 Hi, everyone! It is, I'm so glad that you can all be here. I am Mel Hauser. I use she, they pronouns, and I am Executive Director of All Brains Belong, and I am thrilled to welcome you all to Brain Club, where for the first, the last three weeks, we have taken on the feat of offering a community program in true hybrid format with the help of work of media, where neither option in person or on Zoom is the default. Because here at All Brains Belong, as we strive to shift the community conversation on neurodiversity and inclusion for all people to belong with all types of brains, we've been talking about how anytime there is a default, one way of doing the thing. If your brain does that thing differently, you are not going to feel included. And so part of having a neuroinclusive society is offering everything we do with flexible multimodal options for engagement. And so what we're going to try to do tonight, because when we were all on Zoom for the past six months for Brain Club, is that we began with ground rules of safety, where we are trying to meet everyone's access and access needs being defined as anything that we all need to participate meaningfully and comfortably. So there is no right way to participate. You can speak, you can type in the chat box, and then here for the first time tonight, we've got, maybe the camera might get a better view, we've got texting here on the Statehouse Lawn, where you can still communicate without spoken communication, and we're going to get your message. So anyway, you in Zoom, you can gesture, you can type in the chat box, use emoticons on mute, and we are thrilled for you to participate in whatever way is comfortable for you, including observing. Observation is totally valid communication, participation. We are really, the topic of tonight is really important to us. When we think about neurodiversity and employment, with all of the diversity, equity, and inclusion efforts being done in workplaces, often neurodiversity and access disability are omitted from these conversations. And particularly when we think about the intersectionality of all of the many ways in which human beings are marginalized and othered, these topics need to be addressed, especially when we think about how one in five people has an invisible disability. One in five people thinks, learns, or communicates differently than the so-called typical brain, even though I don't think that's really a thing. But when we think of that self-selected group of people, 20% of our population, 80% of neurodivergent people are unemployed, unemployed, including, you know, even when we control for education, this is really, this is an environmental problem, because the environment that is not designed to meet a brain's needs is going to make it very, very hard to do the thing. And the thing is everything. So tonight, we're going to talk about the fundamentals of neuroinclusive employment. And because this month, we've been taking on the theme of the double empathy problem, we're going to talk about how the double empathy problem will review what that is, and talk about how this plays out in the employment sector. And I am thrilled that we are joined by a community panel talking about experiences both on the employee and employer side of things. And we'll start to, and including that we'll share a little bit about what we're doing here at All Brains Belong, Vermont, about neuroinclusive employment and ways we are creating what we hope to be a model for flexible, multimodal ways of being an employee, because turns out there is no right way to think, learn, and communicate. So what is the double empathy problem? So Dr. Damien Milton, who is an autistic social scientist, social psychologist in the UK, coined this term 10 years ago in a study where autistic people were found to connect quite readily to perspective take, to brain to brain connection. And non-autistic people were found to be unable to perspective take and have empathy for and communicate accurately with autistic people, as opposed to the stereotype is that there is one normal set of thinking and communicating versus people who are deficient in those skills. When really we're talking about mismatches, mismatches of thinking and communicating styles. And we see this play out in the workplace all the time, whether we know it or not. And so when my patients talk about workplace conflict, and I have the kind of brain that can zoom out and like match patterns all day. And so almost always we are talking about a neuro diverse or neuro mixed difficulties with perspective taking on both sides really. And the more, the more dysregulated we are, the less likely we are able to perspective take, because no one can perspective take when we are dysregulated. With that, I'm going to introduce our panel. So we've got some of our panel here at the State House and some of our panel on Zoom. So maybe I'll introduce everybody and maybe you can wave when I introduce you. Okay, Clem, I'm going to introduce you first. So Clem Nune is an administrative assistant for by State Primary Care Association, which is a nonprofit that represents and supports community health centers in Vermont and New Hampshire. They started this role about eight months ago after graduating from college last year. And they come to us prepared with an early career perspective on hybrid in-person and remote office work. Thank you for being here, Clem. Connie Beale is United Ways Working Bridges Director and supports a team of workplace based resource coordinators who support employee stability, retention and advancement by helping connect employees with resources in housing, transportation, healthcare, financial resources, childcare, food, education, mental health supports and more. Amazing. I'm so impressed with what you're doing, Connie. Sierra Miller is our nurse practitioner here at Albreen's Belong, who has recently started this new job and is going to talk about what this has been like to navigate access needs and conflicting access needs and all of the above. And Zeph, hang on a second. Zeph is an adult autistic, disabled, also diagnosed with complex PTSD, agoraphobia and functional neurologic disorder. Zeph has recovered from autistic burnout. And after a 35 year career predominantly in staffing and recruiting, Zeph brings a unique perspective, lived experience, sending around mist, late identified autistic adults and navigating supports in the community. Thank you. Thank you, Zeph, for being here. So I'm just going to begin by and any particular order is totally fine with me. Does anybody, any of our panelists want to go first? And I'll just let you do your thing about whatever these topics have meant to you. And then I'll ask you questions. Any volunteers? All right, Sierra is going to start. Hi, everybody. I'm Sierra. She, her. I am, as Mel said, a nurse practitioner at Albreen's Belong. I think about, I think neuroinclusive employment is interesting from my perspective as coming at it from a new provider and a new career, but also in a startup nonprofit. So neuroinclusive employment in the terms of a small organization that's able to do individualized care and individualized care of its employees while also having limited resources to be able to do whatever we're able to do. So I like to think about when I first was starting, and Mel and I were first talking about me starting at the practice, I was asked what type of technology I like to work on, whether it was tablets or desktop computers or laptops, and I had never been asked that before. And I think that was one of the things was like, oh, this is a really amazing practice and a really amazing fit both for the patients I hope to take care of and for myself. Because being asked those questions and being given those options, I think it can be really hard, especially as somebody newly starting in a field not knowing what options there are and not knowing what to ask for. And yeah, that's me. Thank you, Sierra. That's been your experience. I think that it really is the job of a supervisor to get to know your employees' access needs. We all have access needs. We all have things that we need to meaningfully participate in our lives. And we have to know what those things are. Earlier before we started Brain Club today, someone here at the State House was sharing, you know, I was told, don't ask for anything. You know, like that was told to me as advice. And oh, cool. All right, cool. We've got truly a hybrid participant here. It's amazing. Anyway, who's on both? But really, that's how a lot of people feel because a lot of culture, workplace cultures, it's not safe to ask for what you need. And so as a supervisor, we really have to be in that place to say, this is normal. It is normal to have needs. And I want to know what those things are. So that's what I, it's part of, it's part of safety, like emotional, physical safety of knowing that it's normal to have needs. Clem, here you go. Oh, you want to use that microphone? Okay, cool. Yeah. As long as everyone can hear me, sounds like you can. Um, so my early career experience for the past like eight months has been really interesting, because I'm not only like new to my workspace, but I'm like new to like nine to five, like office space world, adulting, you know, all that. And the thing that I've noticed in my particular space is that there's a lot of freedom and flexibility and like privilege and like having like kind of a white collar like office job. But at the same time, there's like no structure for anyone because there's assumptions. And like, these are explicit assumptions that my like supervisors have talked about where they, everyone's so busy that they expect everyone to kind of self regulate themselves and like do things the way that is going to work for them. But that's an assumption that everyone's going to be able to work well on their own without that structure. And then when that's not the case and you try to communicate it, it's like even if you're trying to communicate your needs or something, I don't know, like it can be hard to translate to people. And just before this, I saw a Twitter that was basically about spoons and thinking about spoon theory from like a neurotypical neurodivergent mental health lens. And it's like the thing that highlights is that like I try to do my best work when I have the energy to do it. And when I don't have the energy to do it, like I that's not up to me. And that type of like energy ebb and flow does not fit into the nine to five cycle like it's supposed to. So if I want to like stay at the office and work until like nine p.m. on a given day, sometimes that like is legitimately like the best thing that I need to do for myself. But no one like sees that like if I need to leave earlier, if I need to leave late, because there's not that supervision or that structure. So my point is with all this is that in my work, there can be a this situation where like, nobody sees how much you're struggling to like regulate yourself from how much you're struggling to cope with your given environment or whatever, because like as long as you do the work or whatever, then they might think that everything's okay. So you have to go beyond just like doing your work and getting things done. You have to like make your work work for you, you know, you have to make your own work existence like tolerable for yourself, which is a learning process. It doesn't happen overnight. I'm curious. So you're a new college graduate entering the workforce. Did you know that this would be so hard? It's really interesting. It's okay. I didn't know, but it's because I expected it to be different, but it actually ended up being exactly the same as that like college environment where again, like professors don't regulate you. You just kind of have to do your own homework and they want you to get results. But the way that you do your homework or whatever, the way that you go through your work, some people will find it very easy. Some people will find it very challenging. And like, so it actually ended up being like the exact same like work habits and patterns that I've been having for the past like four years, which is weird. So to answer your question, I didn't expect it, but only because I expected it to be different. And it ended up being the same, which was weird because I thought, you know, you were supposed to get off at 5pm or whatever and then go home. But if I have my laptop at home and the things I didn't get to today are going to bother me tomorrow anyways, it really breaks down those barriers. So it's actually very similar to college. That's interesting. So a lot many times people share with me that when they first enter the workforce or even they first graduate high school or like various stages of transition where there is a this feeling of failure, like I'm having a hard time adulting, like as though there's right way to be an adult or like, you know, I'm having a hard time like paying my bills or like I can't I can't cook for myself. I anyway, like all these things that there's a lot of self judgment and a lot of internalized ableism that goes on because sometimes there's like this mythical narrative that being an adult means that you have a certain amount of executive functioning skills as though like executive functioning equals adulting. I don't know if if that resonates with anyone else but that is a that is a struggle for a lot of people. So I just want to name that for anyone in the audience who is feeling that today. Connie. Hello. Hi. Thanks for having me. This is my first brain club and I'm so glad to to be part of this and I guess let's just think how what can I share with you without going on too long. So Mel, like give me the the hook if I go on and on because my brain is making lots of connections right now and I'm kind of that like idea person where I'll just go off because I see all these connections but I actually did that with Mel recently on a call and everything that's being talked about today really comes together for me with the work that our team of resource coordinators do in working bridges through United Way's workplace based team both on a on a it was like a supervisor level like working with our team and the people that show up to do the work of being a resource coordinator in very diverse workplaces. We actually resource coordinators go to workplaces to work with employees that are within specific companies and and they go to companies that are essential jobs. So these are kinds of jobs where many functions many job functions that are in these companies don't have remote capabilities even through COVID and some of the initial challenges that we we faced where we work with employees that have to show up to their job you know in manufacturing settings and in healthcare settings and so I think a lot about neuro inclusion and diversity of all of how our brains work as far as how the resource coordinators do their work because we have lots of different tools available to us but not everybody works with those tools in the same way or wants those tools in their job. I think about it just from an organizational perspective you know United Way Northwest Vermont had the chance to connect with Mel through our staff training and start to really think about how the how does this happen how does neuro inclusion impact our workplace and our work styles and the way we show up fully at work. So that's one perspective but then I also see in our workplaces where we provide resource coordination so with the employers that we work with this feels sort of cutting edge you know and I it's kind of interesting because I think many of you here you've been talking about this for some time you know this you know the work but employers aren't you know this isn't really been discussed I don't think employers have had the chance to even have some frame around this or have some understanding about what this means and how they can look at jobs and look at individual needs and really see where options can be where flexibility can be. One of my teammates met with an employee at a manufacturing company who was feeling really frustrated and like really undervalued in their work and disclosed to the resource coordinator who's a confidential support that their person on the autism spectrum and that what they really want to do is organize that darn warehouse but they're in a completely different position that's not that's not really like speaking to them right it's not it's not grabbing the the way they want to work right and so I think there's just there's so much stigma still that employees come to their resource coordinator and will will share these things and yet they don't feel safe sharing with their employer when they know they could like what what's so hard to sit there is like the employer could have really maximize that employees well being and their ability to produce and do the job if only we could break that down and and create opportunities for people that really talk about what they need and and maybe just shift that stigma so that employers too can create ways for people to you know talk to their supervisor and know that that's encouraged and that we want that in our our culture in our workplace I'll stop there but this just to me with the employers they work I feel like there's just a lot of work to be done and I I just think the timing and the relevance is just all coming together really nicely and I anyway I'll stop there thank you Connie and it looks like has a question for your comment hi Zach go ahead hi actually I was hoping to tag on and go next after what you were saying so um I want to preface my comments by saying number one Mel I'm going to be using the prompts that you sent out thank you I'm going to try to blow through them really quickly um and what I would like the community gathered here to understand is that I didn't get my autism diagnosis until I was like 54 years old that meant that I spent most of my life um I'm 55 56 now I forget but I spent way more of my life not knowing that I was autistic in a neurotypical environment then I have knowing that I am neurotypical and unfortunately because of where the lack of information comes regarding neurodiversity the complex PTSD that I have actually is as a result predominantly of my employment scenarios so some of the stuff I'm going to share isn't going to be really happy stuff and I'm sorry about that but it's also real and I'm also not super sorry about that so the first question was what kinds of access needs do you have at work I wrote down a couple notes about executive functioning and organization um I want to give an example of how the company came in had a consultant come in was working with us all for things on like organization and things like that at that point I had been in the business for 25 30 years I was holding high level professional roles and I couldn't manage things and all of the suggestions that were given were neurotypical suggestions they're all the ones that you find in the books they're all the ones that I had tried before and none of them worked for me because they weren't built for my brain but unfortunately what winds up happening is I just came off like I was resistant to any kind of help because the help that I was getting wasn't actually conducive to the problems I was trying to solve the problem was nobody knew that I was autistic at that time um another thing that came into play regarding access needs is top-down processing Clem you were talking about working different hours I can't work when there's sound around me I can't block out that sound and so I would go into the office at six o'clock when it was quiet work until it was nine not not be able to get anything done between nine and four o'clock with interruptions and then I would work until seven eight nine o'clock every day and I wound up getting fired in spite of unprecedented results because they needed somebody who could do the job in 40 hours a week I was on salary so it cost them nothing more and I was putting in the time and getting unprecedented industry results and fundamentally what wound up happening is I wound up getting kicked out of the company for political reasons they use 360 degree reviews and fundamentally none of the people who were reviewing me were actually qualified to review me so um that's just a little bit about the access I don't want to go on too long but the part about making it hard to communicate the access needs really comes down to the fact that three percent of the research that goes into autism goes into adult autism as opposed to pediatric autism um I've been declined for medical services because the physician or the therapist doesn't know what to do with me if the therapist or the physician doesn't know what to do with me how can I expect the employers to know what to do with me if the scientists aren't doing the research to inform me what help I need how can I be informed to help an employer be informed as to what kind so it turns into like this vicious circle um the last thing I want to address and I'll make this really really quick um about how the concepts of access needs and perspective taking play out in the workplace the one thing I want to note is because most people most people make an assumption that everybody else is neurodiver neurotypical they do not have it in their thought constructs that oh this person might be autistic this person might be neurodivergent and so what happens when some of our neurodivergent features like rigidity or pathological demand avoidance show up those kinds of features are often conflated as personality traits when they're actually hurdles that we are trying to get over in order to do our job and get the results that the company expects us to get so that's my kind of little brief and thank you thank you thank you so much for sharing that um and I uh here on the state house so many people nodding their head along while you were speaking Connie Zeph what you just said made me think of something I just wanted to share I think oh there goes my hand sorry I was like my hand's still up where's my hand um oh but what you just said I saw this happen in a workplace with there was an employee that came to meet with me as a resource coordinator right so the employee came in was crying and clearly really escalated and um you know really upset by their supervisor on a production line having yelled at them to do the job and do something a certain way and so um they came to me and and they disclosed that they are um they've experienced they had experienced a lot of trauma and having um been previously incarcerated and that they're they were experiencing that um flight fight you know kind of that that just the flood you could tell that person in it but that team lead that supervisor essentially that was a trigger right that person triggered that and so the the supervisor team lead I you know this is days later I came to find out the company let that employee go and what I have come to learn since what I think happened there and I don't know for sure but what what I think was happening is a team lead in the company you know perceived that employee had that perception right that idea that you know this person just being difficult not following rules and you know creating this problem yeah when I know because I got to talk to that person I recognize no no that what's happening right now is the way a person's communicating is triggering your brain to go somewhere else your brain's not here at work right right with that team lead who you know wasn't supported to approach that situation with those types of tools or with that thinking right we didn't we hadn't set that team lead up to be able to communicate in a way that would it would really have de-escalated the situation it could have made that work totally differently that I will never forget because I sat I knew what was happening but the company didn't have any steps or any practice or any support for the employees that are in it day to day right right yeah and and and if if I could also point out because Connie what you're really reminding me of is you're you're really like a cultural broker you know you are an interpreter where you are taking what you've seen the communication the nonverbal communication that you have perceived and you're now translating it interpreting it through a lens of understanding nervous system regulation and it is not it's not a common practice that we can even identify when people are dysregulated so like when I do trainings on neuroinclusive employment that is the first thing I do it's what I do for you guys because because I think if we cease overtly flipping their lid and throwing things like we can maybe recognize that's not a calm person right now but that's not the only manifestation of dysregulation you know so if somebody is you know the tone of voice the flood of ideas the pace of speech the rapid pace like there's all different ways that a nervous system manifests dysregulation and so like I think you know one of the most most helpful steps for an employer to like be investing in neuroinclusive culture is to is to get some training around recognizing dysregulation in your employees and not attributing things to like a conscious cortical like yeah I really thought this out and I thought this was the way I was going to handle this like this is limbic involuntary automatic responses dysregulation Jeff yeah I was going to tag on to that and say that especially with the the flight flight fight fun and freeze responses particularly with the fawning responses and disassociation we know that our brain goes offline when we just disassociate and that is precisely the time when we need to be able to be paying attention to what is going on but because of the disassociation we have to spend more time focus and energy on passing in that scenario rather than on the work content that the employer actually wants us to be to be working on right if you are spending all of your cognitive energy focusing on regulating because the environment is so dysregulating you have less cognitive energy available to do your actual work I'm curious for any of our panelists for anybody in in in the audience this idea of a of a go between or an interpreter to like help facilitate perspective taking or just like challenges of perspective taking in general in the workplace what have other people's experiences been about like why it's hard to do or how how how failures to perspective take have on you know unhelpful consequences yeah the bandwidth tax that's exactly right Connie yeah so um and and and I can start with the folks um in zoomland um you know feel free to unmute or type in the chop box if you know any any any any ways that that these topics of perspective taking in the workplace are resonating with you I haven't uh go ahead oh um well I think I think part of the you know a huge part of the problem is is simply that there's a giant percentage of the adult population that has no idea that that that that there's some that neurodiversity is so common and so you know and I'm and I say that including myself right Mel said to me a long time ago what do you think happens to all those kids who are who are diagnosed with this when they were little they turn into adults and we just don't learn anything about that and it's not just physicians it's like everybody right so so there is so little knowledge and therefore interest in in getting an interpreter or being an interpreter you know the other thought the other thing I'm thinking though is there are certain I mean you tell me what you think about this but there are certain kinds of jobs where you being regulated is a necessity you can't just accommodate everything for every job I love that you're bringing that up so two things I would say so one is um the idea is that many times when people are dysregulated it would be helpful to like wonder why why are you dysregulated and so like to prevent dysregulation so um when I when I think back to my medical training um and I can think hi um when I can think back to like um being a resident and like breaking down like crying in the in the resident call room it was always in the context of my computer doing something terrible to me that was like really interfering with my ability to do my job um I had no idea that I had visual processing and visual motor differences I had no idea I just knew that I felt terrible and I was flipping my lid about it like this happens all the time these like subtle ways in which the environment and the bandwidth tax depletes one's nervous system and so like the idea would be that uh yeah we we should we should we should all know about our brains so that we can design a life that's meant for our brain you know like I I didn't know about assistive technology until I was 37 years old made a huge difference now my five-year-old has already had an assistive technology console like this is this is what happens when you can learn about your brain you have incredible power up you know offered to you and and and the most important thing is to not internalize a narrative of being broken and defective like yeah this is a thing this like zoom it's so hard to work it it's not my fault it's the way the program was designed so like that that that subtle shift makes a huge difference you know over over someone's lifespan because what I would say to Zef's point about or actually I'll also just just just to add on directly to Rachel's point about you know autistic or you know otherwise neurodivergent kids become neurodivergent adults we have you know here at all brains belong we have you know almost 200 neurodivergent adults who were not identified as children you know the the people that come to our practice may or may not you know be neurodivergent or identify as neurodivergent but by and large the people come here because their needs were not met by the traditional health care system and we're offering something different and in so doing what many not all but many people have in common is that you know growing up with a brain that thinks learns or communicates differently than that so-called typical brain whatever that means is that there's just a lot of internalized ableism and and just like impact on agency and self-esteem and self-concept from being told explicitly or implicitly that there's something wrong with you and that there's something broken about you when that that's that's not true it was a brain rule it was a package it was a myth that was that's that's been fed to so many people you know from from you know infancy toddlerhood onwards like the myth that there's a right type of brain like we tell toddlers that like you know this is this is how you play you can't just play the same thing over and over again that's pathological like plays the pursuit of joy like who are we you know like that makes no sense but yeah that's what kind of goes on that's the narrative go ahead hold on i want to give you a microphone here you go oh cool yeah you got your own microphone here you go i i think there's a i think we're up against something that's also that's bigger than just sort of informing people about like and getting people to buy into the idea of that that there access needs and that it would be really great if there were sort of a universal design or a universal design approach because when i think about the the cultural context in which people come into employment um first of all i mean this is the means of for me to make a living and support my family so already anybody who's like needs to be in the job market is stressed about their employment so they're coming in that fight so they already have their fight flight stuff going up up in arms when it comes to retaining employment so if someone else gets an advantage that that you know is if all of a sudden that pool of potential employees becomes larger that's a scary thing for the people who are already the even the neuro the neurotypical people who are like wait this is my pool now somebody else is getting an advantage and then and also you've got not only that but you've got the the the companies that are in competition with each other and and they're in fight flight with each other so so we we have a whole culture where employment is a fight flight thing that's sort of bringing out the worst of us as far as how how we each secure our own private little advantages our own little advantage nooks rather than how we open access and um and and um and share resources and so I don't I don't know how to deal with that but I think we're coming into something that has to be that that that is better recognized um and and addressed intentionally as a part of like how do we how do we make this better for everybody in a way that that like and and how do we make clear the stress the impact that the stress is having on everybody that it's like that the way that we're doing employment right now is bad for everybody so it would be good for us to begin to change um and I would say that I mean this is an opportunity to to zoom out and say the way that we're doing a lot of things in society is not working for a lot of people the way we're doing healthcare the way that we're doing education the way that we're doing employment like it's like and and and and this this this is the work that we're trying to take on here it all brains belong in terms of like like can we zoom out and reimagine what's possible because like this not working bad so um uh for 20 years I worked in um non-profit fundraising and uh after those 20 years I eventually found my way to graduate school and now I work as a therapist case manager at washington county mental health the biggest difference that I see um is the is the and the thing that I well there are many things I love about the work I do now but one of the things is the contemplative supervision model because my supervision is is um it's confidential it's based on it can be based on how I feel in the moment um it's really incredibly honest and when I look at my career before that um you didn't want to talk about a mistake you made you didn't want to talk about something you were unsure of you didn't want to talk about anything that was different that might threaten some kind of profit motive or you know um you didn't want to be the bad cog in the in the machinery and um yeah so perspective how do you get perspective um everything in life comes down to the quality of the relationships we have and you know there are studies out there indicating that that when um different organizations implement a contemplative supervision model things really transform so um being real yeah that's that's the way to do it right and modeling that we all have access needs we all have we all have challenges we all have things um and and and uh sorry Connie I see you're sorry I I did not catch you with the glare I did not see the yellow hand up oh cool okay yeah um just a few things in the chat just to verbalize for the people here as well um autism is largely invisible except when it's not um one of the key points of accessibility hiring decisions based on interviewing competency is not the ability and not the ability to do the job I absolutely agree with that I think yeah um stigma and shame is the barrier to all good things um and then just another one some people acknowledge access needs exist but they don't seem to realize that the needs are continuous um my access needs like my allergies are going to exist every day not just for this project or this quarter I think that's a really good point Connie those are all such great points now I have two more points because of those points gracious it just keeps going let me lower my hand okay so the first point though that just came to mind I think it might have been something that um one of one of the folks on the on the green um from Washington County Mental Health I'm sorry I didn't catch your name but what you said about Matt yeah about your experience in workplaces made me think about that um the shift that that shift we were talking about that needed and I think many of the employers that I've come to know and work with they start to make changes when we can make the business case right so when we can actually formulate a really clear bottom line like why is it better for you to have diverse brains doing your jobs and so I'd love to like maybe that's the the real clincher in this economy right is maybe finding ways to to kind of say or draw research that can really promote that thinking that you're going to have a better product you're going to serve your customers better because you're going to have people that can relate and can connect in all sorts of ways maybe like I think there's there's probably data points that could be used there to really like help us shift that thinking to start to um you know really speak the the language of business right to kind of like flip into that how are we getting in front of um employer partners in a way they can really hear us that said that's one thought that just came out and then the second thing is um something that mel was talking about at the beginning around equity and inclusive hiring and we've worked with some manufacturers that are doing a lot of what they'll call it open hiring they'll call it second chance hiring they'll call it inclusive hiring I tend to land on inclusive hiring and I've seen employers open the door really wide and bring lots of folks in to do the job and to just to hire and to train but I've seen some employers do that where they haven't really thought through um all of the sort of the the um policies practices and they haven't really reimagined the the structures of the jobs right and so people come in and there's no success right and so um it's almost like our employer partners and business community like is just continuing to need opportunity to examine their own their own ways they're doing work like how in asking questions like you know do the structures of a job and the functions of a job really need to be as they are can the work happen in different ways are their adequate wraparound and on-site supports that can meet the diverse needs of all of your people and what are those and how do they how do they do that like I think it's almost like an inventory like people need a toolkit or an inventory a way to kind of um you know I say people but like I could see some of our partners and I think they're starting to call on that which is why like Mel and I've been chatting so much but I think um I just nobody's doing that and employers I don't think know where to begin sort of like Zeff said employers just don't know um anyway inclusive hiring there's work here that needs to I think it fits that work too when you think about what that um what that means you know keeping and we often talk about like the same things employment workplaces are designed and built around the idea that everybody comes to the door with stability right everybody comes with all the resources they need to fully show up to the job and goodness you better leave all the other stuff at home but that's just not how our world works anymore right and I think it's an impossible request nobody can do that I'll get off my soapbox now well I love your soapbox stay on the soapbox because I think that there are all of these and I've used this term a couple times today but since there since there are so many folks new to brain club I'll define it like I use the term brain rules to describe like something we think is a universal life truth like a given like an assumption but we really made it up or someone else made it up um as opposed to like a world rule like a law of physics or something like I have been taught that that it means a certain thing to be a professional well it's not professional to have emotions it's not professional to you know like all the things there's just like all these myths um like turns out humans have access needs I'll also say that it's actually really hard to inclusively hire um all brains belong is currently um uh we we we just posted our first competitive hire we are hiring a resource coordinator and we're very excited and Sierra and I put a lot of effort we put so much effort into writing this job description to really imagine like reimagine like we've read so many job descriptions in our life where like you can't even tell what the job is like it's all about the company but like not even really and anyway you can't even tell what the job is and what would what like am I even interested in this job um so that um so we we described in great detail we think um what this job is um because we're really looking for someone who wants to do that job and when you think about like the laundry list that sometimes gets listed of the required essential job duties like really are those all really essential job duties a lot of times it's like the the arbitrary creation of a job and then it's about fitting the hire fitting the employee around the job as opposed to fitting the job around the employee like really trying to support the engagement and self-actualization of an employee um and there are things that are required elements of the job we are creating the job to fulfill a purpose we know exactly what the required skills required to do it because we've been doing it ourselves and I don't have those skills um so it is true so back to Rachel's point um from from uh whatever 15 minutes ago a point that I forgot to say back then which is that yeah um not everything can be accommodated um for example this resource coordinator the role of this person is to be our patience accommodation so to fill out the terrible forms and to access the terrible websites um so we can't not do them we can't eliminate them as an accommodation because that's that's that's what the job is but if transparency is the way out of chaos so like being truly transparent about what needs to be done um and really everything else flexible and it's gonna be my job as this future person supervisor to really understand their brain to and and this is when I do when I do employment trainings I I talk about like this isn't just when someone discloses a disability this is about everybody um how do you do your best work how do you receive information how do you um you know how do you most comfortably communicate um so that you can really like achieve niche construction like finding a life that works for your brain for everybody because we say that one in five people is neurodivergent most of those people have no idea um just before I get to the question um just in regards to you Connie um there is a great website neurodiversityhub.org that has a whole bunch of resources um specifically about neuro inclusive employment and specific um data and research about how neurodiversity increases productivity profits and that type of stuff um so just plugging that resource um a question from the chat how does an employee get an employer to remember their needs so repetition doesn't become draining and that being an advocate proactively is understood so kind of getting to the point of continuous needs and needs aren't just for one project or one term and then also in the chat um even if the job description was written in a way to explain that philosophy of making the job fit the person versus the other way around is a really great option so I'll throw this out to anyone um in in zoomland or here at the steed house um about the the topic of like having to advocate for yourself like that really can it's a bandwidth task I Connie I'm gonna start quoting you like all day long I love the concept of the of the bandwidth tax um because it's true so it is a bandwidth tack it's not totally you okay we'll find out who is the um the the originator of the bandwidth tax um but like what have has anyone found any strategies um that make it so oh fantastic oh Connie you are good I love that book too and I have the kind of brain that did not store that term with that book so we all have different brains thank you so anyone have I in the chat the and the concept of that book is that when we are in a cognitive state of scarcity we make bad decisions and so that the idea is to maximize your bandwidth um and for one in five people bandwidth is being depleted constantly just by being in the world I remember my first day um at all brains belong um you know I start uh you know my first day I'm like sitting in a room by myself I have no staff I'm doing all the things um and I I made a LinkedIn post that I will I'll I'll I'll share when I send out the recording next week um the 36 steps required to send a prescription through my former electronic medical record I was pretty tired after doing that I was sending one prescription um so anyway when you have the kind of brain that um sequencing and motor planning and like the task analysis of everything needing to be thought through and you know not developing muscle memory for these things there's a lot of people tired in the world Clem I don't think this is connected exactly with uh the idea of scarcity but I've heard the metaphor of like everyone has a cup um and maybe that's like your energy or your bandwidth and I think I've heard this metaphor normally based on the phrase either like fill your own cup first or fill someone else's cup first and I think it's a saying about like take care of your own needs so that you can ensure that you can take care of others needs so the idea is like fill your cup first but um I want you to bring this up because that's the helpful metaphor and we can like expand on it in like so many ways because you know like the size of everyone's cup is different um the like flow in and out of that cup is different um and sometimes if you're like really focusing on filling your own cup and then you're trying to like help others feel their cup aware like sometimes there's a crack somewhere and you are just losing bandwidth or whatever um in a way that you weren't aware of or something like that so there's a lot of ways to think of that metaphor and think of uh scarcity um not as like a like set amount of energy that you are distributing but as a set amount of energy that has like so many factors involved uh in so many different ways I love that Clem and it it reminds me um uh my first my first week of medical school um uh one of one of my most memorable lecturers shared a quote um uh that I will never forget that really has stayed with me that in order to heal a person you must first be a person and like that really always stayed with me um and I think that you know whatever whatever field people work in there is often a culture of our cultural message either explicitly or implicitly shared that like you know the work comes first and you know the heck with you um and that's not healthy regardless of what type of brain you have yeah yeah yeah you know in my work I I advocate for people every day using my privilege to um to help them move through systems and the best advice that I can give to people um is to find your community and find your voice find people who hear you um and if I can give a shout out to another non-profit entity uh disability rights Vermont is a great access point for people who can listen to um what's going on in your own story and and give you good feedback because they're all there are so many different kinds of law employment law disability law they all have different rules and and you know different um different situations might have different outcomes under different lenses but it's just important to find people who will hear you amen to that thank you and um I am so oh go ahead yeah one I guess just one last thing I just was struck by your the comment and about you know that 20 of us I have our our our bandwidth is um you know is being constantly depleted and and I think uh what strikes me is that it that's the really painful part about it is that it's being constantly depleted by other human beings largely by other human beings largely acting in ways that aren't good for any human being and so that that anyway for whatever that's worth yes yes and unknowingly so often it's like any other type of privilege um when when something's not hard um it many people are unaware of it and so that's why I think this is so important to be having conversations like this um and to really be um it's it's it's not about having a particular disability disclosed at work it's about um it and and I as we wrap up today I think that um something I I I like to talk a lot about and I think sometimes lands is that since there's no default brain there's not a default way of doing something so if you offer a workflow like this is how we hire and somebody made the comment about how an interview is the only way we evaluate someone's capacity to do the job um we you know we only do this this way anytime you have a default anyone else who does it differently is othered and is not going to feel included and so you know one of the one when when I consult to um companies who are looking at at their neuro inclusivity um a lot of times the first step is to go through your workflow like how do we you know how do we do hiring how do we do onboarding and training how do we do supervision and and how do we do meetings and if anything has a default workflow it's not neuro inclusive and so just like even starting by offering some variation like two or three ways of doing the thing and give people freedom and choice and and autonomy to take what works for them and the in the chat um uh totally agree about finding your people excellent point and this produces balance against adversity and successful outcomes thank you for sharing that nina that's yes very well said everybody needs a village um we are all wired for connection and so I am so grateful to all of you for being part of the abv village and uh thank you to all of our panelists and um participants in in both settings and um we hope that you will join us for brain club next week where we are going to be uh we're taking on the theme of of brain rules bringing back brain rules looking at um the brain rules of the health care system next week so anyway we look forward to seeing you then bye everybody