Thread by @al94781

Arrived for the @sainsburys Agile Community Autism Awareness Workshop at @MSFTReactor. I'm excited to see what they have in store for us...

Catherine Leggett from the @nationalautisticsoc kicks us off. Focusing first on workplace adjustments.

Catherine Leggett: "We're not diagnosed on our strengths, these (from the diagnostic criteria) are "difficulties". But these are strengths in different circumstances.

Catherine Leggett now presenting some stats from @Autism themselves. Companies in the last 12-24 months looking to actively recruit Autistic people in the Cyber space.

Catherine Leggett: Shortages (skills-wise) in many areas (beyond cyber): healthcare, media, logistics, and more.

Catherine Leggett: Particular strengths of Autistic people - focused, logical, different ways of thinking, technical, creative (w00t!), and perfectionism.

Catherine Leggett: "There's not hard-wired ways of doing things".

Catherine Leggett - @Autism (National Autistic Society) provides support for employers to create accessible opportunities, to recruit, and retain autistic individuals.

Catherine Leggett from @Autism (National Autistic Society): Psychometric testing was judged as discriminatory in one recent case where an alternative to the test was not offered.

Catherine Leggett - @Autism (National Autistic Society): Other issues, low self-esteem, selling oneself, may prefer different methods of communication, may appear socially awkward, and many more.

Catherine Leggett - @Autism (National Autistic Society) on tailoring recruitment to autistic people: "Get the input from the candidate themselves. They are the one that knows best."

Catherine Leggett - @Autism (National Autistic Society): "Open up the conversation about alternatives (to the standard recruitment process) so you don't lose that talent."

Catherine Leggett - @Autism (National Autistic Society): "To encourage candidates to disclose you need to be visible and pro-active."

Catherine Leggett - @Autism (National Autistic Society): "Be flexible and let people know they can ask about accommodations."

Catherine Leggett - @Autism (National Autistic Society): Interview Adjustments "think of the environment, don't require eye contact, consider a work trial, rephrase unclear questions, and give the candidate time to think about their answer."

Next up, Micheal Barton, author of "A Different Kettle of Fish". amazon.com/Different-Kett…

Micheal Barton: "It's hard to summarise yourself very quickly. How about answering 'whats it like to not be autistic?'"

Micheal Barton: "At school everyone wants you to be the same, and process things in the same way and fit into a nice (same) box."

Micheal Barton: "Being different can be an incredible benefit. You can stand out amongst hundreds of other applicants."

Micheal Barton: "The biggest problem is the lack of understanding of autism by in people."

Micheal Barton: "Prevalence of autism stats *only* apply to people with a diagnosis."

Micheal Barton: "Difficulty in understanding more than half of communication - the non verbal part - is a significant disadvantage."

Micheal Barton: "If I am forced to look at your face and make eye contact when listening then I can have too much information and have difficulty listening. I learned to look at their mouth rather than their eyes" (Soooo much this BTW.)

Micheal Barton: "Knowing when it is a suitable time to interrupt a conversation needs to be learned. It's a bit like being in a foreign country."

Micheal Barton: "Indirect requests (e.g. 'would you like to sit down?' 'yes, I can.') when answered can be interpreted as insolence. It doesn't sound like much, but it can make a *huge* difference."

Micheal Barton: "Even when I know all these neuro-typical turns of phrase I can still get caught out."

Micheal Barton: "I just went to the first logical conclusion and then continued down the path of that conclusion. I didn't realise there was another interpretation." (Yup.)

Micheal Barton: "Special interests are one of the defining aspects of autism." (Yas! Italian Zombie movies from the 1970s! 1980's British Comics!)

Micheal Barton: "Special Interests mean you're fascinated by the small details."

Micheal Barton: "Taking up music and judo helped me a lot growing up."

Micheal Barton: "You aren't required to disclose the fact you are autistic to your employer, but if you do, they are required to make all reasonable adjustments to you. I did this on my CV and listed my strengths."

Micheal Barton: "Our strengths are often overlooked because of our communication difficulties. But it is important to get a wide variety of skills into your companies."

Micheal Barton: "Over time there has been an increased awareness of Autism."

Micheal Barton: "We should focus on the strengths autistic people have and what they can bring to an organisation."

Micheal Barton: "Autistic people have ideal brains for the scientific revolution of the future!"

Micheal Barton: "We could end up with a 'neurotypical spectrum disorder'" :D

Next up, Michael Vermeerssch, Digital Inclusion Lead and Chair of MS UK disAbility Employee Research Group, @MicrosoftUK

Michael Vermeersch: "Only 17% of people are born with a disability"

Michael Vermeersch: "70% of disabilities are invisible, so if you think you're not employing people with a disability, think again."

Michael Vermeersch: "World Health Org: disAbility != personal human condition. disAbility == mismatched human interactions (a social model of disability)"

Michael Vermeersch: "This is a great definition as you focus on the mis-match, not the person."

Michael Vermeersch: "In 2015 Microsoft announced they would hire people with autism. And the next week over 800 CVs were sent it. But of these CVs, the vast majority you would bin. So we decided to look at how we hired people..."

Michael Vermeersch: "We looked at inclusive hiring. We needed to hire people differently, _Starting from the CVs_."

Michael Vermeersch: "Out of this we started re-shaping everything. Would you rather hire someone with a nice CV, or someone who could do the job?"

Michael Vermeersch: "We set up ability hiring events, which weren't interviews but still allowed candidates to show the skills they had."

Michael Vermeersch: "No employers say 'we don;t hire people with disabilities', but few employers _show_ they mean it."

Michael Vermeersch: see a toolkit at microsoft.com/inclusivehiring

Michael Vermeersch: "Inclusion and retention: We train the team not the new hire on how to be inclusive.:

Michael Vermeersch: "Mishaps still happen."

Michael Vermeersch: "This is all a culture change. Our new leader, Satya Nadella wanted us to include everyone, not just the 80%"

Michael Vermeersch: Temple Grandin quote!

(There will now be a pause while Sally Piggott from @scope runs an interactive workshop...)

Next up: @JamieKnight and his sidekick, Lion (@lickr) 🦁👨‍💻 (I'm gonna try and live tweet so apologies for all the alerts. Hopefully twitter batches them for you.)

@JamieKnight: Talking about employment and finding his niche.

@JamieKnight: It'll be all anecdotes and less science.

@JamieKnight There's no one way to be autistic. (All neurotypical people _have_ however been diagnosed as being mathematically impaired.)

@JamieKnight: Engineering his life. Engineered like an arch. Goals as the keystone, next to that work and home life, next to them skills and structure, and then foundation of identity (lovely and symmetrical).

@JamieKnight : Goals and Identity: Live with autonomy, and be productive. "Do you want to be independent?" "Naah." All the value is in the autonomy, not in brittle independence.

@JamieKnight "Fuck variety, its not that great really." (W00t!)

@JamieKnight "I describe myself as very sensitive, not over-sensitive."

"Expectations are the lies we tell ourselves in the absence of facts"

"Impairment + environment = disability"

"Fuck it I'm going to be autistic. It's not a bad thing, it's not a good thing, it's not an autistic thing, its just a thing."

"The autism closet is _incredibly_ tidy."

"If you can access someone else's spoons then that's good. Save your spoons for things that are valuable to you."

"Extremely able, not always capable. The capacity to be capable is what is important. Capacity changes every day."

"I'm not allowed a driving license, so instead I learned how to fly. It's just a lot of checklists, and if you can see another plane it's already gone wrong."

"There are lots of places in my life that have never heard me speak" (props to the local @CostaCoffee )

"I like being around people, I just don't always like talking to them."

"Access to work is v good."

"I went on the internet (web design forums) when I was younger and found both my obsession and my peers."

"I didn't wait to be taught: I shared what I learnt."

"Why do most autistic people die? Probably because most people don't bother to understand them or talk to them."

"Like homosexuality in the 50s, we try and separate autism from the autistic people."

"My routines aren't rigid, they're strong. That means I waste less spoons every day working out what to do." (Hell yaas.)

"None of these things would work if I was trying to be less autistic."

"If you work with autistic people, find what gives them spoons."

In summary: That was f**king AWESOME. 👏👏👏👏👏👏