This site is dedicated to the idea that neurodivergent adults can become leaders by whatever terms they choose to define leadership.
The main goals of this program will be to:
- Educate business leaders on the value of neurodivergent employees that may not know are already in their companies.
- Educate business leaders about the inherent value and potential pitfalls of neurodiversity hiring initiatives. Leadership and Neurodiversity recognizes the importance of getting neurodivergent people hired, but also understands the “pigeon-holing” some of these employees face.
- Encourage neurodivergent employees who are looking to advance in their companies to advocate for themselves, or if the reaction is negative, seek new employment elsewhere.
- Encourage neurodivergent people to live their best lives by whatever method they choose to live.
The method this program will use is to incorporate leadership skills into neurodivergent people’s lives so they can achieve their best lives. While many neurodivergent people are looking to get promoted at work, or improve their own business margins, others may wish to become more recognized for their unique talents, or to incorporate their abilities to better manage their lives.
This program will combine servant leadership with a new concept called ARMOR. Servant leadership was chosen based on the focus on how a leader’s actions can be more effective than what they say. Since neurodivergent people may have issues with communication, servant leadership was an easy choice to make for the approach the program will use.
ARMOR is intended to replace “masking”, which is where neurodivergent people tend to mimic neurotypical people while often experiencing great discomfort. It is intended to allow our community to advocate for themselves and show that we are more than just the conditions we live with.
ARMOR is best explained as follows:
A: Accepting our conditions. This means we accept who we are without compromise.
R: Recognizing our strengths. Each person has different strengths and we all deserve to utilize them as best we can, again without compromise.
M: Motivating ourselves. We are our own best advocates, but to get there, we must first accept who we are, what are strengths are, and what we want.
O: Organizing our lives and our community. This is about planning and working towards making things happen. If we are properly organized, we can progress towards our goals.
R: Realizing our goals. Simply put, we achieve what we want in life, whether that is promotion to higher-level employment, building a successful business, completing school (which can vary from earning a high-school diploma to earning a PhD), or simply building one’s self-confidence.
The key to ARMOR is that the individual sets the goals and tone of what he/she/they which to achieve, which will be accepted without any compromise. We are are own best advocates as to what
It’s important to recognize that others are also working towards these same goals, but the approaches are different. One of the people who have inspired me in my own research is Nikita Williams, a PhD student at UNC-Charlotte in Organizational Leadership whose goal is similar to mine. Her master’s thesis was on what autistic people might want in a leadership program, and quite honestly, it was a masterpiece. We are aware of each other’s plans and we follow each other on LinkedIn.
ABOUT THE FOUNDER
William Hughes is an autistic man who is currently a PhD student in Global Leadership at the Indiana Institute of Technology, with classes taking place online. This project is part of the academic research that will be done towards the PhD.
William’s experiences have included working for a multinational bank, earning a bachelor’s and master’s degree in Political Science, being hired for one of the first neurodiversity hiring initiatives in the United States, staying with that company for more than 7 1/2 years and earning a second master’s degree in Data Analytics, and finally, moving to a staffing firm and later to a law firm, where he works as a data steward.
In January 2022, William was awake late at night after being frustrated about his inability to advance in his then current role, despite having just earned his MS in Data Analytics from the University of Maryland-Global Campus. An idea sprang into his head to consider pursuing a PhD in Leadership instead of a PhD in Data Science. In February, 2022, William was accepted into the PhD program in Global Leadership at Indiana Tech. He is expected to earn his PhD in late 2026 or early 2027.
Although the research portion of this project may end up being restricted to autistic people (professors tend to limit the number of subjects for this type of project), the project will be open to all neurodivergent diagnosed or identified people.