Employees Are Still Talking About Neurodiversity
Over the past few years, the topic of neurodiversity in workplaces has shifted from a niche topic to a mainstream, ballooning conversation.
More people than ever are seeking and receiving diagnoses as neurodivergent. Social media has opened up spaces where individuals confidently share their lived experiences, providing the examples and guidance previous generations never enjoyed. Today, younger generations in particular are growing up with a language for difference that simply did not exist at scale before.
This societal change is now reshaping the workplace and workforces. Employee expectations have changed as a whole – and one such expectation is assuming or hoping that employers will recognize and support different ways of thinking. For organizations, the implications of this are profound. People remain organizations’ most expensive asset, but significant human capacity is wasted because systems are not built for the realities of how people think and work.
Simply put, the companies that adapt quickly here will unlock performance and innovation, while those that do not face substantial risks both to their reputation and bottom line.
A Shift in Awareness
Awareness of neurodiversity is no longer limited to advocacy groups or specialist circles. Diagnosis has become more accessible, making it easier for individuals to understand and articulate their needs. Online platforms have normalized conversations about ADHD, autism, dyslexia, and other forms of neurodivergence, removing stigma and building communities of support.
The numbers highlight the change. While it’s hard to gauge, it’s estimated that around one in five people may be neurodivergent in the population at large. Among Gen Zers, awareness is even sharper, with more than half – according to a recent survey considering themselves at least “somewhat neurodiverse”.
This, of course, represents a significant part of today’s and tomorrow’s workforce. Yet even with this rising visibility, and the leadership of top companies in driving neurodiversity education, more than 1/3 of all employees still do not know what neurodiversity means. The result is a workplace reality where awareness is growing faster than organizational readiness.
The Risks of Falling Behind
Organizations that treat neurodiversity as optional are putting themselves at risk of losing talent, wasting capacity, and damaging their reputation.
Many employees leave not because they cannot do the work but because they cannot work within rigid norms. While attrition has been lower in many organizations for part of the current year, a consequence of many factors, employee satisfaction remains low. 1/3 of voluntary turnover is linked to issues with managers or teams – something that will likely bite employers significantly when the labor market gains greater liquidity. Uptimize’s own research also shows that almost 1/4 of employees are considering quitting because their needs are not supported.
Lagging team performance represents another area of risk. Teams that fail to leverage cognitive diversity perform 60% less effectively – something that makes intuitive sense when you consider the missed upside here around ‘diversity of thought’. Even high performers can fail when joining a new team if communication styles or working practices do not accommodate difference. The legal and reputational picture is equally stark, with neurodiversity-related lawsuits increasing by more than 500% in recent years.
The Upside: Diversity of Thought
While the risks are significant, the opportunity is greater still. Innovation has always been driven by people who think differently. Diversity of thought is what produces new ideas, fresh solutions, and resilient organizations.
Neurodivergent employees represent a huge source of creativity and problem-solving ability. When managers understand how to support different communication and working styles, they don’t just reduce conflict and enhance team synergy: in doing so they can also release potential (for ideas and team productivity) that has too often been left untapped. Those that embrace diversity of thought gain not only engagement and retention but also a real advantage against disruption.
What Forward-Looking Organizations Are Doing
Some organizations have already shown what can be achieved, working with companies such as Uptimize to transform attitudes and equip teams and managers for more informed conversations around working style differences.
In one instance, a leading gaming company’s initial benchmarking revealed that nearly half of employees were neurodivergent. Many reported challenges with meetings and team communication, and other norms not shaped for their specific thinking styles. But after targeted training initiatives, more than 60% of participants saw immediate improvements in collaboration.
At a Fortune 500 technology company, neurodivergent employees in the company’s Employee Resoruce Group expressed an urgent wish to improve the organization’s hiring processes to avoid unintentionally excluding future talent. After an overhaul of the recruitment playbook and targeted training, recruiter confidence in hiring across different thinking styles increased by 58%. These cases show that progress can be made quickly and that the impact is measurable. When organizations equip managers and teams with the right tools, previously wasted human capacity becomes a source of collaboration, innovation, and growth.
The Call to Action
Neurodiversity as a conversation at work is part of a recent and accelerating societal shift that workplaces can no longer ignore.
For organizations, the choice is clear. They can evolve to embrace all ways of thinking or they can risk losing talent, performance, and reputation. Those that act will reduce friction, build trust, and unlock innovation. Those that do not will find themselves disrupted by competitors who understand how to optimize for the reality of human thinking.
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