Written in March 2025

It’s Neurodiversity Celebration Week 2025 and I’m enjoying the webinars I’ve attended so far. One theme which is creating a running thread in my mind is the commodification of neurodiversity.

It seems that one of the more convincing arguments to get employers to take neurodiversity in the workplace seriously lies in the commercial benefits of having neurodivergent thinkers on the team. We convince businesses that neurodivergent talent is worth having, because of the productivity benefits which can be gained by the pseudo-exploitation of our different brains. It is an argument that it seems we must use in order to get some workplaces to open their doors to people who think and operate differently.

I see an uneasy line between doing the right thing by neurodivergent people, and seeing us as a resource to be exploited. I worry that those of us who can fit in to a workplace well enough to provide these benefits to employers could do quite well from this drive – but what about those of us who can’t? Is our worth as people, and as neurodivergent thinkers tied so closely to our economic value?

What worries me is a future where neurodivergent people whose skills and talents aren’t the ones (currently) valued by employers get left behind, and we end up with a split in our community. There already is a valley between the high-masking neurodivergent people who have lower daily support needs, and neurodivergent people with higher daily support needs and several co-occuring conditions. We risk further devaluing some of our community, under the gaze of the rest of society, if we leave those members of our community behind.

I also worry that businesses will take a neurowashing approach to the topic. That they will say all the right things to make them appear to be progressive and neuroaffirming when it suits commercially. We already see this with token events for International Women’s Day, or profile picture changes for Black History Month and Pride. Lots of noise is made about the pertinent issues when there’s a social media post in it, but how much of this actually represents positive action?

It sits uneasily with me because my work is providing neurodiversity training to workplaces, and coaching neurodivergent individuals (inside and outside of the workplace context).

How can I provide the best training for my corporate clients, while maintaining my personal integrity – can I convince employers to accommodate neurodivergent people without laying it on thick about the commercial benefits?

How can I effectively coach neurodivergent people through a neuroaffirming lens, if employers want coaching to make their employees more productive, and less of a “hassle”? Do employers expect me to “fix” their neurodivergent employees to function like their neurotypical colleagues?

One thing which helps balance this, is that through facilitating open conversations about neurodivergence, and getting people to feel comfortable talking about it, people learn from their peers. It familiarises the whole idea of neurodiversity when colleagues and friends open up about their home lives, their children, even their own struggles.

These conversations are an opportunity to draw similarities where differences might be most apparent. Perhaps it’s not on the neurodivergent community to convince employers to get neurodiversity training, but the role of employees of all neurotypes.

The other running theme I have noticed is the pernicious mis-use of “neurodiverse” by people who know better, and who would be helping our community by using the right terms. If those who purport to support us can’t adjust their language, how will they adjust anything else? But that’s another blog for another day…