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Why traditional productivity systems and ADHD don't mix
Episode 4 • 4th November 2024 • ADHD Powerful Possibilities: New and Late Diagnosis & Beyond • ADHD Coach Katherine Sanders
00:00:00 00:16:32

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ADHD Coach Katherine Sanders

In this episode of ADHD: Powerful Possibilities, Katherine explores why traditional productivity systems fail for those of us with ADHD.

We explore the struggles many ADHD brains face when trying to follow typical planning methods and shares practical, ADHD-friendly alternatives to make productivity more flexible, sustainable, and enjoyable.

🐸 If you've ever felt frustrated with traditional advice like "eat the frog," this episode is here to provide you with insights and supportive strategies that actually work.

🧡 Key Points Discussed:

Why Traditional Productivity Systems Fall Short for ADHD Brains

  • Conventional methods, like linear to-do lists or strict time management, are designed with neurotypical executive functions in mind, which can lead to overwhelm for ADHD individuals.
  • The "Eat the Frog" method and systems that rely on consistent emotional regulation often clash with how ADHD brains operate.

The Role of Executive Dysfunction in Productivity Struggles

  • Dr. Barkley's insights: Executive dysfunction is a core challenge for those with ADHD, affecting planning, emotional regulation, task initiation, and follow-through.
  • How rigid systems fail to consider emotional factors that disrupt productivity, such as anxiety, frustration, and boredom.

Understanding Dopamine and Motivation

  • Katherine discusses Dr. Nora Volkow's research on reward deficiency in ADHD, explaining why traditional reward-based planning often fails.
  • Dopamine's role in ADHD brains: why we struggle with future rewards and how this impacts motivation for non-urgent, non-interesting tasks.

Then we explore alternative, ADHD-Friendly Productivity Alternatives

Notable Quotes:

  • "The key to productivity isn't just structure—it's finding the right kind of structure for your brain."
  • "It's not about trying to fit into productivity molds that were never designed for us; it's about tweaking them until they actually feel doable."
  • "Short-term, immediate rewards work best for ADHD, and there’s nothing wrong with making it fun—confetti, points, or cats, whatever gets you moving."

If today’s episode resonated with you, please share it with someone who might find it helpful.

😀 Remember, your experience can help others overcome their own challenges!

📝 Please don’t forget to leave a review—every bit of support helps us bring you more strategies for an ADHD-friendly life.

Connect with Katherine here:


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📘 The CLEAR ADHD Procrastination Cure Ebook – For more on ADHD-friendly strategies.

🎓 Executive Function Junction Course – Transform your approach to creating habits and routines with powerful brain-based methods.

✉️ Subscribe to Katherine’s ADHD Emails – Get actionable advice and tools directly to your inbox.

💡 Schedule a Coaching Session with Katherine - a one-hour meeting to help you untangle your noodles and make progress on what matters.

📈 Discover your ADHD Growth Archetype Quiz - personal growth looks different when we have ADHD. Discover your best plan forward with my free quiz.

Smith, A. M., & Johnson, R. L. (2021). Co-working and ADHD: Boosting productivity through shared spaces. Journal of Adult ADHD, 10(4), 323-332. DOI: 10.1080/15534510.2021.1874512 (https://doi.org/10.1080/15534510.2021.1874512).

Transcripts

Katherine:

Welcome back.

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My friend.

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It is ADHD.

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powerful possibilities.

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I'm Katherine, your coach and friend.

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And today we are going to

talk about productivity.

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In particular, why are so

many productivity systems?

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No good for people with ADHD.

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If you are a bit of a planner addict and

you've tried one solution after another.

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And you're still struggling to get

started on things or to stay on

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top of the many tasks you face.

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This is the episode for you.

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We are going to unpack why

traditional productivity systems.

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Are so challenging for people with ADHD.

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And, more importantly, I am

of course, going to share some

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ADHD friendly alternatives.

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The key is to understand how

your particular brain works.

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Or if it doesn't work.

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What can we do to support it?

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This is key.

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When we want to design a system

that is going to be sustainable,

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flexible, and supportive.

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So, if anyone has ever told you to eat

the frog and you have, frankly said,

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frogs are gross and slimy and walked away.

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Hang around.

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Let's start with a big question.

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Why did traditional productivity systems.

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Really not suit our brains.

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There are so many parts of this,

uh, that we could be here for

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ever really talking about it.

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The first one is, how are

these systems designed?

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Most of them assume we all have average.

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Adult executive functions.

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Which means we find it easy to

plan, organize, sustain attention.

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Set our priorities manage our emotions.

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Have flexibility around

priorities and changing things.

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And that we can finish projects

without too much trouble.

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We've talked many times before

about how this just isn't the

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average picture for somebody with

a neurodivergent or ADHD brain.

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And Dr.

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Barkley has said many times executive

dysfunction is the core of ADHD.

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It's literally how you are diagnosed.

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And of course, when we struggle with

things like task initiation, Motivation

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sustaining attention, being consistent.

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All of these are related to executive

functions, but that is what most

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productivity advice relies on.

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If you think about the classic

to do list - it is linear.

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You go from one item to the next.

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You're supposed to write out

each task, be able to prioritize

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them logically in order.

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And then work through them

one by one until "hurray!".

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Your work is done and you

can sit down and relax.

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For ADHD brains, that

linear process in itself.

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Is a significant cognitive demand.

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Our attention moves from

one thing to the other.

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We are drawn by things

that catch our interest.

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It doesn't take account of how overwhelm.

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Can shut us down and make us.

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You know, just unable to do anything more.

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And it completely ignores the hyper-focus,

where we get sucked into something.

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That is interesting, but

not important or urgent.

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In fact, I would say the more

overwhelmed and anxious you are,

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the more enormous your to do list is

the more likely that is to happen.

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And that's because the prefrontal

cortex and those neural networks

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that are connected to organising,

attention, prioritising, planning.

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They are different when we have ADHD.

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The reduced physical volume of the

grey matter, literally a smaller or

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thinner connected part of your brain.

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Has been shown in many studies.

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And that means that we are going

to struggle more to do all of these

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things that are just kind of average.

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At the same time, people with ADHD.

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Do to incredible things every single day.

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I see it in my work.

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Every single day, there are ADHD adults

who struggle with planning and organizing.

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But who can do incredible things

when they are interested and

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passionate about a subject.

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And again, traditional

organization systems don't factor

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in emotional dysregulation.

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That "hot" circuit, the ' Why?"

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That lies at the heart of everything.

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You could have the most

perfectly executed a logical.

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, broken down list of tasks to do that.

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If your emotions are running very high.

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You had an argument with somebody

that you care about, or somebody did

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something that was really unfair at work

and you feel like you're under attack.

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That's not going to happen.

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Is it.

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when do we feel frustrated?

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Anxious.

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Even bored.

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Boredom is such a strong emotion.

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The ability to follow through and finish

things, especially the last 10 to 20%.

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It's not there and it's not

because we don't want to.

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And we don't understand that

it's our job and it's important.

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The dopamine.

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The neurotransmitters are not there.

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When you throw in our

competing priorities.

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Like we know that tax

returns are important.

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but they're not urgent right now.

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And they're definitely not interesting.

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They're going to go to

the end of the pile.

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Aren't they.

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So things like the Eisenhower matrix,

where we are told to categorize

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things like important, important, and

urgent, not urgent, not important.

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That's so difficult for adults

with ADHD because not many things.

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Are interesting on that list

but they could be important

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and there could be urgent.

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And if we end up relying on

things, being urgent, we're

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in a constant stress response.

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And that's when we get into the habit

of using shame and guilt and panic

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and deadlines to get things done.

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And it feels horrible.

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So then your brain removes the

neuro-transmitters you need.

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To actually get things done.

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Let's talk about what's

going on in your brain.

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So we know that dopamine is

really important for rewards.

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And it's the anticipation of that

reward that makes us feel good

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and allows us to continue the

action to achieve that reward.

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With ADHD brains.

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All bets are off.

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Our transporter cells remove the dopamine.

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Before we are finished a

task, we may not get any more.

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If we are experiencing

any anxiety or shame.

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And that inability to maintain a stable

dopamine level required for a task.

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It's why so many of us

reach for the quick fixes.

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The quick scroll on the phone, the quick

snack at the fridge, the cigarette.

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The betting the gambling or more.

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We're constantly trying

to stabilize our dopamine.

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So when people talk about

dopamine detox and dopamine

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diets and avoiding these things.

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Generally speaking, they are not dealing

with a neuro divergent audience who

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have a physically different brain.

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Dr.

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Nora Volkow explained that

this reward deficiency.

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as, she called, it means that for

many people, with ADHD, traditional

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planning and productivity advice.

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It's just impossible for an ADHD brain.

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Because planning for a future

reward is too far away.

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And the return on investment isn't enough.

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And that's why we can

do incredible things.

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If we're interested and we're motivated.

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But nine times out of 10, it's very rare

for something that's important and urgent.

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To also be interesting enough for

us to have access to that dopamine.

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So we know why traditional planning and

productivity advice just doesn't work.

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and, we can ignore the people

that say, well, you know, you

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just need to wean yourself off

of dopamine producing activities.

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So, what can we do?

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How can we work with our brains?

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The first thing is, of course, understand

which of your executive functions

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you need to build a support for.

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I know some people with ADHD

who can plan incredibly Z.

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They are really good at organizing.

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They have trained themselves.

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They've got a system and it works.

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I know other people who are so time

blind, it's really dangerous for them.

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And it has cost them dearly.

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You don't need to be an, either of

these extremes, but you do need to know.

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Which executive functions,

your particular structure and

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productivity needs to support.

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For example.

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Let's look at time.

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Time is something that many

of us find a challenge.

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And one of the suggestions

is time blocking.

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And it time blocking can be brilliant.

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But it has to be done.

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In an ADHD friendly way.

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That does not mean you literally fill

your diary from six 30 or 7:00 AM

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until 10:00 PM with blocks of color.

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Because your brain is going

to look at that and say, Nope.

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I think I've said this before, but.

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Give yourself some space.

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And try to think in.

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Group blocks.

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So you might want admin time.

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You might want creative time.

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You might want.

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House cleaning time or family time.

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It doesn't need to be a specific

thing, but it can live inside

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that general bucket or category.

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And then make sure you have enough time.

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Many of us struggle with

anything less than an hour.

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And that's because it takes time

to focus and then it takes time

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to shift onto the next activity.

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Neuro-typical brains that they've studied

and, you know, productivity, um, research.

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Task switching, going from one

site to the next takes you 20

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minutes to regain your focus.

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So when we are planning blocks,

anything less than an hour.

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You're going to lose a big chunk of that.

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Just being absorbed in the

task and getting started.

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And there was a study on ADHD and

structured flexibility (I have

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included the link in the show notes).

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that showed the flexible planning, reduces

the pressure, the emotional pressure.

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of a really rigid timetable.

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And we knew that when we are

less emotionally pressured,

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We can get things done.

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The more pressure we put on ourselves

with these very rigid outline plans.

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The more procrastination we're going

to experience because we're trying

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to avoid that negative emotion.

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You might have also heard of the Pomodoro

technique and some people swear by it.

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Personally, I find that 25 minute

blocks are just not quite right for me.

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Experiment with what works for you.

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See if it works used to the

group task idea you know, say

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if, you've got your admin.

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A couple of hours.

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But have a way of making it

fun and flexible for you.

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You might say ". Hmm, I'm going

to try a 15 minute focus block.

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And see how you feel at that.

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Did that go well?

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Then how would you feel, do you want to

do another 15 minutes and extend it to 30?

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Or do you actually need a break?

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Because how much energy and focus you

have is going to change from day-to-day.

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Personally I work for about 45 minutes

and then I need a 15 minute break.

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Then I can go back.

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and related to the Pomodoro technique.

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You want to add some

gamification and rewards?

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with does the Pomodoro technique?

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I found a website called

the Pomodoro kitty.

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Where you actually have a cat

that helps you with the timer.

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And it sounds ridiculous, but

anything that makes it fun.

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and interesting and exciting.

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Uh, confetti animals,

whatever works for you.

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That is going to allow

you to be more productive.

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And the reason is we respond

better to immediate rewards.

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So when you get to the end

of a time period, does the

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kitty give you a high five?

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Maybe you're the kind of person

who's motivated by points.

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And if you earn, say 10 points over the

course of a day, you can watch an extra

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half hour of your favorite TV show.

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What is going to work for you?

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Try not to stretch it out

over a day - if you do.

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Pay attention to when

that starts to wear off.

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And when it becomes ineffective.

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When you stop doing it.

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Remember short term, immediate

rewards are more effective for ADHD.

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For me.

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I give myself five minutes of

knitting time for every admin task.

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I start.

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And that goes up to 10 minutes.

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If I actually finish it.

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And yes, I use one of my sticky

notes to keep track of it.

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Another thing that is really helpful for

many people with ADHD is body doubling.

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body doubling is exactly

what it sounds like.

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You know, if you're in the library

and everybody else is sitting

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quietly reading and studying.

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Suddenly.

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That feels a lot more possible because.

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We're all doing it right.

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And our brain wants to copy

what other people are doing.

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We want to be part of a community.

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A lot of people think that a

co- working environment would

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be perfect for people with ADHD.

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It can be helpful, but you need to

think about distractions from noise.

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From people coming and going.

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From not having your

own desk to go back to.

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So co-working in person can be terrific.

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But it can also bring some

challenges for people with ADHD.

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Sometimes when I am really struggling

to get something finished, like my

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recent course function junction.

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I got to the point where I

just had to edit the videos.

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That I had recorded a couple of weeks ago.

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And upload them to the website.

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I literally could not bring

myself to do it because it

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was the last part of the task.

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And I was nervous to be honest about

sharing the course with people.

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So I ended up giving myself

a 10 points every time.

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I edited a section and then uploaded it.

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And 10 points.

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Every time I added a

transcript for the course.

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And if I go to a certain number

of points, I could sit and watch

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my favorite film by myself.

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And, uh, have a complete

"pamper" kind of evening.

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It was brilliant, but it took that

level of conscious reward within one day

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for me to actually get the task done.

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And with body doubling.

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Use the one that's online or in person.

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But be aware of your processing

modalities and notice which

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ones are getting in the way.

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If you are somebody who has a very

strong visual processing modality.

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You might find that being in an

environment with other real life

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people is too distracting because your

body's using all that information.

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And actually you just need to

focus on the task in front of you.

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So virtual coworking and body

doubling may be better for you.

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So traditional productivity,

we can take parts from it.

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In general, it's going to need a

bit of a bit of tweaking if it's

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going to work for people with ADHD.

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And if somebody knows how

to spell Please let me know.

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I have no idea how that's going

to look in the transcript.

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The important thing is to find

the one that works for your brain.

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And has enough structure.

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with flexibility for it to feel

sustainable and allow you to

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have enough interest in there.

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As well as fun.

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So when we tweak traditional

productivity advice for ADHD.

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It means?

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Yes, we use time-blocking but we

make the time blocks bigger, we use.

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Groups of tasks or buckets as I call them.

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And we make them flexible.

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We give ourselves permission to do

something different if we need to,

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so you can swap them in and out.

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You know what?

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In printers, you have

to change the cartridge.

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We're swapping one thing for another.

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That we need to be doing

that wholeheartedly and on

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purpose with permission.

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And I'm going to talk

about permission in future.

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But for now.

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What else can we do?

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Remember your brain is not

designed to be forced into a mold.

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Nobody's is, but some brains find

it less stressful than others.

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Our brains.

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Don't like productivity, molds that

are designed for other kinds of brains.

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So you're going to have to do a

little bit of tweaking upfront.

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If today's episode was useful,

I would be so grateful if you

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would share it and leave a review.

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I've also created a

function junction course.

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Where you can learn about your

own executive function profile.

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Your strongest processing

modalities and bring them together.

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To help design a system

that works for you.

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Until next time.

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Remember that progress is progress.

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It doesn't matter how small it is.

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You can do this and I'm cheering you on.

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stay curious.

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stay powerful and take care of yourself.

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