Autism & Career Development

The narratives on the autism employment gap are often centred around finding work and getting a job. But what happens once an autistic person is in employment? auticon’s Neurodiversity at Work report 2023 explores the barriers and enablers for neurodivergent people to build a meaningful career path. We invited Aleksander Oleszkiewicz to share his career journey and perspectives on thriving at work and developing a rewarding career as a neurodivergent professional. Following is the article, which featured as part of auticon’s 2023 Impact Report, published last month.

Aleksander is part of auticon’s senior leadership team, leading innovation and product development as Director of auticon Labs. With a career spanning over 26 years, he has held several business and technical leadership roles in global organisations including Acoustic and IBM. Alek received an autism diagnosis as an adult. He is a passionate advocate for neurodiversity, has featured in several media publications, and is a regular speaker at forums to help build better awareness of autism and neurodiversity in society.

What factors have contributed to your successful career path?

Thinking about the most recurring theme in my career, I think it would be that I wasn’t following the crowd. I don’t mean that I was always going against the flow, but rather I was doing my own research and evaluations to select the best route. I like to learn, and I was always keen to explore opportunities that looked interesting and superior to others, even if, or maybe because, they were niche solutions and not mainstream. This often led me to situations of being the only one around who knew the technology, so I quickly became a go-to person for all related things and eventually became recognised as an expert.

I tried to align my learning with what I saw as possible future roles or interesting projects but there were a few shots that I missed and dozens of things that I learned, that didn’t lead to any specific engagement. As much as I’d like to take all the credit for what I achieved, I recognise that there was also some luck of being in the right place at the right time. However, I actively supported my luck by preparing for the time when a chance materialised.

How has being autistic contributed to your career?

As I always felt different, I put a lot of effort into self-discovery over the years, reading books on psychology, doing many personality assessments, and trying to analyse my strengths and weaknesses. Only later in my life I was diagnosed as autistic and learned that many of my traits, that I identified earlier were well aligned with the diagnosis. Realising that there is nothing wrong with me was a major relief that gave me the courage to focus on my talents even more and become more open about how to work around my limitations.

Another part of my tactic of not following the pack was that I never considered my career as a one-way ladder – meaning that I didn’t feel that I should only be going up, to a higher rank or bigger responsibility. I was rather looking for places where I could make the best use of my talents, where I felt I could add the most value, learn something new, and gain insights and visibility into new areas of the business. I was making many transitions that were upwards to management roles, but I was also making lateral moves, or even going down the ladder to again work as an individual contributor.?

What can organisations do to ensure equitable career development for their neurodivergent employees?

In terms of what workplaces can do to support equitable career development... I think that one of the key aspects of supporting neurodivergent people is to help them identify their strengths and provide opportunities for non-standard career paths. In our research survey, 65% of autistic employees say they enjoy challenges at work, opportunities to learn, and the ability to innovate. Hence companies should enable people to explore different roles to grow their skills and find out what is best aligned with their natural talents. At the same time, it’s important to have inclusive internal processes, provide accommodations, and support employees in finding ways around their weaker areas. To ensure that the company is taking the right approach, relevant to their employees, it’s essential to include neurodivergent employees in all decisions related to programs and initiatives geared towards neuroinclusion.

It is a common finding that autistic people are not well-represented in leadership positions. What, in your view, are the strengths of autistic people in leadership roles?

First, it’s important to emphasize that being a leader doesn’t mean the same as being a manager. While both are about influencing other people’s work, I see technical leadership as having the drive to explore possible paths and inspiring others to follow the best course. Leadership is not based on coercion or power, but on merits (and sometimes negotiations) centred on in-depth assessment of the situation, analysis of data, recognition of patterns and analogies, evaluation of possible solutions, understanding of limitations and interdependencies as well as technical feasibility, anticipation, and mitigation of risks, estimation of benefits to stakeholders.

We can’t generalise, but I think that in many of those areas, autistic people have a lot to offer with their unique skills, ways of thinking, and ability to see things that others tend to ignore.

How, in your view, do organisations benefit from neurodivergent leaders?

I see autistic managers as being very inclusive, not only in the space of neurodiversity but generally across all areas. I see them as very fact-driven, evaluating people purely on their performance and not taking into consideration any factors that are commonly connected with discrimination. They are fair to their team members, may sometimes be a bit harsh but they are honest, straightforward, and don’t play games. They follow clear and written rules and are open to the individual needs of each person – which creates a great foundation for healthy and high-performing teams.

What would be your advice to neurodivergent professionals considering leadership roles?

Once you have success and are recognized as a leader, you will often have a choice. You may want to keep doing what you do, but maybe on a larger scale, or you may explore if you can amplify your skills even more by passing your knowledge to others helping them to grow and together building even bigger things. This may lead to people management roles, which are often more challenging, but also very rewarding.

Given there is limited awareness and understanding of neurodivergence, what do you see as the risks and rewards of disclosing at work?

I was lucky enough to have many great and supportive managers in my career, who were open to my needs, so I was able to get the accommodations I needed to deliver good results. It was only once that I needed to formally share my diagnosis at work. My organisation at the time was going through a significant transformation, and so was my role. I knew that I could perform those new tasks, however they required many changes in the way I work, which would have made the situation very uncomfortable for me. I explained to my manager which parts of the new role were causing stress and why, and how that would impact my performance, making the role unsustainable for me in the long term. They appreciated my disclosure, and we were able to redefine my duties to better align with my strengths.

This was a positive outcome for me, but the benefits and risks of disclosing are very specific to each person’s situation — the accommodations that the person needs and the organisation they are working for, their manager, their team, and even their customers.

If the people around you don’t understand neurodiversity, disclosing can create more confusion than understanding, as even with the best intentions and will, they may not know what to do with that information.

What’s your advice to someone who may be considering disclosing their neurodivergence at work?

My approach is to focus on being specific when sharing my needs and asking for accommodations that will make me more productive at work. If the organisation has a supportive culture, this should be enough to get an accommodation, without a need to provide any special justification, not to mention the diagnosis. It’s worth mentioning that getting an official diagnosis is often a lengthy process. There are still many instances of misdiagnosis especially among women, and some people simply can’t afford it financially. So, a formal diagnosis should not be a prerequisite for getting reasonable accommodations.

Unfortunately, when the environment is not favourable, being different in any way can become a potential risk. Co-workers may perceive accommodations as preferential treatment and this can lead to misunderstanding, alienation, or even bullying and ostracism.

This lack of predictability of people’s reactions is a major stress factor for many neurodivergent people; hence they may be reluctant to disclose, and unless they are turning into self-advocates, they may want to limit the number of people who are informed to the minimum.

Organisations must reflect deeply on the spoken and unspoken needs of their neurodivergent employees when considering how to build truly inclusive cultures. This can help create healthy workplace environments where everyone (not just the neurodivergent) has the psychological safety to thrive.

What is the importance of autistic role models for the autistic community and society as a whole?

I think we need way more media presence of autistic people and role models. Just as the 60% of autistic people surveyed by auticon reveal, I never had an autistic role model; prior to my diagnosis I wasn’t even aware of any known people who were neurodivergent.

I was diagnosed as an adult. Despite having contact with autistic people before, I didn’t have enough knowledge to realise I was one of them. It changed by a pure coincidence (or luck) that, driving in a car I was listening to an interview with an autistic person on the radio. I wasn’t paying much attention until they mentioned that the autistic guest didn’t feel any emotions or connection with the cheering crowd during a sports event. Then they mentioned some other autistic characteristics, and this was like being struck by lightning; it was all like me; it was like getting answers to all the questions I have had in my life. Before I even arrived home, I pulled over and ordered a book about autism to learn more.

This was a few years ago, however now I see more public discussion about neurodiversity and more interviews with autistic people, they are present in movies, television series, and shows. Still, I think a lot more should be done, as for many people the word autism still only relates to some stereotypes based on popular culture and outdated information. Neurodiversity is such a broad topic, so it can be difficult to find one person as a relatable role model. The more role models we have, the better! ?

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