Neurodiversity and Inclusive Practices that Benefit Entire Organizations with Jeff Miller
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Dane Groeneveld: Welcome to The Future of Teamwork Podcast. My name's Dane Groeneveld, CEO of HUDDL3 Group, and I'm really pleased to be welcoming a good friend and colleague, Jeff Miller, the CEO and founder of Potentia Workforce. Welcome to the show, Jeff.
Jeff Miller: Thank you, Dane. Good to be with you.
Dane Groeneveld: Yeah, it's been a good while since we were together in person, but I've really enjoyed staying in touch with a lot of the progress you and your business have been making down there in Houston through the last couple of years, with the pandemic. Did you-
Jeff Miller: It's been a wild ride. We're really fortunate, when we think about when we started, and obviously, didn't know that the pandemic was coming. We started in 2019, and so 2020 was a big year for us, but then to go into the pandemic and come through it and have actually grown the business substantially, we're really grateful for that.
Dane Groeneveld: Yeah, and it's a common statement, COVID and what we've come through is creating huge opportunity for acceleration on some new themes, some new ways of doing business, of supporting teams, and none more so than neurodiversity. But before we jump into the work that you are doing with Potentia Workforce around neurodiversity and other projects, maybe you could give the listeners a little bit of a background story on you. How did you find yourself in this CEO and founder position? What's the journey been so far?
Jeff Miller: Sure, happy to. So I was born and raised outside Boston, Massachusetts, went to school up there, spent my first couple of decades in the Bay State, and really didn't have any idea what I wanted to do coming out of school. I'd play four years of basketball and I knew I wasn't going to go pro, but other than that, I really didn't have a good handle. And just through networking and people that I knew, I ended up getting into the staffing industry. I started out as a recruiter, then moved into sales, then moved into management. With one company I was with for about 11 years, they moved me out to the West Coast. We opened up our first office in Silicon Valley, and then one office became five on the West Coast, assumed a larger role with the company, and then the company sold and I was looking for other things to do. I felt like I'd learned at least the basics of the staffing industry, hopefully, in 11 years, and hopefully, a little bit more than that. And I was wondering, what else was out there? And so, I got into project consulting, and I liked that side of things. I was in the healthcare side for about four years and really enjoyed that, really the level of engagement that you have with customers, that's sometimes a little different. A lot of times, on the staffing side, customers can keep you at arm's length and have you work through a portal or through a middle person, or what have you. And on the project side, you got a chance to really work with executives and understand where they wanted to go, and hopefully, help them to get there, and I really like that. I like the scale and the impact you could have at scale and staffing, but I like the one- on- one interaction with executives on the project side. I didn't think I'd get back into staffing, but I got offered a position to run a global staffing company, as you know, and it was a wonderful opportunity, so I had a chance to run day- to- day operations for a company and really see how things work in all aspects of the business. The general counsel reported to me, the whole thing, IT, sales, and that was a wonderful opportunity. And so, I stayed in the business probably for about 20 years in total, with a brief detour in the project consulting side, and I brought that to some of the staffing companies that I worked with thereafter. But yeah, that's the background, generally, having larger levels of responsibility over time as you go, but a lot of work in human capital, project consulting, and recruiting, really.
Dane Groeneveld: Neat. And that project consulting experience, when you talk about the engagement, I think we're seeing more and more business relationships go in that direction, whether they're consulting or not consulting, is that there needs to be more engagement, there needs to be more co- design, co- development of whatever it is that we're trying to do. It may be a solution or it might be deploying software. It may be designing a new supply chain partnership. But you are seeing this theme of teams that expand outside of the boundaries of the traditional organization and org chart, so that was an interesting, I guess, revelation for you at that earlier stage of your career, finding the enjoyment there.
Jeff Miller: It was, it was. And I think it's got to be the right fit, but I see organizations that are looking to take a larger role with their clients, but I also see clients that are looking for companies that'll put a little skin in the game and will invest more. Maybe there's a different level of relationship. There may be some differences in terms of the terms, success fees, and engagements and things like that, but in general, I just like that partnership and that ability to... We're in the healthcare side. We end up working with small to mid- size hospitals, and we got a real chance to see how their business worked, and work with a chief technology officer that might have been a doc as well, and some really cool people that you get a chance to meet, and they want value from what you're providing. They're willing to give a little bit more, versus, sometimes, in the staffing side, at least in the past, we don't find this with Potentia at all, which I'm happy about, but with some staffing companies, you can get put in a box over here.
Dane Groeneveld: You're not part of the team.
Jeff Miller: You're not really part of the team, yeah, yeah. So I like that. I knew I liked that, just in terms of a day to day and being able to interact with customers, where you felt like they saw the value that you brought. And now, what we're doing, we're really working with customers on a number of different levels. We're working with them to solve problems that they have, but also on a core values level where we're able to make sure that we align with them. And so, those are interesting conversations to have with executives, especially.
Dane Groeneveld: Yeah, neat. So let's come onto Potentia Workforce in a little more detail. You've had that 20 years in staffing and project consulting, and then you wake up one day with this brilliant idea to start a new business. How did that come about?
Jeff Miller: Really, the two stars of that show are my son and my wife. So my son, Charlie, was diagnosed at six as autistic, and so when he was about 16, I started doing research, but it really didn't have anything to do with the work that I was doing at the time. I knew that this was a cause that I cared about. Because of my son, I was going to support in whatever way, but I might support a nonprofit or something like that. But I had no idea at all when I started that this might be ultimately where my career would go. What I wanted to find out is, as a dad... We'd gotten pretty good, and parents can relate to this, hopefully, in looking at that year- to- year approach of like, okay, what can we do to help Charlie be his best self as a sixth grader, seventh grader, eighth grader? And that had worked pretty well, not perfect, lots of bumps in the road, some tears along the way, but pretty well. And I realized that, okay, if I were to look at him as a 16- year- old then and say," Well, what about 26, what about 36," I had to admit to myself, I really didn't have a good picture of what that was going to look like. And sometimes, the year- to- year stuff was pretty consuming, so I give myself a little bit of a pass on that, but I realized I needed to up my game. I needed to really be thinking about what that was going to look like for Charlie. So that's how the whole thing started for me, was starting to ask those questions and learning things like, 25% of the population is neurodistinct. I didn't know, as a parent, even, and someone who I felt was fairly well- educated on the topic, I had no idea the number was that big, because we include things like ADHD and dyslexia and PTSD, which changes the way brains are wired. Then, you're talking about at least 25% of the population that's walking around, as we say, or was explained to me, basically, with a different operating system. And it's not worse, it's not better, but it's different. And so, you're walking around with this operating system and the world is set up on another operating system. Then, your strengths are going to be minimized and your challenges are going to be maximized, and so that was one thing that I found that really hit home for me, along with that 25% number. So you start to see, as I was researching, that a lot of these individuals are really exceptional in their abilities and their strengths. Now, they may have some mitigating areas, some challenges, some areas. Especially for companies that aren't accommodating to those, they could be a little problematic, but most of them are really basic stuff. People were talking to me about things like moving somebody from the cubicle that's next to the kitchen and the copier, that has lots of sensory overload potential, to a quieter place over here in the corner. Well, who cares? I mean, if they're a great accountant, then that's certainly a win for the company, and a very low- cost solution, so I was learning things like that as I was talking to all sorts of people about my son. And having that employment background, I was thinking about work, but also about social life and all these kinds of things, so the 25% number really, really surprised me. The other number that just blew me away was, for someone like Charlie, who is autistic, but will go to a four- year college, will probably graduate with a GPA better than mine, not that that's great shakes, he's looking at an 80% unemployment rate, which just blew me away. How is that even possible? I knew enough to know that there are a lot of people who are profoundly affected by their autism, sometimes nonverbal, sometimes lots of challenges, but I still feel like those individuals have a lot to contribute if only people will meet them where they are. This was a more traditional sense where I know Charlie's going to, again, go to a four- year college. I believe he'll do well. And so, I knew about the labor shortages out there, and yet, we're still seeing 80% unemployment? That's crazy. So the 25% number surprised me, the 80% number blew me away, and now I started to think about this in the context of what I do and learning about how big companies are dealing with time to fill and turnover issues and things like that. And I said," Well, okay, so this population is very low turnover, high productivity, in a lot of ways, they make ideal employees, but they may not interview the way that people are used to seeing folks interview, so they may not be the best interview in the classic sense, but they make wonderful employees." And yet, when I was looking at it, less than, I want to say, 5% of the Fortune 500 was doing anything constructively around neurodiversity. And so, I thought, okay, huge benefits here, and yet, very few people are doing it, but the folks that are doing it are telling me it's incredibly impactful on their business in a variety of ways. And I started thinking, okay, this is the path for Charlie, but this is also something that, maybe with my skills, whatever they are, I can apply them to this, because I saw a real business need there, and people that understand how these big corporations work... I didn't come from a nonprofit background, and a lot of people who come from that background do amazing things, but I know sometimes there's a disconnect between that individual and somebody who's running a six billion dollar division, and I felt like I might be able to bridge that gap a little bit. So that was what took me from just the research project and learning about Charlie and what he might need as a 26- year- old, in that instance, to thinking, wow, maybe I should take a step and not just support non- profits that I care about, although I do that, but maybe I should make this my full- time work, because the more I learned about it, the more passionate I became, the more I just fell in love with this community, even beyond my son and his friends, to just see... It's incredibly rewarding, what we get to do on an ROI level, but also on a core values and a head and a heart level. It just pulled me in, and ultimately, allowed me to, with my wife's blessing, to found this startup at a time when not a lot of people knew about neurodiversity, back in 2019.
Dane Groeneveld: Yeah, I think you were the first person who introduced me to that term. And I don't know, it's kind of like when you buy a new car and all of a sudden, you start seeing that same model of car on the road all the time. I don't know if I just was naive in not being aware of it, or that you are... It's probably a mix of both. You're at the front end of this big change, because now I see it everywhere, which is great, and naturally, in large part, to companies like yours and some of those not- for- profits, for really driving the agenda.
Jeff Miller: No, I had the same situation to me. Once people explained it to me, once I really understood neurodiversity, you see it everywhere, and that's a lot that's true about the candidates as well. A lot of these candidates are hiding in plain sight, and with 25% of the population, everybody knows somebody who's neurodistinct. Now, that can cut both ways because it can build some empathy or some understanding about how incredibly capable folks are, but sometimes I see that it leads people to make assumptions. Because they know someone who's autistic, let's say, they think that that's what autism is, so a lot of our work is educating folks who've come new to neurodiversity. And the term itself was only coined in 1998, so this is a relatively new phenomenon, although I want to point out, neurodiversity has existed forever. And people talk about Mozart and da Vinci and all these amazing people who we really think were neurodiverse and neurodistinct. But the term was only coined in'98, so a lot of people don't know about it, so for us, a lot of it is education and a lot of it is then overcoming, sometimes, that perception that, oh, yeah, I know what that is, I've got a nephew who's autistic, and whatever the... And so, they get locked into that, both of which are understandable, neither of which are particularly helpful. We want to let people know how incredibly broad the population is, because neurodiversity is that niece that you have who's nonverbal, who needs a lot of supports. It's also Elon Musk. It's also Richard Branson. So that's the breadth of neurodiversity.
Dane Groeneveld: Yeah, that's neat. And you used a great phrase earlier about operating system, which I really like, and I've got some questions around that. But traditionally, you've seen autism attached to ability and disability, particularly in allowing some people to access certain services, probably at one portion of the spectrum. And now, you're starting to see some of the language that you read, where we're talking about superpowers, we're talking about people like Musk and Branson, which is great. It's a great change in framing the opportunities. I liked another one that you said, increasing the strength and reducing the challenges, versus the opposite. So what is it, coming back to that operating system, that Potentia Workforce is really focusing on doing with some of your customers? Are you working more with the customer organizations to be more accommodating to these different operating systems? Are you helping the individuals and neurodistinct individuals to pivot and change some elements of their operating system? Is it a mix of both? I'd be intrigued by that.
Jeff Miller: Yeah, so the offering that we started the company with is something called STARS, and we also have a group called Projects where we outsource projects, tech and data projects, building websites, dashboards, things like that, and we'll outsource that work and we'll staff that with majority neurodistinct individuals, so we're providing them with maybe contract to hire or growth opportunities, and we're also showing the creativity and the innovation that comes when you have a largely neurodistinct team. So that's Projects, and Projects came up for us in 2019, or 2020, excuse me. But the offering that we started with and the offering that's our... I would say it's our number one focus today, is called STARS. And STARS stands for spectrum, training, recruitment, and support. So spectrum being that legacy term, autism spectrum, when we started out, we were really focused on the autism side, and then we quickly realized, wow, there's a broader community here that we want to serve. I started the autism side for personal reasons. For me, that was the place to start, but then we saw that there was really a lot of momentum around the concept of neurodiversity. So spectrum is the first S there, and then it's training, recruiting, and support, and those are the services that we offer as part of the program for STARS. And training, to your question, Dane, is, the majority of the training is for the employer, because what we find is that that individual who graduated from UCLA with a nice GPA and they've got a marketable set of skills, but they're not going to interview in a way you're traditionally used to, they're going to struggle a bit. But to a certain extent, they are what they are. What they need is companies that are more accommodating to them, and when we look at it in... I don't often use terms like disability with our community because most people who are neurodistinct don't consider themselves disabled. It's part of their identity, as much as it is being gay, or being lefthanded, or what have you. That's how the majority of our folks see it, and so out of respect for that, I rarely talk about that. But if you think about a difference, if a company is not accommodating to it, it can be a limiting factor, for sure, if you want to call it a disability, so the companies need to understand the benefits. First of all, what is neurodiversity, what are the business benefits of it, and then how to create a more inclusive environment that's more welcoming to folks like that. And so, if you had someone who was in a wheelchair, of course, the fact that your building doesn't have a ramp would be a shortcoming for you, not for them. They can't help that. It's part of their reality, is they're in a wheelchair. You would see that as a limiting factor for the business, that they couldn't have people access the company that are in a wheelchair. It's the same thing from a neurodiverse perspective. So the majority of the training that we do is company side, where we train them on how to write a proper job description, how to interview. Interviewing is probably the number one thing that trips up these candidates because they'd be wonderful on a random Tuesday afternoon, they'd be heads down, doing great work, in that corner cubicle, let's say, but they're not going to interview in a way that, traditionally, is going to work, so how do we create systems and design a process that's predictive, number one, because it's got to be the right person getting into that role who can really thrive, but is also inclusive, is fair to everybody, allows people who don't necessarily have those traditional interviewing skills, the ability to still show what they can do. So it's training, it's recruiting, and then it's support. Once candidates get hired, we support both on the back end for a structured, 90- day process to help them get up to speed. Really, the biggest things that we do from a training perspective for the candidates, and I think this is important to note, we're not looking to change them. Our candidates don't want us to cure their autism. They would be totally offended by that concept. Again, this is part of their identity, part of who they are. But help me to understand what the corporate environment is like that I'm maybe going into. And number two, if you think of the... Our typical candidate has got couple years of experience out of school. That experience was typically with companies that are not very accommodating. Unfortunately, a lot of them have had difficult experiences. So the biggest thing that we train our new hires on is self- advocacy, because a lot of them have had difficult situations in the past where, and we just did this training for a customer just last week, where we were talking about, listen, if you know what someone is dealing with, you can deal with it yourself, you can help support them in whatever ways the company allows. There may be an accommodation that's requested that you can't accommodate, but just by the act of listening, you're going to be ahead of the game. And as a leader, you always want to know what your folks are dealing with if it's affecting their ability to work and they're comfortable to share it, so self- advocacy is a big thing for us. We work on both sides with that. But those are really the main things, what's the company about, and let's talk about the language you can use to advocate for yourself in a respectful way, in a way that's going to contribute to the business being better. I think I'd be happier and more productive if that possible. We put them in the seat, we give them that training. That's really the majority of it. The vast majority of it is on the client side because they're the ones that really need it, frankly, that need to see this as a competitive advantage. So if company A is really leveraging this 25% of the population and company B is not, that's a huge competitive advantage for company A. And so, that's really what we talk about with businesses when we're talking about the what, why, and how of neurodiversity. That's the why. You want to access the population, because the war on talent isn't going away.
Dane Groeneveld: No, and there's some brilliant work. I think you've pointed me to some of the work that talks about neurodiversity in teams and the fact that you can very quickly reframe problems, or get to the root cause of an issue, or come up with a whole new idea, because you're not driving from a place of conformity of thoughts and social rhythm, you're actually changing up the environment in that team. Could you perhaps give us some examples of that or share some stories that really have caught your attention in that space?
Jeff Miller: One of the things that we find is interesting about this space is that the larger the company, the more institutional inertia makes it more challenging for people to step outside that in a respectful way, and say," What about X, what about Y," or," I'm struggling to understand this." A big concept for us is psychological safety, with creating teams where there's psychological safety. Google did a study on it. It consistently comes up as the number one predictor of team success, is the ability to disagree without being disagreeable, to admit weak spots, or challenges, or... Dane, you just trained me on that, but I feel like I'm missing something. Let me confirm with you, let me... admitting that, or saying," Dane, you're saying,'This is the best way to go.' What if we went this way? Why wouldn't that be better," and having an environment where that's okay. It's okay to challenge your boss respectfully, those types of things. So we spent a lot of time on psychological safety. There's a good story out with Ernst& Young, where they had a cohort of new hires that was coming in, fresh out of college. And I think it was on day three, one of the individuals raised his hand to the instructor who was demonstrating this well- worn process that Ernst& Young had always used, and it had really been proven to be... He said," Why do we do it that way? That's wrong. We should do it this way." The individual happened to be neurodistinct. Now, the fact that they said," That's wrong," on day three is probably something that those of us who work a lot in the neurodistinct community are used to seeing. You're going to get some blunt honesty from people, but how refreshing and how great to have that? Ernst& Youngs had a program for six or seven years, and they've really worked hard on psychological safety, from day one, on getting candidates to the point where they can voice challenges. How great to have people who literally think differently, have that different operating system that we talked about, be able to look at how things are done and have the freedom to say," What if we did it this way?" Well, the Ernst& Young process, it turned out that the trainer had enough foresight to say," You know what, let's park that, let's you and I talk about that, and I'll tell you what, I'll make a commitment to you that if you're right, if your process is better, we'll change it, and I'll go to bat for you. We'll implement that process if yours is better and we'll teach that one, but let's sidebar." And they did, and it turned out the guy was right. This new hire, this 22- year- old, was right, and Ernst& Young never would've seen that if they hadn't created that environment and if that trainer hadn't been as astute as they were. Well, this ended up being a multimillion dollar savings for Ernst& Young per year. So that's the kind of thing that, when you hire folks who think a little bit differently and you create an environment where you leverage those types of different thoughts, then you can have radical change, huge innovation, and huge swings in terms of your competitive balance with the companies that you're out there, trying to beat every day.
Dane Groeneveld: Yeah, no, I think that's important. I think it's something that other people have stumbled across, but to be intentional about it, and to have the opportunity to be intentional about it and know how to recreate it in your team is the really exciting part.
Jeff Miller: The intentional part is really key. So one other story that I'll share with you on that topic is, one of the things that we find... So the feedback that we've gotten from our customers is that they like what we do because it's customizable, it's not the same every time, it's ND- led, so the training is led by folks who are neurodistinct themselves. So a manager can ask a question to someone and say," Well, why do we need to do it that way," and the individual can say," Well, I can't speak for everyone, but I can tell you, from my perspective, I would not apply to this job as it's written, and here's why," and someone goes," Wow." But it's data- driven, so all our stuff is based on ROI, and we survey every customer before and after we measure, and then we measure over time what the impact is, not just in terms of new hires, but the team itself, because if you introduce psychological safety to the whole team, the whole team should become more productive and more engaged in... And then, it's holistic, so the things that we do, that are neurodistinct, tend to benefit everybody. If you put a good onboarding program in place, it's going to benefit everybody, so it isn't just about... And in fact, you do not want to devise processes just for the ND community, because that's othering. That's not good. But you want to use that as an opportunity, and we find this all the time, that individuals who are neurodistinct, and their team members, who may not be, these programs are incredibly popular with these team members, who we'll call neurotypical. And they love it because they want a good mentoring program, they want a good onboarding program, they want be able to share how they work best, how they're happiest and most productive. Everybody wants that. So neurodiversity is a way to start to move down that road leveraging the perspectives of these candidates. But to your point about intentional, every program we do is different. It relies on core principles, but it's somewhat bespoke because every company is different, every company is starting from a different point. And this is maybe what I learned doing workforce management and project management and things like that, start where the company is, leverage the stuff they do that already works, and make the tweaks where you need to make the tweaks. So every program is different. One thing that's the same every time we do this is the number of mid- career individuals who are part of that company, who come forward, and now start to disclose. So they might have been with the company for 10, 12, 15 years, never told a coworker or a boss or an HR individual that they are neurodistinct themselves, that they're dyslexic, or they're autistic, or they're what have you. They see us doing this new hire program, and they see the company being intentional about it, and it changes the calculus for them. They start to see that, okay, the company is really leaning into this, and this is something the company clearly wants, where before, the possible stigma or people looking at me differently outweighed the benefit to me, so I've struggled with the fact that I've got Asperger's or I'm autistic, whatever, and I haven't shared it with my team, or arguably, couldn't bring my full self to work. But now, I see that the company is doing this and I want to come forward, not only to share my experience, but maybe to be a mentor to those new hires, because I know I didn't have that when I started. And so, just think about how that flips the script for the individual, and how engaged or not engaged, or how not optimally productive they probably were when they were stressed and not bringing their full selves to work. And now, someone who wasn't part of our program at all is going to be much more engaged, much more productive, and their team members are going to feel that, and it has a real carry forward effect. But it's all because of that intentionality, that this is what we're doing. Part of working with companies is developing the right communication strategy for them so that they can communicate to their own internal employees and have them fully appreciate the benefit that they're leaning into this, that they're leading on this, and companies still have the opportunity to be leaders in this. I mean, it's-
Dane Groeneveld: Yeah, it's so, yeah, early.
Jeff Miller: Yeah, it's still not that widely utilized still, so you can be a leader in this space. We work with companies in energy and financial services and tech, and the companies that are doing this in their respective areas are part of a handful of companies that can legitimately say," Hey, we're leading on this, we're out front on this," and it's wildly popular with their employees. Think about if you've got an employee who's a parent like me, who's got a child who's coming up, and now their employer is stepping into this. How excited is that employee going to be? How more likely are they going to stay and continue to produce well for that company because they feel like the company... The core values thing again, those core values are really aligning maybe more strongly than they ever had before.
Dane Groeneveld: And that's what, going back to the early part of the conversation you're alluding to, I guess, is that you help some of these companies to allow their core values to come to life through these programs, not only for their employees who are neurodistinct or have neurodistinct family members, but also for the others who benefit from that holistic program that you're talking about.
Jeff Miller: Well, it's a tangible, intentional way for people to live their values, and what we find is that a lot of companies struggle with that. And I don't think that they're insincere. I think they believe that these are their values, but how do you operationalize that? And when you-
Dane Groeneveld: So it's-
Jeff Miller: ...do operationalize-
Dane Groeneveld: ...inaudible, it's onboarding, to how we run meetings, to how we talk to each other about where we're at and where we want to go.
Jeff Miller: That's right, and when you do operationalize it... SAP has done a really nice job with this. They really lean into it. They say," This is part of our core process," and they work with customers of theirs, and they'll meet with them and they'll link up with them on a core values level, because they're saying," Hey, this is something we're doing, maybe this would benefit you, we'd love to talk to you about how we're doing it." And so, now you're able to engage with your customers and maybe competitors or suppliers at a totally different level. And just to bring it full circle, I mean, I've definitely been the beneficiary of that, where, going back to our staffing days, you're not always given a seat at the table. And yet, in terms of what we do when we're linking up with companies and we're aligning with their core values, that's something that executives can really get excited about, which is good because we need that executive support. We need them to say," Hey, this is where we're going," and then folks will follow, because it's a concept and it's a program that... People love it when they hear about it. When they learn what it is, we get really wide support for it, which is great.
Dane Groeneveld: Yeah, and I think from all the conversations you and I have had, and from my own readings with family members that are neurodistinct, the one thing that I'm learning most in this conversation, Jeff, is that fact that this can be a holistic driver of competitive advantage in a business. And I'm working with a number of big companies right now who are actually starting to ask us for more help on, how do we design our talent attraction strategies, how do we look at retention? And this is a great starting point. Even though it might feel like it's very precise, the fact that it can start to build these systems that benefit the whole company and the company's customers is a really, really strong direction to be investing in.
Jeff Miller: Well, and the average neurodiversity program has 96% retention. That's average.
Dane Groeneveld: That's a big number.
Jeff Miller: Now, part of that is, a lot of our candidates tend to be change averse, so if, and this is a big if, if they're in a supportive environment, they tend to not go across the street for another five grand. It means more to them to stay where they are if they're in a good, supportive environment and they're unshackled, they're free to just let it fly, and really do what they can do, and innovate, and be creative and be productive. So yeah, and the things we do to help them get there are the same things that benefit every employee, like we were saying.
Dane Groeneveld: Yeah. Well, and-
Jeff Miller: A real, holistic connection, I think, is something that, as we educate people on what neurodiversity is, we always try and let them know, look, done well, this should benefit your entire employee pool. Quick story, it benefits your leaders as well. So I had a CIO who reached out to me out of the blue, and said," Jeff, I want to thank you," and I said," Okay, tell me why. What'd I do?" And he said," Well, I've got a bit of a reputation as a hard guy. I drive results, I expect results, I push my people hard. But since you guys have had your program, I've had half a dozen people that have sought me out individually to let me know that they're neurodistinct, that were already in my organization, but I never knew. And it gave me the opportunity to meet with them as human beings, to work with them one- on- one, for them to see... I was very conscious of them seeing how I received that information and how supportive I was of them as individuals. Now, it doesn't mean that I'm still not a driver. I am, but you gave me an opportunity." This is this guy saying to me, a CIO of a Fortune 500 company," You gave me the opportunity to show my people that I care about them, that I'm invested in them, that I'm still going to drive them just as hard, but I respect them as individuals, I respect the differences in our teams. That's a strength of ours. And I was able to show that, and I don't know that I would've been able to show that without your program," so I mean, that, for us, was just phenomenal.
Dane Groeneveld: It is. And I've spoken to a number of leaders in different businesses that always talk about challenges in leadership roles, with engaging and connecting with teams. And if you look at it, again, going back to the talent crisis that we're in, those leaders are not maximizing upon the potential of their existing teams. So if you can bring about these programs and better onboarding, better mentoring, better dialogue, better interviews, job descriptions, the whole piece, then naturally, without even going out and making a hire, you're going to be lifting that potential, which is really neat. And it actually reminds me of a story. I asked my dad once... He was very fortunate, had a great career with a global mining company, and I asked him," What was the big driver of your success in your career?" And I was expecting some scientific answer, and he said," A lot of hard work and luck." I was like," Tell me more about luck," and he said," Well, in a big organization, there's a hundred other really smart people, but are you one of those smart people that's working hard and gets picked up by the right leader, going in the right direction, at the right time?" And while that was exciting and clearly beneficial for my old man, how many of those other hundred equally- smart people got missed out and didn't achieve the same career progression, or left the company, and all of these types of things? So it's an untapped source of potential.
Jeff Miller: Well, and what I find is, my best mentors, and it sounds like your dad would definitely fall into this category, despite their successes, they stay humble and they stay curious, so they know that there's a certain amount of luck that happens in any of these situations, and yet, they work hard and they prepare to try and create that luck as much as they can. But any success they have, hopefully, they meet with a level of humility, because we know there's an awful lot of talented people out there. I just speak for myself, it's an absolute privilege to get to do what I do.
Dane Groeneveld: Yeah, yeah, I can see that, and it excites me every time we talk about it. So you're now running some programs, not just in the US, but in other parts of the world. I know you referenced some big centers down in Latin America and over in Asia- Pacific.
Jeff Miller: That's right, that's right. We started in'19, in Texas, actually went national in 2020, and then this year, we went international, so we're working with a US client, but we get a big set of opportunities in Buenos Aires, in Argentina, that we're working on right now, and working with those managers and doing our STARS program, running a similar STARS program in Manila as well, so yeah, those have been great. You talk about approaching it with humility. We've definitely done that. We're encouraged by the fact that we're seeing that a lot of the best practices that work... because we've really worked throughout the US. We'll get thrown... the example I typically use is engineering opportunities in Reno, where a customer just said," Hey, here's the need. Can you help us with it?" It's a plus and minus thing that there are neurodistinct candidates who are, unfortunately, available in every city in the country. And so, the mechanisms we've used to attract those candidates, of what we've learned about attracting candidates in Reno or in Tallahassee, we found a lot of it maps to what we find when we're overseas now. A lot of it maps. Now, there are some differences. We'll look at hard and soft factors, so we'll look at... Hard factors would be like employment law, inaudible how is disability treated, and those things. And then, we'll look at soft factors, which are more cultural. So how does the culture view difference, and what's the language that's used, and are we up against anything there that we need to be aware of? So we do a deep dive on any city that we go to. Basically, it's a similar process, but then we run it through our hard and soft filter, to say," What needs to change, given that we're in this..." because a lot of these cities are similar, but it's like our programs, everyone is a little bit different, so it's just about figuring out what you need to do to be successful in those places. But the returns so far have been great.
Dane Groeneveld: That's fantastic. So as you now look forward into the future and you think about Potentia Workforce and some of the programs your customers are running and this wider, global movement around your neurodiversity, what are your hopes and dreams for teamwork in the future? Where do you see Charlie as a 36-year-old? What do you think we can go out there and achieve in the coming five, 10, 15 years?
Jeff Miller: So yeah, I think ultimately, for us, the objective is to work ourselves out of a job. So where we start, every program we do is a bit different, but we recommend that you start small so that you can learn as a company, how to do things in your environment best. Ultimately, the companies we work with, we let them know," Listen, this is your neurodiversity program. We'll advise, we'll recommend, we'll share with you what other people are doing, we'll share best practices, but ultimately, the company has got to decide how to implement this, and they've got to own it." When we start small there, then the program expands, and then it becomes maybe a national or a global program, and it expands in its scope. But ultimately, we want it to just become, we've got to come up with a better expression with this, where we say," Part of the wallpaper." It just becomes part of how you do what you do. It becomes part of your overall human capital strategy. And we want companies to get there, where they're just like," Well, of course we're ND- friendly, and we've optimized for that in our college recruiting," because we've optimized for it everywhere. And our existing hires and our leadership team, where we know we've got neurodistinct individuals, these people thought that wasn't the case. We see it all the time. We have people who disclose to us," Hey, I'm an executive at this company and inaudible." But ultimately, it's about getting that company to have this be just part of their overall human capital strategy. And when they do that and when enough companies do that, we'll be out of a job, and that'll be just fine.
Dane Groeneveld: I love it. And going back to your early example, working with Charlie in the early years, year to year, and now starting to think about future planning, 26, 36, 46, I think a lot more parents, a lot more families, a lot more individuals will see much more clarity in the pathways that are open to them once this is standard operating procedure for human capital strategies.
Jeff Miller: I certainly hope so. And I know we say," Expose your kids to a whole bunch of different things, and if they try something and they don't like it, or they don't have immediate success, that's okay." But for a lot in the ND community, finding that passion, finding something that really lights you up every day, to do that, you've got to try a whole bunch of different things. And it doesn't mean that's going to be your job from day one, but if you have an idea of things, maybe you work to support that... Maybe you want to be an artist and you haven't found a way to do that as a full- time career, but your work gives you incredible enjoyment and allows you to support-
Dane Groeneveld: To do your art, yeah.
Jeff Miller: ...that hobby, to do your art. It could be that. But getting exposure to all kinds of different things is really the key, so really wide aperture there. And then, for Charlie, it's just finding that next stairstep. So for him, it's, don't ask him to jump five steps at once, but don't keep him inaudible either. Introduce some challenge and help him get to his next level. So right now, for Charlie, that's finishing high school, that's learning how to drive, and getting a part- time job, so those are going to be the next couple of things that are going to happen for him, and then, obviously, college is going to be not too far after that. So he's got his stairsteps, and he's got things that he loves to do, and it's just about supporting him as a family and just enjoying the awesome kid that he is.
Dane Groeneveld: That's great. Well, thanks for joining today, Jeff. Wonderful work that you're doing, and huge impact, not just for individual people, but for companies, for communities, which is so exciting. For anyone who's listening to the show and wants to reach out and make contact, learn a bit more about maybe starting a STARS program with you, what's the best way for them to find you, Jeff?
Jeff Miller: Sure. So our website is potentiaworkforce... So Potentia is like potential without the L, so potentiaworkforce. com. They can reach me at jeff. miller @ potentiaworkforce. com, or our general is info @ potentiaworkforce. com, any of those. You can register or ask questions off of our website or just email us directly. Anyone out there who's interested in neurodiversity, we'd love to hear from you.
Dane Groeneveld: Wonderful.
DESCRIPTION
Today on The Future of Teamwork, host Dane Groeneveld talks to Jeff Miller of Potentia Workforce about neurodiversity in the workplace and how inclusive hiring improves results across entire organizations. The two discuss the importance of psychological safety for teams in the workforce. Jeff also discusses how inclusivity can help companies better translate their values into behaviors.
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Dane Groeneveld
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