Neurodiversity: autistic people solving new problems and challenging old stereotypes with Alexandra Helens

Neurodiversity in the workplace is becoming a big conversation around boardroom tables - tapping into extraordinary minds to solve the complex issues of our time.  BHP Neurodiversity Lead Alexandra Helens shares her top tips for creating a neuro friendly workplace and the huge benefits to be found through the minds of autistic employees.  

“They will revolutionise your workflow, they will help you develop faster, better performing and easily designed products ...” – Alexandra Helens

“The stuff that makes you a kind of a pain in the butt is what makes you interesting and valuable.” – Alexandra Helens 

*CORRECTION from the interview:  Mensa actually started in England, at Lincoln College in Oxford University.

 You’ll hear:

• What is neurodiversity? (2:00)
• Why should workplaces embrace neurodiversity (6:00)
• Stereotypes (7:50)
• Centrelink and false starts as a young person (9:00)
• Joining the corporate world (10:10)
• Disability (11:00)
• Leading Neurodiversity at BHP (13:00)
• Autistic or person with autism? (16:30)
• Being more neuro-friendly (18:30)
• Mensa – the high IQ society (22:00)  (see above for where Mensa started)
• What we should know (27:00)

Duration: 29 minutes.

Links:

BHP - Neurodiversity

Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome

Curtin Autism Research Group (CARG)

Autism Academy for Software Quality Assurance (AASQA)

Mensa

Book: Alice in Quantumland by Robert Gilmore

 

Want to join the conversation on this week’s episode?  

Facebook  LinkedIn  Instagram 

Listen, subscribe, rate and review:

Apple Podcast  Spotify  Amazon Music or your preferred platform.

Podcast website:

Transcript

Alexandra Helens: 0:05

When I go out to different companies talking about neurodiversity, and its importance, I say to them, I am not suggesting that any of you perform a lick of charity, you're not creating jobs for these people as a favour to them, these people are providing you their exceptional services as a favour to view. They will revolutionise your workflow. They will help you develop faster, better performing and more easily designed products. They are capable of seeing changes that other people won't that would make things more efficient or more affordable. They can see the simple solutions that once you point them out, everyone's like, Oh dang, why didn't I think of that two years ago? Because you weren't autistic. That's why

Sonia Nolan: 0:52

That's Alexandra Helens with a compelling argument on the revolutionary value of neurodiversity in the workplace. Alexandra is autistic, a member of Mensa, which is a society for the world's smartest 2% of people, and she champions the opportunities gained from weird and wonderful thinking. She leads the neuro diversity programme for mining giant bhp, and is chipping away at changing our culture to ensure we tap into the most brilliant minds to solve our most complex problems. I'm Sonia Nolan, and I'm delighted you have joined us at my warm table today, to hear Alexandra's journey from school dropout and Centrelink to Mensa and a most meaningful Korea. Alexandra, thank you so much for joining me around my warm table today. I'm so looking forward to hearing about your experiences, and learning a lot about neurodiversity.

Alexandra Helens: 1:44

Thank you so much, Sonia. Happy to be here.

Sonia Nolan: 1:46

Oh, fantastic. Alexandra, let's start with that word. What does neurodiversity mean?

Alexandra Helens: 1:52

Okay, well, neuro diversity is the concept that there are many different types of brains and types of brain function. And all of them are valid. None of them are inferior, or derivations of one true type of brain. They're all different parts of the human experience and should be treated thus.

Sonia Nolan: 2:17

So we all think things differently, we all process things differently.

Alexandra Helens: 2:23

Absolutely. Historically, we've acted as if neurotypical, that's the most common type of brain function, I like to say it's like straight but for your brain straight for you. And there, we've treated neurotypicals. Like that's the correct way to be a human being. And anyone who has a brain different than from that needs fixing, or they need managing. And we've done that with a lot of things we've treated male, like it's the correct gender. We've treated white, like it's the correct race, and many other things besides and, you know, in this new age, we're finding out that that's just not so

Sonia Nolan: 3:01

that's a really good way to actually position all of this Alexandria, because that makes it so easy for us to understand that. neurodiversity is something that we just haven't been open to really exploring and understanding or seeing. or accepting.

Alexandra Helens: 3:20

Yeah. And, you know, I remember what it was like when I was even when I was a kid. Back in the 90s. It was a lot meaner, a lot meaner place for neurodivergent people. And I'll just clarify. I am not neurodiverse I am actually neurodivergent. It's not blind that yes, it's like it's a grammar thing. It's not really an offensiveness thing. If you mess it up, no one's gonna, you know, get hurt or anything. It's they're just gonna say it. That's not the right grammar. I am neurodivergent because I only have one brain. Yep. It's not possible for me to be neuro diverse. Me and my buddies together, we might be neuro diverse. And neuro diversity is something that we espouse. But each of us is just neurodivergent, or neurotypical. That's sort of the general terminology. And then neurodivergent can mean I'm autistic. Or it can mean add ADHD, bipolar, dyslexia, Tourette's or other neuro types besides, and it's possible to have more than one of those neuro types. I have a friend who's autistic and ADHD, and another friend who's autistic and bipolar. But I myself, just autistic,

Sonia Nolan: 4:43

right. Okay. So they're all I don't know, is it right to say there are all types of a spectrum,

Alexandra Helens: 4:50

that the spectrum terminology is mostly just used for autism? Because there's the classification used to be There was low functioning autism, high functioning autism. And then Asperger's Syndrome over the top. And people used it to rank people, as you know, better than other people. high functioning people were preferable to low functioning people. And that's just, it's gross. And it's a crude system. And it doesn't truly show our differences. There are some things at which I am very high functioning, you know, public speaking, I love I love networking and meeting new people and doing stuff like this. But when it comes to other things, like keeping track of a day planner and stuff like that, I'm much lower functioning, and I need a lot of help with that. So we don't use that anymore. And we say autism spectrum to represent that much like a rainbow has a bunch of different colours. We all have different attributes. And some of those are stronger than others and different people.

Sonia Nolan: 5:54

Makes perfect sense. So neuro diversity is a term that I have heard a number of times now and you know, look, there's in a lot of organisations, there's a huge diversity and inclusion push the latest approach to diversity, is this this concept of neuro diversity. So why is it important to workplaces to embrace neurodiversity?

Alexandra Helens: 6:17

There's a lot of different reasons that it's important. First of all, it's just plain the right thing to do, you shouldn't be discriminating against people in the workplace. And it's important to promote neurodiversity, because it lets people bring their authentic selves to work, which is something that a lot of corporations want right now, because employees that feel that they need to shut themselves off when they come to work, are less happy, less efficient, less productive, and less likely to stay at your company. One of the things that a lot of people don't know about neurodiversity, and also about disability, is both of those attributes are strongly correlated with high intelligence. So if your company is making it hard in any way for disabled or neurodivergent employees to join your company, you're as good as actively saying, We don't want smart employees here.

Sonia Nolan: 7:09

Yeah, isn't that interesting? Because that is exactly what they do want is they want the smartest people to be working.

Alexandra Helens: 7:16

They want the smartest peoplein the room, but then they go, and it certainly make it very hard for those employees to join, and very unpleasant for those employees to stay.

Sonia Nolan: 7:27

And why is that? Is it because neurodivergent people maybe challenge them and ask the hard questions. Is that something that you've ever had? Alexandra?

Alexandra Helens: 7:36

Yeah, I think there's there's a certain part of that, but also in our culture, we've stereotyped, the disabled person as unable to take care of themselves, or the neurodivergent person as they have additional problems. So they're a problem employee or a problem citizen. But while they have had those additional challenges, they've also had to overcome those challenges. So disabled employee isn't a person with additional problems. They're a person with additional problem solving skills. That's a really interesting approach. Yes, I work in the mining industry. They're constantly worried about safety. And sometimes I get people asking me, oh, if I hired disabled or neurodivergent employees, aren't they going to be less safe? Like no, no employee is truly safe. You have to practice risk avoidance every day. But a disabled or neurodivergent employee is more likely to know how to be safe. They know what their limitations are, they know their weaknesses, and they know how to work around them. Your normal correct employees don't have that for knowledge.

Sonia Nolan: 8:39

Right. So tell me about your work because you actually lead a neuro diversity programme for one of the large companies in WA

Alexandra Helens: 8:46

Yes, I work for BHP before I came to work for BHP. I was on Centrelink and I had been on Centrelink like for about 10 years at that point, being autistic and job hunting means a lot of doors shut in your face as soon as they hear.

Sonia Nolan: 9:00

So your experiences Centerlink over 10 years was a very difficult stage your life

Alexandra Helens: 9:07

it was difficult. And I you know I was a smart kid. I did really well in primary school and then I did worse in secondary school when I ended up flunking out of year 11. I thought that that was it for me that I was going to be up Centrelink for the rest of my life. I thought I would never have a job much less a career. Then in a really funny series of coincidences. I ended up in an internship programme and then eventually hired by BHP.

Sonia Nolan: 9:33

That's a huge leap from from being unemployed and miserable, to actually having this career where you're actually now helping other neuro divergent people to have a fulfilling career and changing the culture of an organisation to understand how valuable they are in the workplace.

Alexandra Helens: 9:50

Yeah, no, it was it was a ride, that's for sure.

Sonia Nolan: 9:57

How did it feel those four first few months or even going back to the first few weeks Alexandra, if you can remember sort of you've gone from being 10 years on Centerlink, waiting months to actually have this role sort of materialise after having a few interviews, and then you've got a job and you're walking into a workplace, which is a corporate workplace, which, to be honest, is quite intimidating for everybody. How did you, how did you cope in those first few weeks?

Alexandra Helens: 10:29

it was great. I had a really great experience, I was nervous at first, and I was feeling like, just an intern. And like I was a charity case. But my team that I went into, treated me like a full real employee from day one, they would ask me my opinions on stuff and be genuinely interested in what they were. And I was able to give input on the projects that we were working on. And it was truly just like being another one of the one of the employees there.

Sonia Nolan: 10:56

So you're able to contribute at a high level from day one, you felt you felt like this is actually you know, I can add value here. This is where I'm supposed to be.

Alexandra Helens: 11:04

It took a while to for me to build that confidence. But the team had confidence in me from day one.

Sonia Nolan: 11:09

That's a big deal, isn't it? Yeah. To have other people have that confidence in you.

Alexandra Helens: 11:12

It was great. You know, 10 years of Centerlink, 10 years of being told that I was too disabled or too autistic to work, any number of places, the only job opportunities that were ever offered to me were stuff like stacking shelves that will ease which I couldn't do due to my disability. So you know,

Sonia Nolan: 11:31

Can you touch on that a little bit? What is your disability?

Alexandra Helens: 11:33

Sure. I have Ehlers Danlos Syndrome, E H, L E, R S, space, D, A N L. O. S? And if you can't spell syndrome, I can't help you.

Sonia Nolan: 11:46

I think we're all good with that one. Yes. So what does that mean for you? It's a connective tissue disorder. It's to do with the recipe that my body has for collagen in my DNA, and so the collagen that my body produces is not up to snuff. It's very fragile, and it gets injured easily. So what that means for me is my skin is delicate, it's easier for me to tear it and it takes me longer to heal cuts and bruises like that I'll bruise very easily, you don't have to hit me very hard, and all my blood vessels under my skin will burst. And also I'm hyper flexible, which is fun in some ways. But it also means I injured my joints a lot more. I had those problems. And when I came to work at BHP, I said, Hey, there's some stuff I can't do. And that was all accommodated immediately, no questions asked. So it sounds like you actually had a very, very respectful workplace for the minute you walked into BHP.

Alexandra Helens: 12:46

even though I was just an intern, they got me a nice chair. And, you know, a special keyboard and special mouse to accommodate me working there.

Sonia Nolan: 12:53

And now some years on your role is to actually be that welcome. person at BHP.

Alexandra Helens: 13:01

Yeah,

Sonia Nolan: 13:01

as a neurodivergent people that they're hiring to actually fulfil all of those smart, complex roles that they need at the workplace.

Alexandra Helens: 13:10

Yes, I love doing it. You know, from when I was hired, I immediately started supporting the programme that brought me aboard because that

Sonia Nolan: 13:20

As they had only just started the programme?

Alexandra Helens: 13:23

an intern that started in the first half of 2018. They hadn't had any interns before me and my cohort. The programme is actually run by Curtin University. And it's a product of the Curtin Autism Research Group CARG for short, which is absolutely terrible acronym and they really need to shoot their branding people

Sonia Nolan: 13:46

They really do need to think about that one.

Alexandra Helens: 13:48

Yes.

Sonia Nolan: 13:49

There was another offshoot of that which has a much better acronym.

Alexandra Helens: 13:54

Yes, that's the Autism Academy for Software Quality Assurance. AASQA for short. That programme is the programme that gave me my internship. They do a bunch of different stuff. They provide software testing education, for high school and college age students, autistic students, because autistic people have a natural talent for software testing. Many of us of course, we are not a monolith. There are some artists who are absolutely terrible at software testing. But we tend to be good at that sort of thing because we're very good at staying focused on one thing for a long period of time, we have a very high attention to detail. And we're good at visualising an entire system in our head, whether that's the system of a programme or of a piece of machinery, something like that a whole database we can visualise that in our head a lot more easily than a neurotypical person. So this programme is designed to create employment opportunities for autistic people because about one in three autistic people has a job. And that's any job at all. That's even, you know, like one shift a week at McDonald's enough to put some extra money in your pocket, but not enough to move out of the family home. So it's actually, the employment statistics for autistic people are actually worse than even for disabled people. You know, the employment statistics for disabled people are pretty

Sonia Nolan: 15:19

Well, that's really interesting, because you know, abysmal as well. the points that you're making here is that the qualities of autistic people are so needed in the workplace.

Alexandra Helens: 15:31

Yeah.

Sonia Nolan: 15:31

And I'm just staggered that we wouldn't invest more in actually getting those people into the workplace to help solve those issues.

Alexandra Helens: 15:40

I'm staggered to when I go out to different companies talking about neurodiversity, and its importance. I say to them, I am not suggesting that any of you perform a lick of charity, you're not creating jobs for these people as a favour to them. These people are providing you their exceptional services as a favour to you. They will revolutionise your workflow. They will help you develop faster, better performing and more easily designed products. They are capable of seeing changes that other people won't that would make things more efficient or more affordable, they can see the simple solutions that once you point them out, everyone's like, Oh, dang, why didn't I think of that two years ago? Because you weren't autistic. That's why.

Sonia Nolan: 16:32

Now, actually, this is something I want to ask you. And one of the things that you do say Alexandra, is that, ask me any question. We're not going to get offended. Please don't you know, don't think that you can't ask these questions. Because you've you've pretty much heard a lot of things in your in your life and career.

Alexandra Helens: 16:49

I've had a lot of people who have said all sorts of stuff to me, because they were actively trying to be hurtful or offensive. Someone just asking me a question isn't gonna throw me for a loop.

Sonia Nolan: 16:59

No. So the question I want to ask is, do we say a person with autism? Or do we say an autistic person? Because that's something that just keeps getting debated in the literature. What is the most what is the most appropriate way to say that?

Alexandra Helens: 17:15

Okay, the whole a person with autism thing comes from some older thinking in the disability rights community back in like the 70s or 80s. The thinking was, that at the time, disabled person was treated very pejoratively, like it was a way to insult someone. And they wanted to highlight that this person isn't just a disabled person, they're a person with a disability, it does not define them and it does not limit them or make them less than. So that's where that whole person first terminology comes from. As disabled voices started to come forward and take over that community as rightly we should taking our place there. We said no, disability doesn't make me less than I am disabled. And that doesn't dehumanise me. It's just a fact of who I am. You wouldn't say This is Eileen, my co worker with femaleness. You wouldn't say, this is Gregory. This is my he's a person with blackness. But don't worry, I don't think that detracts from his personhood. He's still a person to me. Yeah, right. Yeah. So you know, I'm not a person with autism, I'm autistic.

Sonia Nolan: 18:30

What are some of the other questions that you get asked a lot by, especially by the executives that perhaps you're working with to help them understand neurodiversity and neurodivergent employees?

Alexandra Helens: 18:43

What people mostly want to know is what they can do to be more neuro friendly. What do I need to do in order to enable autistic people or neurodivergent people to work for me, although I have a hard time getting people to believe it. It's mostly just about deciding that you want to do it and that you want to be understanding. We don't need something super expensive. We don't need some huge doohickey or some fancy programme to enable us to work somewhere. It's mostly about making the commitment to set aside your biases, and your preconceived notions of what a quote, good employee looks like. We're hiring people to be programmers or software testers, and we're judging them on their social skills. Can they hold a pleasant and entertaining conversation? Do they look us in the eye? Do you need eye contact to be a software tester? Or do you just need to be able to make screen contact with the computer screen? Fine. If they're having a public facing role, then test them on social skills. But if they're not going to use those to generate value for you anyway, why are you making them do that?

Sonia Nolan: 19:54

So we are sort of using some blanket business rules if you like

Alexandra Helens: 19:58

and it's just doesn't have anything to do with productivity.

Sonia Nolan: 20:02

It's so true. And in fact, going back in history, you know, some of the greatest discoveries that have changed and shaped our world were no doubt from some neurodivergent people

Alexandra Helens: 20:14

from some really weird people! Some of our most amazing developments over history have come from some deeply, deeply weird people.

Sonia Nolan: 20:23

Well, Einstein, no doubt was autistic.

Alexandra Helens: 20:26

Well look at that hair for Pete's sake!

Sonia Nolan: 20:29

Yeah, and most of the amazing scientists who've made these discoveries that, like I said, have shaped and changed our world would have had to had some sort of neuro divergence in order to be so focused and so tenacious about the discoveries in there and that sort of field that they just weren't going to drill down and drill down and drill down until they got to the answers.

Alexandra Helens: 20:50

Yeah, it's the stuff that makes you kind of a pain in the butt that makes you interesting. And that makes you valuable. I grew up in a community of deeply weird people. And it was those same things that made them weird or perhaps off putting to talk to that also made them absolutely fascinating, and really knowledgeable, and experts on some amazing subjects, and made them worth talking to in the first place. If if you're trying to make yourself more normal, you're not making yourself more normal, you're just making yourself more boring.

Sonia Nolan: 21:30

I want to explore a bit more about you as a child. And you'd mentioned to me earlier, Alexandra, that you grew up in, in America, which is why we've got this wonderful accent and some of your fabulous dang and lick. And I don't know, you've said howdy. But you know, you've used

Alexandra Helens: 21:48

Howdy,

Sonia Nolan: 21:48

there we go. And you've said howdy. So you know, we've we've got some great Americanisms coming through our podcast today. And you grew up with your parents, who were both members of Mensa. So can you tell me a bit about that? And tell me what Mensa is?

Alexandra Helens: 22:06

Yeah, my mom and my dad originally met through Mensa, it would have been California, Mensa, because that's where they both were at the time. I understand. The reason it's called Mensa is because in a couple different languages, it means month, and table and meeting. And Mensa originally started as a monthly meeting of people around a table to talk about stuff, because, you know, they just wanted some lively conversation. And it evolved from there. And now there's tables all over the globe.

Sonia Nolan: 22:36

I'm loving that it's it's about sitting around a table and having these robust conversations because of course, it comes back to me and my warm table. So

Alexandra Helens: 22:44

of course,

Sonia Nolan: 22:44

that's, that's fantastic. Because, you know, I, I've said it 100 times already, but I really do believe that so many interesting conversations and ideas and solutions happen around a table and Mensa is proof of that I'm loving hearing that

Alexandra Helens: 22:59

when you when you're willing to meet people and just sit down with them and get to know them, you just learn so much

Sonia Nolan: 23:06

solutions can happen.

Alexandra Helens: 23:07

Yes, and Mensa is it was started in the United States, but it's an international organisation. And it's the high IQ society. And in order to join your IQ needs to be in the upper two percentile of the population in the world and in the world. Yes, it's not judged by by state or by country, it's globally. And IQ even really isn't about smart and dumb. It's more about voltage, honestly, is the best example I can come up with.

Sonia Nolan: 23:36

Explain that to me.

Alexandra Helens: 23:37

Yeah it's different people need different amounts of information at a time to stay engaged. So an average IQ person needs a certain amount, and that's a lower voltage. And then a higher IQ person needs more information and stimulation in order to stay engaged. And it means their brain moves a lot faster, which is really good. But for some things, but it also means sometimes you're moving too fast to be able to do something well imagine if you were trying to draw a picture but instead of being able to sit still you had to constantly be walking around the table. So moving at a high speed isn't good for everything right? And you know, that's all it is. And that's that's what leads to really smart kids in class goofing off and getting in constant trouble with the teacher and I got that a lot of parent teacher conferences we can tell she's really smart. But you know, she has terrible grades and if she just applied herself a little more. No, I was bored out of my skull and I couldn't do it. It was I wasn't getting enough input enough voltage.

Sonia Nolan: 24:38

One of the stories you told me when we first met and spoke Alexandria was that given that your parents were both members of Mensa when you had questions as a child if you know and and all children like why does this happen? And what is this and you're not every every child has got questions?

Alexandra Helens: 24:54

Every child had questions. I had weird questions. One of my favourite books in e lementary school was Alice in Quantumland.

Sonia Nolan: 25:02

Alice in Quantumland. Not Wonderland?

Alexandra Helens: 25:03

Yes. From quantumland. It was a parody of Alice in Wonderland, but also an exploration of quantum physics. That was one of my favourite books in elementary school. True story real book. Google it. I'm not making it up.

Sonia Nolan: 25:16

Yeah, yeah.

Alexandra Helens: 25:17

And, you know, I grew up in Mensa, my mom and my dad are both members and I have always had mental issues, because I was autistic. So as part of that, when you were a little kid that includes an IQ test, just to run through all the basics, so I've always known that I am Mensa qualified. And I actually joined Mensa officially a couple years ago. And, you know, growing up all the events that my mom took me to all the cookouts and you know, all the parties were Mensa community events. So I grew up very much in that space. When I was a little kid, and I had questions about astrophysics or something, your normal childhood astrophysics questions,

Sonia Nolan: 25:54

as you do. Yeah.

Alexandra Helens: 25:55

And my mom said, that's a really good question. I'll just go, I'll email that through to one of my buddies at NASA. And I'll get you an answer. Or you know, that's that's what being in Mensa is like. There are a lot of people who are very successful because they have high IQs. But also in Mensa, there are a lot of people who are really unsuccessful, and really unhappy and really struggling to live, because they have high IQs. And it's, I got to see that gamut from a young age. So I've never equated intelligence with worth, or with their value or you know, how successful they're going to be in life. Success is not really anything to do with smarts or intelligence.

Sonia Nolan: 26:42

As we round off today, Alexandra, I've so enjoyed hearing and learning and challenged about the awareness that we need for the work that the productivity and the insights that autistic people can bring into the workplace. If you had a couple of things that you would want people to leave knowing and being more aware of, what do you think that they would be?

Alexandra Helens: 27:06

First of all, just that disabled people and neurodivergent people aren't a burden, they aren't a net loss, they are a net gain. There's a lot of incorrect thinking around disability and neurodivergent. See, that's led to where we are where we have absolutely dismal employment statistics. But once you change your thinking, and you accept, okay, I may be neurotypical, but that doesn't mean that I'm automatically right, or that my preferences are automatically correct. How can I accommodate an autistic employee? What can I change to enable a disabled employee to work for me, and once you just make that simple change within yourself, you will open up your workplaces so much more. And you will gain some intensely gifted, talented employees and loyal employees do because most of us just want job stability, overwhelmingly in the disabled and neurodivergent community, they are more likely to stay with employer long term because they just want one place where they can have a good community and a good setup, get comfy in their chair and just stay there. And that's all I want for our community - somewhere where we can stay.

Sonia Nolan: 28:21

Thank you so much for your time today. It's been an absolute pleasure having you around my warm table, Alexandra, and I really appreciate everything that you've helped me understand. And thank you.

Alexandra Helens: 28:34

Thank you so much anytime.

Sonia Nolan: 28:40

You've been listening to my warm table with Sonia Nolan. In Italian, a tavola calda is a warm and welcoming table where you can share big ideas, friendship, laughter and life. So much happens around the kitchen table, and I wanted to amplify it here in this podcast. My aim is to feed your mind and soul through smart conversations with heart. No topic is off limits, but good table manners rule. I hope you'll join us each week as we set the table for my extraordinary guests who will let you feast on a deep knowledge, life experiences and wise insights. Let's keep the conversation flowing. Please subscribe to the My Warm Table podcast and share it with your friends and networks. Perhaps if they're new to podcasting, take a moment to show them how to download and subscribe so they don't miss an episode either. I'd also love you to join our community on Facebook. You'll find the group at My Warm Table Podcast. Your support is very much appreciated - so that together we can eat, think and be merry.