.'
(The IDF's Special Intelligence Unit 9900, which analyzes aerial and satellite imagery, has a group composed predominantly of individuals on the autism spectrum. It has been proven that these individuals can distinguish patterns others cannot detect.)
Hiring neurodivergent individuals has begun to become essential for the technology sector and other sectors increasingly affected by talent shortages. For example, according to a study by the European Commission, by 2020 the European Union will have a shortfall of 800,000 IT workers. The greatest workforce gaps will occur in important and rapidly growing sectors such as data analytics and IT services implementation, which are highly suitable for neurodivergent individuals.
WHY COMPANIES DO NOT TURN TO NEURODIVERGENT TALENT
What could be the reason that so many companies fail to hire people with the skills they need? It has to do with how they find talent and how they make hiring decisions.
HR processes, especially at large companies, are developed with broad organization-wide needs in mind. But scalability conflicts with the goal of hiring neurodivergent talent. 'SAP focuses on scalable HR processes; but if we use the same process for everyone, we miss out on people with autism,' says Anka Wittenberg, the company's chief diversity and inclusion officer.
In addition, the behaviors of many neurodivergent individuals do not match the characteristics of those labeled as 'good workers.' These characteristics include communication skills, being a team player, persuasion ability, salesperson-type personality, networking ability, and being able to comply with standard practices without special treatment. These criteria routinely exclude neurodivergent individuals. But the value employees bring is not limited to these characteristics.
In fact, recently the importance of being competitive on an innovative basis has increased for many companies. Innovation expects companies to add diversity to what they do; as can be seen in the phrase 'including people and ideas from the edges' in SAP's press release announcing its program. Bessa says that the presence of people who see things differently and who may not seamlessly fit in 'changes the tendency to always look the same way as a large company.'
You may think it is natural for companies, while continuing traditional hiring and development practices, to also seek diversity in their employees. Many companies have shown this approach. Their managers still apply top-down strategies to organizational roles, job descriptions and hiring checklists to meet needs. But there are two major reasons they miss neurodivergent talent.
The first is a universally accepted practice in the traditional approach, namely the job interview. Although neurodivergent individuals may be masters in many important areas, they may not be very successful in job interviews. For example, individuals with autism rarely make eye contact, have a tendency to suddenly take the conversation to an unrelated subject, and may be excessively honest about their weaknesses. Some may have confidence issues stemming from previous job interviews. It is unusual for neurodivergent individuals to score higher than far less talented people in job interviews. SAP and HPE realized it took weeks or even months to understand how good some program participants were (or, just as importantly, to understand their shortcomings). As we will see in a moment, fortunately job interviews are not the only way to understand whether a candidate is suitable. The second problem, especially common at large companies, is the belief that scalable processes must fully comply with customary approaches.
As mentioned, employees in neurodiversity programs must be allowed to deviate from established practices. This redirects the manager's attention from company fit to defining personalized job content. Many items, from installing different types of lighting to noise-cancelling headphones, are not expensive things. But this kind of employee requires managers to work more on individual tasks.
HOW PIONEERS ARE CHANGING THE TALENT MANAGEMENT GAME
The technology sector's past includes hiring 'eccentric' people. The talented 'nerd' lacking social skills became a cultural icon, and his success entered industry mythology as the company built in a garage. In his book NeuroTribes, Steve Silberman says autism is encountered more frequently especially in Silicon Valley (for reasons not fully understood). He and others put forward the thesis that the sector's 'eccentric' and 'nerd' personalities, even if undiagnosed, 'were part of that environment.' Therefore, hiring neurodivergent individuals can be seen as an extension of a culture that values nerds.
Over the past few years, several pioneering companies have formalized and professionalized these tendencies. Although the programs vary, all share common elements; because all draw from the knowledge created at Specialisterne. Thorkil Sonne, motivated by his third child's autism diagnosis, founded Specialisterne in 2004. Over the following years, he developed methods for assessing, training and managing neurodivergent talent without job interviews. He also proved the success of his model by founding a profitable software testing company.
Not content with his company's job-creation capacity, Sonne founded the Specialist People Foundation in 2008 (recently renamed Specialisterne Foundation) to transfer the company's knowledge and experience to others and to persuade large multinational companies to launch neurodiversity programs. Most of the companies that launched these programs worked with Specialisterne to implement a similar approach. This approach has seven major elements:
A team with 'social partnerships' to compensate for the expertise you lack. Although managers at a technology company are knowledgeable on many subjects, they generally lack knowledge about autism and other types of neurodiversity. In addition, for many reasonable reasons, companies do not want to extend their activities into employees' private lives; and at this point, neurodivergent individuals may need extra help. The companies we researched have built relationships with social partners to fill these gaps; these consist of state agencies and nonprofit organizations working to place people who have difficulty finding work because of disabilities.
"INCLUDING PEOPLE AND IDEAS FROM THE EDGES POINTS TO THE ADDED VALUE INNOVATION CREATES FOR COMPANIES."
SAP has worked with the California Department of Rehabilitation and the Pennsylvania Office of Vocational Rehabilitation, as well as nonprofits EXPANDability and the Arc, and overseas with EnAble India. HPE has worked with Autism SA (South Australia). Such organizations guide companies on local hiring regulations for people with disabilities, recommend neurodivergent job seekers, help with pre-screening, generate public resources for training employees and even managers at times, and continue to provide ongoing support for neurodivergent employees. In Germany, the benefits created by moving people from public assistance into tax-revenue-generating jobs have led to publicly funded positions in workplaces to support keeping neurodivergent employees in their jobs. Although revenues governments earn from turning such people into tax-paying technology workers vary, this figure is often around 50,000 dollars per person per year.
Use non-traditional evaluation and training processes that do not rely on face-to-face conversation. Specialisterne organizes 'hangouts' for this; that is, social events held in a very relaxed setting, usually lasting half a day. Here, neurodivergent candidates can demonstrate their skills to company managers in a very natural environment. At the end of a hangout, some candidates are taken into an evaluation and training process lasting two to six weeks (this duration varies from company to company). In this process, projects using Lego Mindstorm's robotic construction and programming kits are worked on first individually and then in groups. As the process progresses, these projects increasingly resemble real work.
Some companies have additional activities. For example, SAP created a 'social skills' module so that those who have not previously worked in a professional environment can become familiar with the norms of such environments. Funding for such efforts is generally provided through government or nonprofit channels. Despite the social challenges many neurodivergent individuals experience, candidates often show very complex collaboration and helping behaviors during project periods. For example, at HPE, groups were tasked with building a reliable robotic drug-dispensing program. During the solution presentations, one of the candidates froze. 'I am sorry but I will not be able to do this,' he said, adding: 'All the words in my head got jumbled.' The candidate's neurodivergent teammates gathered around him and encouraged him, helping him complete the presentation. By extending the evaluation processes in such programs, candidates can be given more opportunities to demonstrate their skills. There are of course other ways to do this. HPE has begun implementing internship programs containing similar elements.
Train other employees and managers. With short, simple training sessions lasting only half a day, it is possible to explain to employees what kind of behaviors to expect from their new colleagues. For example, that they may need different conditions, or that their behaviors may be different. Managers receive more intensive training to become familiar with the resources to support the employees in the program.
Build a support ecosystem. Companies with neurodiversity programs design and maintain simple programs for new employees in this category. SAP refers to two different support circles; one for the workplace and one for home. The workplace support circle consists of a team manager, a 'buddy' on the team, work and life skills coach, work mentor, and an 'HR solutions partner' responsible for a group participating in the program. Buddies consist of company employees who provide support on daily tasks, workload management and prioritization. Work and life skills coaches come from social partnership organizations. Other social partnership roles include vocational rehabilitation counseling and personalized guidance. Generally, employees' families also provide support.
HPE takes a different approach, grouping new neurodivergent employees together with neurotypical colleagues (in a 4-to-1 ratio) into 15-person 'pods' with two managers and a mentor expert in neurodiversity issues.
Develop methods to manage careers. Those hired through these programs need long-term career planning, just like everyone else. This planning requires serious evaluation and development that takes into account the situation of neurodivergent individuals.
Fortunately, supervisors over time develop a good understanding of employees' abilities and limitations. Participants go through the same performance evaluation processes as other employees, but managers follow certain processes to set goals specific to these individuals. Although some goals relate to the participants' conditions, no special treatment is given in cases of poor performance. In fact, neurodivergent individuals must meet more conditions than others; because they must both meet the performance goals like everyone else in their positions and also meet the goals of the program of which they are part.
Some participants quickly demonstrated their potential to adapt to the mainstream organization and advance their careers. HPE's pods are designed to help program participants develop the skills to perform well and at some point leave these pods to transition to mainstream roles.
Scale the program. SAP intends for neurodivergent individuals to make up 1 percent of its employment by 2020. This percentage is determined by scaling from the autism prevalence in the general population. Microsoft, HPE and other companies are also working to expand their programs; but they did not want to set goals with definitive numbers. The easiest places to increase employment are sectors suitable for neurodiversity, such as software, business analytics and cybersecurity.
That said, SAP runs more than 100 programs in which employees serve in 18 different roles. One manager told us: 'As far as I understand, the initial expectation was that these employees would focus on areas involving continual repetition, such as software testing,' adding: 'But in practice, they have proven able to contribute to much broader assignments.' These areas include product management, a role that includes coordinating the development of SAP's new services and products, HR service helpers who support customers in applying SAP solutions to their business problems, and customer service personnel who help customers using SAP software over the phone. These last two roles dispel the notion that individuals with autism cannot perform jobs that require social skills.
HPE distributes its neurodivergent specialists into pods of nine and into client organizations; essentially selling the enhanced capabilities derived from neurodiversity as a package. This model creates interesting scaling possibilities; many employees start work simultaneously and customer demands expand the field of activity.
Take the program to the mainstream. The success of neurodiversity programs has led other companies to realize that ordinary HR processes disqualify high-quality talent. SAP is conducting an assessment to understand how its identification, hiring and development processes can be made more inclusive. The company's goal is to end neurodiversity programs by making mainstream talent screening processes 'neurodiversity-friendly.' Microsoft has similar goals.
Companies have received surprising contributions from neurodiversity programs. Some of these are very direct: companies have become better at finding good, even excellent, talent for hard-to-fill positions. Products, services and balance sheets have benefited from reduced defects and increased productivity. Reports from both SAP and HPE show that teams with neurodivergent employees have produced significant innovations (one employee at SAP developed a technical solution that saved 40 million dollars).
Other benefits of the work are less obvious. One manager told us that making corporate communication more direct to address autistic employees' difficulties with nuance, irony and other subtleties of language has improved communication overall. The perfectionist tendencies of HPE's software testing pods have led customers to raise their own standards and stop viewing common issues as unsolvable. In addition, employee engagement has increased at the points the program touches: neurotypical employees say participation has made their jobs more meaningful and boosted their morale. And early signs indicate that within the program, employees grateful for the opportunity given to them are extremely loyal, with lower turnover rates.
Finally, the programs offer reputational benefits. Companies pioneering these programs are recognized by the United Nations as examples of responsible management and also receive corporate citizenship awards at the global scale.
CHALLENGES FACING THE NEURODIVERGENT WORKFORCE
Companies establishing neurodiversity programs have, of course, faced some challenges. Although there are many potential candidates, it is difficult to identify these individuals; because universities, sensitive to issues of discrimination, do not classify students as neurodivergent or neurotypical, and potential candidates do not self-identify either. Against this situation, HPE is helping prepare unconventional 'work experience' programs at universities and high schools for the neurodivergent population. These programs include computer games, robotic programming and other activities. Microsoft is also working with universities to develop methods of identifying and reaching the neurodivergent population.
Another challenge relates to candidates who are not hired being upset. This is an inevitable situation that must be managed very carefully. In one case, the parents of one of the young people not hired wrote a letter to the company's CEO. The program had raised the family's hopes that their child could eventually find a proper job, and they had understandably been disappointed. Managers felt uneasy about the possibility of a PR issue. In the end, 'compassionate' conversations between the families and managers in the program (some of the managers had similar situations in their own families) calmed things down.
Issues regarding fairness and communication norms may also arise. In one incident we came across, someone with difficulties related to overstimulation was given a separate office, while four people from another nearby department were crammed into the same room. Complaints followed. But after explanations, the complaints subsided. We also heard of several incidents in which an autistic person's extreme honesty annoyed colleagues. In one of these, the autistic person told a colleague, 'You are very bad at your job.' Coaching by managers and mentors helps resolve such situations.
Some managers also reported that the program created extra work for them. For example, one participant's perfectionist tendencies made it difficult to assess which bugs in the product should be fixed, which should not, and which should be handled in a different way.
Managing the work stress of neurodivergent employees stands out as another challenge. We heard reports that unexpected and uncontrollable situations such as system outages disrupt employees' routines and cause high levels of anxiety. Many of those we spoke with mentioned the importance of being sensitive to employees' stress levels. To keep stress under control, some participants worked only part-time; this can cause difficulties especially in projects with approaching deadlines.
"THE SUCCESS OF NEURODIVERSITY PROGRAMS HAS REVEALED THAT ORDINARY HR PROCESSES DISQUALIFY HIGH-QUALITY TALENT."
To manage such situations, organizations should assign tasks to people who can spot problems and address them before they grow. Many managers said that with this support, they could carry out their work quite normally. SAP managers also found, contrary to their initial assumptions, that they could easily manage these individuals remotely as long as mentors and colleagues provided on-site support.
THE GREAT SHIFT IN MANAGING EMPLOYEES
Neurodiversity programs are pushing companies and their leaders to embrace a style of management that prioritizes placing employees in the positions where they can contribute most.
To embed this idea throughout the company, SAP uses a metaphor: People are like puzzle pieces; their shapes are irregular. Companies in the past asked their employees to suppress their differences; because it was easy to fit together people who were all of perfect shape. But this caused employees to leave their differences at home; that is, the very differences companies need to innovate. Anka Wittenberg says: 'The corporate world had missed this side of the issue (the benefit it provides).'
This shows that companies need to embrace an alternative philosophy in which managers bring together different puzzle pieces and view employees not as an endless human resource but as unique individual entities.
Managers' work will become even more challenging. But companies will receive considerable returns in exchange: access to employees' talents and, alongside that, a wide variety of perspectives that will enable them to compete more effectively. 'Innovation usually comes from the ways we are not similar to others,' says Wittenberg.
IN SUMMARY
THE PROBLEM
Individuals with neurological conditions such as autism spectrum disorder, dyspraxia and dyslexia have extraordinary abilities in pattern recognition, memory and mathematics. But the neurodivergent population remains largely untapped.
WHY
Traditional hiring and career development methods (such as job interviews) and the belief that scalable business processes must fully align with standard approaches actually exclude neurodivergent individuals who could be valuable employees.
THE SOLUTION
A growing number of companies including SAP, Hewlett Packard Enterprise, Microsoft, Willis Towers Watson and EY have reformed their HR practices to take advantage of neurodivergent individuals' talents. In the process, they have also become better positioned to fully use the talents of all their other employees.
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