Shownotes
How can embracing neurodiversity create a happier, more successful workplace?
In this thought-provoking episode of the Happier at Work podcast, host Aoife O'Brien is joined by Tatiana Ryan, a passionate neurodiversity advocate and accomplished pharma professional. They had an insightful discussion about ADHD, neurodivergence, and thriving at work. Tatiana shares her personal journey from receiving an adult ADHD diagnosis to finding "superpowers" in her unique way of thinking. Together, Aoife and Tatiana debunk common myths, celebrate the strengths neurodivergent individuals bring to the table, and share practical strategies for belonging and productivity at work.
In This Episode, You’ll Discover:
- Neurodivergent superpowers: ADHD, dyslexia, autism, and other differences bring valuable strengths such as creativity, abstract problem-solving, big-picture thinking, logic, and attention to detail.
- The masking phenomenon: Women and others often "mask" neurodivergent traits, making diagnosis and support more difficult, especially in the workplace.
- How to embrace your own flavour of neurodivergence and experiment with routines and tools that suit your brain best.
- The power of authenticity and how bringing your whole self to work helps attract your “people” and builds lasting workplace happiness.
Related Topics Covered:
Workplace Priorities, Diversity & Inclusion, Behaviours at Work
Connect with Aoife O’Brien | Host of Happier at Work®:
Connect with Tatiana Ryan | Neurodiversity Advocate:
Related Episodes You’ll Love:
Episode 208: How can you Embrace Neurodiversity in the Workplace
About Happier at Work®
Happier at Work® is the podcast for business leaders who want to create meaningful, human-centric workplaces. Hosted by Aoife O’Brien, the show explores leadership, career clarity, imposter syndrome, workplace culture, and employee engagement — helping you and your team thrive.
If you enjoy podcasts like WorkLife with Adam Grant, The Happiness Lab, or Squiggly Careers, you’ll love Happier at Work®.
Join Aoife O’Brien for weekly insights on leadership, workplace culture, career clarity, imposter syndrome, and creating work that works for you.
Website: https://happieratwork.ie LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/aoifemobrien/ YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@HappierAtWorkHQ
Mentioned in this episode:
Thriving Talent book
Transcripts
Tatiana, you're so welcome to the Happier at Work podcast. I'm so delighted to have you as my guest today, and I'm really excited for this conversation that we're going to have. So do you want to let listeners know a little bit about you, your background, and what we're going to talk about today?
Tatiana Ryan [:Sounds good. I'm very excited as well. I know we've been discussing some of the things offline, so bringing this into a larger forum is quite going to be great. But my name is Tatiana Ryan. I grew up in Guatemala and El Salvador, so English is not my first language. It's actually Spanish. Then I went to school in the U.S. worked there for 12 years, decided that that industry was not my thing.
Tatiana Ryan [:I worked there for eight years. It was in aerospace and defense. So came to Ireland for just one year, almost eight years ago, did a master's and I've been working here ever since, so. So now I'm in pharma and biopharma and I'm living the dream. Love it.
Aoife O'Brien [:Yeah, I think that sounds really familiar, that whole, like, I'm just going to go here for a year. I did the same when I moved to London. I moved for one year and I loved it so much that I ended up staying. And the only reason I left was to travel. And I knew I had to get my Australian visa before I turned 30. So that was like the, you know, the crucial piece in the pie, the reason that I left. And I know we're here to talk today about ADHD specifically and neurodivergence a little bit more generally. Do you want to talk to me a little bit about your experience of that?
Tatiana Ryan [:Yeah. So just to start off, I am not a doctor, I am not a psychiatrist, I am not a medical professional. I'm not allowed to diagnose or anything like that. What I am is an advocate for neurodivergence specifically in the workplace or in schools and learning environment. I kind of got into that because someone close to me was diagnosed with adhd. And a lot of the things that I, that they, they were going through or exhibited, I was going through. And that prompted me to get tested as an adult. And my diagnosis, it's.
Tatiana Ryan [:I wouldn't call it life changing because it didn't quite change my life, but it changed my perception of myself. And it really made me focus on what are my strengths, what are the things that I might struggle with a little bit, how I can use my strengths to really bring value to the work that I do and not just Me, just neurodivergence in general, because each type has their own and I call them superpowers. So that's what really made me passionate about that. And that's been my journey. So now sometimes I'll do talks at work or podcasts, things like that. I still have my full time job, so this is just an advocacy that I do on the side.
Aoife O'Brien [:Love it, love it. And it's so funny what you say, Tatiana, because I think that's the case for a lot of people, from what I see on social media, that someone else that was close to them, you know, they're, they're maybe filling out a form on their behalf and going, well, you know, these, these behaviors are normal, you know, quote unquote normal air quotes for anyone who's not watching on video. You know, isn't that just usual behavior? Isn't that, you know, that's how I am? So, so why wouldn't that other person be that way? And from my own perspective, how I kind of got into this was I attended, initially attended a webinar to support a friend of mine who had been diagnosed with autism and adhd. And I went along to the webinar and I was kind of nodding my head away thinking, yeah, yeah, that makes, that makes sense. And I get it. And the penny didn't drop until, I don't know, months later or maybe even a year later that I was like, wait a minute, like, I'm seeing a lot of this stuff around at the moment and I'm nodding my head a lot and maybe it's time I looked into that for myself. Is that a possibility? I did go through the process of not a formal diagnosis, but like an introduction to see should I go for a diagnosis? That experience, and I'm sure I've mentioned it on the podcast before when I talked about my own experience of going for a diagnosis. It was terrible.
Aoife O'Brien [:There's no other way to say it. It was a terrible experience. And the conclusion was that I couldn't be autistic because I traveled the world independently and I may be borderline adhd, but not to pursue a diagnosis. I think that was like what I took from it. So I'm still fuming about that. And I think there's this whole justice thing that neurodivergent people have, like that you get really pissed off about something and you kind of hold a crutch for a long time. You really want to see right done in the world. And so that's kind of my experience.
Aoife O'Brien [:And the more I See people talking about neurodivergence, ADHD in particular, and autism in particular. Although I do see much more on ADHD, you know, in social media, on TikTok, things like that. The more I can empathize and, and think that's. That's actually like me. So, you know, I can kind of get some of the behaviors. Do you want to maybe talk a bit more about either your experience or what you're seeing in the workplace? When it comes to neurodivergence or adhd, maybe some of the behaviors that people don't necessarily realize could be a sign and this is not a diagnosis, but it's more either from your own experience or from experiences that you've seen others go through.
Tatiana Ryan [:Yeah, I can share a little bit of that before I go into that. I just want to share some information just to build up on. One of some of the things that you said is I'm going to throw a little bit of numbers out. It's estimated that between 15 and 20% of the population has some type of neurodivergence. One thing that's really interesting is if you take the population as a whole, one in five males are probably neurodivergent, whereas it's one to every seven females. And part of that originally it was autism, was seen as a male disorder, or back when it was Asperger's and all those other things. And they've coming to the realization that it presents differently in women, especially in adult women, because there's something called masking that women tend to be a little bit better at than men. And what that means is it's basically like you put on a mask and you start portraying yourself as.
Tatiana Ryan [:And I'm going to use the word normal. I'm using air quotes as well. Neurotypical is the right way of saying it. But in this case, if you think of a normal distribution like a standard curve, there's a lot of different things in there and nobody's ever really perfectly in the middle. They're always a mix and match. Neurodivergent people will be all the different types of behaviors of neurotypicals and merge them into what they perceive as, quote, unquote, normal being that mean.
Aoife O'Brien [:Yes.
Tatiana Ryan [:So not. Not normal as in normal versus different. It's statistically significant mean like the. The average.
Aoife O'Brien [:Yeah.
Tatiana Ryan [:And then they'll act that way.
Aoife O'Brien [:Okay.
Tatiana Ryan [:And men sometimes will not hit that mean right. Straight. Right. Women tend to be a little bit more accurate in their kind of bringing that together, which makes them a little bit Better for masking, though it's not surprising that women have a harder time being diagnosed, especially as adults. Not only is there masking, but there's coping mechanisms that you've developed to help you navigate the world that are probably a little bit better than some of the male court counterparts. And again, this is generalization from science. I think that there needs to be a lot more research done into females and women that are neurodivergent. But that's what the literature is saying at the moment.
Aoife O'Brien [:I think it's so interesting what you say that and, and I, like, I have so much to say about this, but, but there's a great book by Caroline Criado Perez and I'm trying to think of the. I try to remember the name of it, but I'll pop it into the show notes anyway. But basically it's about how most of the research is done on men, and men is considered the average or the mean. And things so far as, like design of public transport, seat belts that are not designed for breasts. You know, all of these kinds of things that you don't really think about but are actually because they were done for, for the, the average person which was considered to be a man. And, you know, the same applies to a man if you're, if you're taller or shorter than the average. You know, all of these, all these kinds of things. But anyway, that's, that's what I'll say about the, this whole thing.
Aoife O'Brien [:There does need to be more research done on women specifically. And it's really interesting how, like, I think the perception always is. Like, my perception of autism is Rain man, you know, and I think that that's what's shown in the media. That's what we think it's about. And adhd, my perception of that is a little boy who's really hyperactive. You know, that's kind of what we think these things are because that's what's shared. But actually, I think, like you say, women present in a very, very different way. Women and present in a very different way.
Aoife O'Brien [:And it's under research, so we don't necessarily know the way they show up. And beyond that, we're brilliant at mimicking other people's behaviors and therefore masking our true selves and become so accustomed to that that that's just how we show up in the world.
Tatiana Ryan [:Yes, exactly. And then there's one thing that you said and applies to all neurodivergent, but I'm going to use autism as an example. There's a Saying that a lot of people in the neurodivergent circle say is if you know one person with autism, you know one person with autism, okay? Because it's. Yes, there might be similarities and things like that, but when they say it's, it's a spectrum, it's not a linear spectrum, it's more like a three dimensional spectrum. And it's similar with adhd. So with adhd, there's three different criteria for you to have it, and you can have one, you can have two, or you can have all three. So the first one is hyperactivity, the second one is attention deficit, and then the flip side of attention deficit is hyperfocus. And the third one is impulsivity.
Tatiana Ryan [:So you could be hyper focused and impulsive, but not really hyperactive. And like you said, your idea is of a little boy running around. That person would not be perceived to have adhd, when in fact they might. So it's always good to know how things show. It's more about how your brain works and how it processes information. And because it processes information differently, hence neurodivergent, you get. And now coming back to your first question, you get different superpowers, different ways that you show up at work. I'm going to speak of my personal opinion, my experiences as someone with adhd.
Tatiana Ryan [:I have someone close to me who has ADHD and autism, so I can speak a little bit about that. But there's other types of neurodivergence. So dyslexia is actually the most common. It's about 10% of the population can have dyslexia. And one thing that you noted, and I just noted it, it's not uncommon to have one, two or three of these because it's just the way that your brain is wired. So it's more often than not that you'll have multiple. So autism and ADHD is very common. Dyslexia and ADHD is very common.
Tatiana Ryan [:And then different aggregates, let's say, of them, they call them comorbidities, which I don't like. But that's the technical term.
Aoife O'Brien [:Yeah, yeah.
Tatiana Ryan [:The scientific term. But yeah, that's too much. It's too much. So I stay away from that. It's just different conjugations of things like autism, bipolar, dyslexia, dyspraxia, down syndrome, adhd, Tourette's, dyscalcula, and then there's a bunch of other ones. Those are just like the bigger ones. And if you don't know a lot about dyslexia, basically what it is, it's the way that you perceive your spatial awareness is slightly different. And most people will correlate this with difficulty reading.
Tatiana Ryan [:And that's partly because it's almost like the letters move, so you're trying to read them as they're moving. And sometimes they come into focus and out of focus because their perception is different. But because they have to adapt to a world and because they see those types of things, part of their superpowers is having great spatial awareness. So you get a lot of civil engineers, architects, visualizing in their brains like a three dimensional space and remembering it. They have really good memory and verbal skills and that's a great asset for any work environment just to people with dyslexia. Anderson Cooper from CNN has dyslexia. Steve Jobs had dyslexia. Salma Hayek has dyslexia.
Tatiana Ryan [:So, you know, there's people that are very high productive in a work environment that have had this and they could be an asset to a great team. And for dyslexia, self made millionaires, about 40% of them have dyslexia.
Aoife O'Brien [:Wow.
Tatiana Ryan [:So that kind of shows the type of problem solving and the way that they work. Dyspraxia is similar. So it's like your body and how you find and gross motor skills. But their superpower is understanding abstract concepts. So they're not so much in touch with their physical world, but in their brains. Abstract concepts, things that would be hard for someone to understand, they will understand in a flash and they can jump to a solution which works. But they can't tell you how they got there because they've skipped like five, 10 steps. They will not be able to tell you how they got there.
Aoife O'Brien [:But they know they got there.
Tatiana Ryan [:Yeah. And it usually is. They get there faster than, than neurotypical people. Daniel Radcliffe is and Florence from Florence and the Machine, they have dyspraxia. So dyspraxia and dyslexia seem to go hand in hand. So over 50% of people that have dyspraxia will have dyslexia.
Aoife O'Brien [:Oh, interesting.
Tatiana Ryan [:Which is really, really interesting. It goes back to like that whole conjugation. If you would.
Aoife O'Brien [:Yeah. Then if you, if you are wired differently in one way, it's likely that you're wired differently in another way as well.
Tatiana Ryan [:Exactly, yeah. And you can bring those assets to your work, to your life and be still be very, very successful. ADHD. Approximately 5% of the population has ADHD. But if you look at emergency services, first responders, really agile places of work, that figure of people with ADHD jumps between 15 and 23%. I personally, and this is just my personal opinion, so I work right now in R and D, which is very hectic. Priorities change all the time. Everything is moving very fast.
Tatiana Ryan [:So it's a little bit that kind of, you know, we have to triage, we have to work on programs that are different levels and things like that. For me, because my brain perceives everything as high importance, I get really good at sorting things and organizing, and if it's a new input, I just kind of roll with it. Because for me, if it's an emergency or if it's just when I'm trying to figure out what I'm doing for dinner, it takes the same amount of effort and work I get. Sometimes they're like, oh, when there's an emergency, you're always so calm. How do you do that? And I'm like, well, because my brain is always an emergency, even if it's, I'm crossing the street and there's things that I can do to bring value that are my superpowers. Other superpowers, besides being calm and rational under pressure is creativity and being able to perceive things that others don't. So one of the things about ADHD is a lot of people, like if you're in a crowded, loud room, let's say they can tone down, like turn down the volume of the background noise and turn up the volume of the person speaking because their brain says, okay, this is important, this is not. Let's process it differently.
Tatiana Ryan [:Usually not everybody, people with ADHD have trouble with that prioritization. So for me, if I'm in a very crowded, loud room and you're talking to me, I'm almost liberating because. And sometimes it'll take a second or two before my brain's caught up with the conversation. But that means then that I am paying attention to things that are happening in the background and picking up on cues and subtleties that maybe someone else doesn't. And that gives me a completely different perspective. Also adapting to change. Things like that are really good. Bill Gates, Adam Levine, Simone Biles, they have ADHD and also are very successful.
Tatiana Ryan [:And lastly, there's autism. And like you said, there's a lot of people that think, you know, Rayman, when they think autism more common in recent media. I don't know if you ever watched the Big Bang Theory.
Aoife O'Brien [:Oh, yes, yeah, yeah.
Tatiana Ryan [:Sheldon is another kind of autism like character. Yeah, A little bit more high functioning and things like that, but still. And Autism, people think it's a. It's a development disorder or learning disorder. It's more of a social disorder. And we as humans learn by interacting with other people. If you have trouble socializing, you have trouble picking up on certain cues and things like that, it just seems like it's a learning thing, but it's not necessarily. It's a lot more complex than that.
Tatiana Ryan [:But people with autism are really, really good problem solvers. There is a very, very big influx of people on the autism spectrum that go into stem. Yeah, they have great memory and logic, and that kind of helps with that incredible attention to detail and the ability to solve those complex problems because they can see that detail and then zoom out and see the bigger picture. And they like structure, so that makes them very dependable. So some people with autism, though, it's unconfirmed, but a lot of people credit Albert Einstein with being on the spectrum.
Aoife O'Brien [:Okay.
Tatiana Ryan [:There's Greta Thornberg, potentially Elon Musk, just from the way that he reacts.
Tatiana Ryan [:And if you think about it, if you do a survey on people studying STEM, about 35, if not more percent of people in STEM will have autism, which is way higher. Yeah.
Tatiana Ryan [:No, I was just going to say it's way higher than the 2% in the general population.
Aoife O'Brien [:Yeah, okay. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Way like almost 20 times higher, basically. Yeah, yeah. But that makes sense because you're talking about. It's about memory and it's about logic and being methodical, which lends itself to STEM really nicely. And it's so funny, Tatiana, what you're saying, like, for me, coming back to adhd, first of all, this hyperactivity, I think previously it was thought that the hyperactivity is external. And it's again, this idea of the.
Aoife O'Brien [:The boy running around and he's being really hyper. And what they say, that it doesn't necessarily have to be an external thing, that it can be the hyperactivity is actually going on inside your head and you don't know any different because that's how you've always been. And like, if your brain is just on fire all the time with loads of ideas or whatever it might be, that can be hyperactivity. And again, it's one of the reasons I never thought any different, because I didn't know any different. But when you maybe compare yourself to other people, you realize these different things. And then there's the like, attention or being distracted easily versus the hyper focus. Yes, tick. I can tick the box on that as well.
Aoife O'Brien [:And then the impulsive nature. And for me that's like getting maybe distracted or, or really, really wanting to buy something, buying it. And then I'm like, now I have it, I don't actually care anymore, I'm not going to use it. But the, the huge impulse to take action was there. And then this idea of what you're talking about, of like, everything is high priority. And I think that's a huge struggle. And I never realized, you know, someone brings something to me and says, oh, you need to do this. I'm like, okay, drop everything, get it done.
Aoife O'Brien [:Or if someone says to me asap. To me, I interpret that as like, yeah, drop everything, get this done straight away. Whereas what they might mean is asap means when you're finished, what you're doing now, then you can go and look at that. And actually I don't need it until the end of next week. So like, whereas I would interpret that completely differently because it's like, this has to be done now. Maybe we'll come back to the idea of priorities in a second. But then this idea of like being very logical, having a really high attention to detail and a problem solver, I'm like, tick, tick, tick, like that's, that all makes sense to me because that's just always how I've been. And I never, I just never knew any, I just never knew any different because that's just kind of how I am.
Aoife O'Brien [:But I suppose for, for listeners, like recognizing themselves maybe in some of those traits, like, it's just, you don't, you just don't know any different because like I say that's, that's just how it's always been. But if we can come back to, to this idea of the prioritization, I think that's a huge struggle that neurotypical people have. But I think adhd, people with ADHD have that, like in bucket loads. So how, how do you manage that? Or how have you seen. And this is something that I struggle with all the time as well. Like I have My massive, massive to do list. I've started adding things like high priority or adding like this is around how much time I estimate this will take. Like, I've started using tools like that.
Aoife O'Brien [:And I had a conversation with a coach a few weeks ago and, and basically this is what I was looking for. I was looking for permission to just. She's like, what if you just took the deadline off all of those things that you haven't got done yet? Just take the deadline off them and then they'll go to the bottom of your list because it's clearly not a priority if you haven't done them yet and they're sitting in your to do list for like months. And I did that and I was like, oh, that feels so good. And now things are starting to pile up again that I'm like, I haven't got to that yet. Have got to that yet. So any, any thoughts on priority priorities, managing those kinds of things?
Tatiana Ryan [:So like you said, prioritization is a struggle for anybody. Um, and just because you're not on any of these spectrums of neurodivergence doesn't mean that you don't have traits from that. Like, everybody has something. Our brains all work slightly different. I don't know what's going to work for a lot of people, but what works for me is the Eisenhower matrix and I've adapted it to be more. I need to do this and it's critical and it has to be me. I need to do this. I have a little bit of time to do it.
Tatiana Ryan [:So I start looking at what the knock on impacts are of that task. If it's not impacting anything later, then it can't be a high priority in my brain. Then there's this has to get done, but it doesn't have to be me. And that's kind of a little bit. Comes with delegation and things like that. Easier to do in the workplace. But between you and me, sometimes my husband gets added to that list. And then there's the other one because like you said, people with adhd, they tell you to do all these things, but some of those things you don't actually have to do.
Tatiana Ryan [:So they're. The, the fourth square is don't. It doesn't need to get done.
Aoife O'Brien [:Doesn't need to get done at all.
Tatiana Ryan [:At all by anybody. And, and sometimes that's one of the ones I struggle with the most because.
Tatiana Ryan [:Well, or because Everything's important and if it got added to the list, there's.
Aoife O'Brien [:A reason it must be important.
Tatiana Ryan [:If it was, it must be important. Exactly.
Tatiana Ryan [:And the funny thing is who controls the list is me.
Aoife O'Brien [:Yeah, exactly. Yeah, yeah, it was important in the past, so it definitely must be important still. Yeah. So like permission to be like, oh, oh, well, you know, and that's probably again, rather than deleting all of those things that I had on my list, I just took the deadline off and so they went to the bottom with no deadline. And I have occasionally looked through it, but yeah, not the end of the world, but I do put an awful amount of pressure on me, on myself, to just get stuff done and everything has to be done immediately, everything has to be done now. You know, and I'm thinking about some of those things that are on that bottom with no deadline and do they actually need to get done at all? They're more of a nice to have. I have admittedly tried to use the Eisenhower matrix. Didn't work so well for me, but I think people are different.
Aoife O'Brien [:Like the system that I'm, I'm setting up now and I would love to learn how to use ChatGPT to create my own thing and I think I might try and create something for myself and that is very unique to exactly what it is because I have a very clear idea of what it is I need, but I just don't, I haven't got there yet with what's available on the market, let's say. So I've tried. I use Asana at the moment. I tried using ClickUp and I think with all of these things you have to just give them time. And I'm slightly impatient when it comes to things like that and maybe slightly impulsive of wanting to change as well. I know another thing that we talked about was this idea of now and not now and this concept that like everything needs to happen now. And I can absolutely so relate to that as well. You know, there's two times that exist and it's now and not now.
Aoife O'Brien [:And most things have to happen exactly now.
Tatiana Ryan [:Yep. And they don't because, you know, you have to look at the prioritization. But I 100% agree. My mom is undiagnosed, but pretty sure she has adhd. And when we plan trips together, when we make a decision, we need to that day, book all the flights, book all the tickets, book all the hotels, everything. Now, now, now, now, now. In 24 hours span, it's all planned because it has to be now, but it doesn't.
Aoife O'Brien [:I'm sorry. It really does makes total sense to me. I'm like, if I decide I'm going somewhere, I'm booking everything all at the same time.
Tatiana Ryan [:Between you and me, most people are not like that.
Aoife O'Brien [:Okay, that's good to know. That's good to know.
Tatiana Ryan [:And something that I tell the person that has autism, that's really close to me. Just because something is easy for you and you find it, it's so normal to use the median definition, not the regular odd definition. Because it just comes so naturally and so easily and it's so obvious to you, does not mean that for most people, that's really hard. That wouldn't even cross their minds. You try to explain it to them, they're not going to get it. In that area is where your superpower lives. And if you're contributing to a team or if you're in your home life or wherever, you're applying this, that's your area to shine. Hopefully you enjoy it.
Tatiana Ryan [:If you don't enjoy it, please don't.
Aoife O'Brien [:Go.
Tatiana Ryan [:Into something into detail just because you're good at it.
Aoife O'Brien [:Interestingly, the. The thing that's popping up for me is, have you ever done an escape room?
Tatiana Ryan [:Yes.
Aoife O'Brien [:Yeah, I love escape rooms, so it helps that I really enjoy it as well. But I'm. I'm actually good at seeing the connections between stuff and being like, oh, hey, we saw. Didn't we see something that could be potentially connected with that? And, and yeah, so solving the clues and, and, and getting out. But I love doing that kind of stuff, which, you know, it lends itself to my entire career, you know, looking, being really methodical with data, analyzing stuff, turning it into a story to impact on sales and marketing decisions. Essentially. That's what I've done my entire career. And then I set up my business to solve a huge problem that most people are unhappy at work.
Aoife O'Brien [:And so, yeah, slowly, surely, methodically getting through organizations one by one to solve that problem.
Tatiana Ryan [:And I bet that it was so obvious to you that there was a big problem and people weren't happy at work. And I don't know how other people react when you kind of ask them, are they happy at work? Because most people would just be like, it's work. It wouldn't even cross their minds that maybe I could be happy.
Aoife O'Brien [:Yeah, that's a big aha moment for me, now that you're reflecting that back, because I hadn't really thought about that. It was very obvious to me, and I left two organizations. I Left three. The first one was because I wanted to travel to Australia. And that's. That's the only reason that I left. I really, really liked it. And then the other two were because I was like, something's not working here and I think it needs to be fixed.
Aoife O'Brien [:And. And then the last one was like, well, I'm. I could be the person to try and fix that. And I never really thought about that. Other people didn't know that. Anyone I speak to says, such an amazing concept. And then a lot of people are not happy at work or they don't know how to figure out how to be happy at work. Some people, like the minority, by absolute spades.
Aoife O'Brien [:They say that they're really happy in their job, they really, really enjoy it. And then some people love it. And then something shifts or changes or the honeymoon period ends and then they don't like it anymore. So, yeah, like, that's. And again, it's all. For me, creating frameworks is maybe another one of my superpowers, because I can see the connections between. Between things and I can organize things in a very structured way to say, this is how you need to look at it, or this is how you need to address it. So if anyone wants to know about more about the Happier at Work framework, then I will pop a link in the show notes to go and check out the episode where I talk about a little bit more about that.
Aoife O'Brien [:I think from the. The biggest reason I wanted to talk to you today, Tatiana, was because what I can see is a lot of people with neurodivergence, they end up leaving the workplace because they don't feel like they belong, they don't fit in. They. For one reason or another, they end up leaving. Whereas from, you know, from where I'm looking, you have made a huge success in spite of, or maybe because of your neurodivergence, you know, you're using your superpowers, you're bringing all of that to work. And to me, it's so inspiring to see someone doing that. Any thoughts on that yourself or any thoughts on helping or supporting other people with neurodivergence who want to stay in employment? Who wants to stay that rather than, you know, rather than feeling like I don't belong here, I don't fit in and I need to leave.
Tatiana Ryan [:Yeah, that's one of the reasons I'm so passionate about being an advocate, because I have seen sometimes people struggle, though I am very open at work. It's almost like a joke. It was at the Christmas party, bingo card Tatiana says that she has ADHD. And that's because if you think back maybe like 50, 100 years ago, people who were left handed were viewed as weird, odd, different, sometimes even evil, depending on who you ask. The word in Spanish for left and right is evil and correct. It's certain words. So like even if it's in the language, but nowadays you might not even notice that the person sitting next to you is left handed. And they've had to adapt.
Tatiana Ryan [:My husband's left handed, so sometimes, you know, it. Using scissors is a big one. So now they have scissors for left handed people. Yeah, but my husband learned with right handed people learn to adapt and cannot use them for the life of him. Okay, but it was just something he had to learn to adopt because the world is built for right handed people. Yeah, but they just take it in stride. It's fine. You're at work, there's a left handed person, like, go and see, walk around your office if you're, if you work in an office, walk around town in your family, take a poll, see if you actually know who the left handed people are in your life are.
Tatiana Ryan [:That's kind of where I want to bring neurodivergence into.
Tatiana Ryan [:It's just, it's something that makes us different. You know, it's something that we had to adapt, but it's also something that we bring to the table as added value. That's where our superpowers live and everybody has something. So one of the things that I do in my teams is I ask them, you know, things like, how do you like to be, how do you like communication? Because some people like a video call, some people like instant messages, some people hate instant messages because it distracts them. Some people prefer email, some people like graphics, some people audio, you know, and tailor your communication style to the person that you're talking to. Because different people will take in information differently regardless whether they're neurodivergent or not.
Aoife O'Brien [:Yeah.
Tatiana Ryan [:Or I say, you know, for example, if you're walking in the hallway and you tell me something, odds are by the time I get to my desk, it's gonna be gone. If you do not see me, write it down. Send me an im, send me an email, Write it down for me.
Aoife O'Brien [:Yeah.
Tatiana Ryan [:Because I will forget and I just, there's nothing I can do. It will not stay in my head.
Tatiana Ryan [:But then that opens up the conversation to other people. Like there's people that come up to me and they go, oh, I have insert neurodivergent diagnosis here. I was scared to tell people because I was going to be looked at differently, I was going to be treated differently. And some of them now are more open about it. Some of them have decided to keep it between us, and that's fine. But then we started creating our own support system. And you start realizing that there's more neurodivergent people at work than you would have realized. And you can use them as support or you can use.
Tatiana Ryan [:So I have a friend, one of my really good friends started working with me now in my office, which I'm very excited about. These neurotypical. And sometimes I will run things by her kind of as a sounding board, and we get that support. And she does the same to me because I look. See things differently. And you can use that to create better teams, to create better structure, but also to feel included and heard so that you can bring your true self to work. So that person that decided not to share their. The people, because there's more than one have shared, decided not to share their diagnosis.
Tatiana Ryan [:It doesn't matter because that diagnosis is a label. But they feel more confident in acting like themselves.
Aoife O'Brien [:Yeah.
Tatiana Ryan [:So it doesn't. The diagnosis part doesn't really matter. Like, it's more just how people perceive you and how you feel people are perceiving you. Because that's another thing is sometimes we feel neurodivergence. Feel like you're being judged or you're not.
Aoife O'Brien [:Yeah. That there's maybe stigma still associated with it.
Tatiana Ryan [:Yeah. But they might not even notice. They might not even care. Like, it might just be in your head. And opening up those conversations really does help bring that along. So that's. That's something that's worked for me and that I'm trying to, like, move. Pay it forward by creating that because it's.
Tatiana Ryan [:It's imperative to have neurodivergent people in your teams. Hewlett Packard did a study. Teams are 30% or more more efficient if they have neurodivergent people in them.
Aoife O'Brien [:Interesting. Why is that? Is there a particular. It's like, Like I'm. I'm thinking from an autism perspective, the methodical and spotting inefficiencies and wanting things to be efficient. Like, I see inefficiencies, inefficiencies all the time. And it's not something I ever associated with autism. But, like, I do want things to be as efficient as they possibly can be. I hate waste.
Tatiana Ryan [:So you can have. And I'm making this up and I'm over generalizing, but you could potentially have someone who's autistic that creates that process and lives in the detail. You can have someone with ADHD that sees the big picture, not so much in the detail, but kind of guides people through and make sure that they're going in the right direction, not getting lost in the forest for the trees. You can have someone who is dyslexic, that has those critical problem solving skills, and then you can have neurotypical people that balance everything out. But it's just having the same as any other team. You want to have diverse thoughts, you want to have diverse perspectives. And that's where it comes from. Companies that really promote inclusivity.
Tatiana Ryan [:Not the fluffy di. The join a group kind of thing, but actually do promote it within and create groups and the ability to be yourself. Have 19% more return of investment. That's from the Harvard Business Review. Than companies that don't.
Aoife O'Brien [:Wow.
Tatiana Ryan [:So it pays off, company wise to invest in programs that really work. Not the programs that you just post on, you know, on April 2nd, but.
Aoife O'Brien [:Actually the reality internally and what's happening in the organization is very different than the perception outside, which I think is really frustrating. Especially if you join an organization with the expectation that it's, it's going to be a certain way and then you see the reality that actually it's not like that at all. Tatiana, we've kind of touched on some, maybe some tools and techniques that people can use. Do you have anything else to share in relation to that in terms of like either working with other people who are neurodivergent or managing yourself a little bit better?
Tatiana Ryan [:That's, that's hard because I'm going to use. And I forget who told me this. Another ADHD thing. I retain the facts, not necessarily who told me them. And sometimes I'll tell them back to you as if I thought they were brand new and they were like, you're the one. I'm the one who told you.
Aoife O'Brien [:I told you that.
Tatiana Ryan [:Yeah. So apologies in advance. I don't remember who said this, but someone told me an anecdote that their child would refer to their flavor of autism, which I loved because it brings a little bit more fun. And you know, it's, it's, it's not a color spectrum. It's like a three dimensional thing, not just autism. Like everything else, my flavor of ADHD might not be your flavor of adhd, so my coping mechanisms might not necessarily work for you.
Aoife O'Brien [:Yeah.
Tatiana Ryan [:What I recommend more than anything is find a community.
Aoife O'Brien [:Yeah.
Tatiana Ryan [:Or. And if there isn't one make one. Because guaranteed that you. You know, I've started just by saying that I have adhd. People were like, oh, can I talk to you over lunch? And suddenly it becomes like a weekly thing. And then people start joining and be like, oh, I would love to talk to you. And I was like, come join my lunch group. And now you have a support system where you can share ideas, you can share support, and don't be scared to try a new technique.
Tatiana Ryan [:It might not work. It might for me, color coding. I color code everything. I. To do tasks, I schedule them in my calendar.
Aoife O'Brien [:Okay. Yeah.
Tatiana Ryan [:And I know like this is going to take me. And I have ADHD. I think it's going to take me five minutes. It's probably going to take me 30 minutes. But I've learned to give myself a little bit of buffer time.
Aoife O'Brien [:Hmm. Is it the opposite as well? Like you think something's going to take two hours, but actually it would only take 15 minutes?
Tatiana Ryan [:Yes.
Aoife O'Brien [:Yeah. Okay.
Tatiana Ryan [:And sometimes three minutes. And I'm like, why did I procrastinate this for three weeks when it's only 30 minutes to do?
Aoife O'Brien [:Yeah, yeah.
Tatiana Ryan [:So I put them in my schedule. So if you look at my calendar, it's every morning I go through it and it's very structured and sometimes things happen. Some tasks might need to move, but at least I have that time blocked off where I know what I need to focus on because I'm going to get distracted. That works for me as well.
Tatiana Ryan [:Don't be afraid to bring your true self. You'll. You'll be surprised at how receptive people are. And so one thing that I didn't touch upon, you kind of touched upon it a little bit. People that are neurodivergent, they're scared of rejection because they know that they're different.
Aoife O'Brien [:Yeah.
Tatiana Ryan [:Most of the time that's in your head. So talk to people. And even neurotypical people, not everybody's going to like you. But if you bring your true self, the people that are like minded, that will like you will gravitate towards you and you'll start building that support system. So don't be afraid. Just be yourself.
Aoife O'Brien [:I, I had that conversation just yesterday with someone and she was an older lady and she's like, I want everyone to like me. You know, why can't everyone like me? I want everyone to like me. And I was like, I'm like that as well. And again, I can't remember who said this to me? But the reframe of that is, do you like everyone? And she's like, well, I like most people. And then she's like, oh, yeah, no, wait a minute, there's a few people. Oh, yeah, no, that guy really gets. He's. No, no, really don't like him.
Aoife O'Brien [:And so you have to think of it like that if you want everyone to like you. Do you like everyone? And there'll be some people who, for no reason whatsoever, just grind your gears or you just don't gel with or whatever it might be, and you have to reframe it to think that way. Not everyone's going to like you. Just like you're not going to like everyone, and that's okay.
Tatiana Ryan [:And yeah. And if you are putting on your mask and pretending to be someone else, people are going to gravitate towards that someone else.
Aoife O'Brien [:Yeah.
Tatiana Ryan [:And that might not be your people.
Aoife O'Brien [:Yeah.
Tatiana Ryan [:You want people, your people to gravitate towards you. And that's only going to come if you are yourself.
Aoife O'Brien [:Yeah. Yeah. And I think, you know, I'm learning much more about that because when I, especially when I first started my business, people said, you can't do this and you can't do that and you can't show up that way. Like, I can't. You can't put memes on LinkedIn. LinkedIn's a professional place. You can't talk about the Simpsons, you know, And I was told all of this stuff, and now I'm starting to do more of that stuff. And the people who get you gravitate more towards you, and they're like, oh, really? There's your people talking about.
Aoife O'Brien [:Because they're my people. Exactly. So, Tatiana, the question I ask everyone who comes on the podcast, what does being happier at work mean to you?
Tatiana Ryan [:So for me, in my flavor of life, being happier at work is to be able to be yourself, your true whole self. Good days, bad days, and everything, and the acceptable scene. And I value relationships and contributing. So if I'm helping at least one person, that's going to make me happy.
Aoife O'Brien [:Brilliant. Love that. If people want to connect with you, if they want to find out more about what you've done, if they want to reach out, what's the best way they can do that?
Tatiana Ryan [:I am on LinkedIn, so you can find me there, Tatiana Ryan. And I'll be happy to answer any questions if I can, or point you in the direction of guides. As I said, full disclaimer. Not a psychologist, not trained professional in this area. In any way, shape or form. I'm just an advocate and navigating the world with adhd.
Aoife O'Brien [:Brilliant. Thank you so much for sharing your wisdom with us today. Really, really appreciate your time. I've had. I've enjoyed this conversation so, so much. It's been really enlightening for me as well, and validating in a way. So I really appreciate that. So thank you.
Tatiana Ryan [:Thank you so much. Aoife, I listen to your podcast. You make me happy. So it's been great. It's been lovely.
