Kia ora TEDx Speaker Selectors

Thanks for being game enough to come check this out. My hope is this will be most helpful for you to say “Hell yeah, we want Callum on our stage!” 📣

But first, to answer the obvious question:
Why not just complete the application form?

Well, truth-be-told & try-as-I-might, I’m actually unable fill out your online form with the level of detail you require😌 so I’ve had to collate it here over time. Here’s why in a video about me 👉

My Idea Worth Spreading:

‘It’s Time We Hacked the Hidden Revolution’

For too long people with neurodiverse brains🧠 have been ostricised and made to feel less than or inferior to those with ‘normal’ neurotypical minds. Social stigma, traditional management techniques and the curated Instagram👍 lifestyle exacerbate the continual stifling of an often hidden minority so full of potential.

This potential comes via the gifts🎁 and talents💃 we possess, and the fact we’ve often spent our entire lives hacking the system in order to make our way in a world not designed with us in mind.

Well, now that COVID has thrown the world🌏off it’s axis requiring new ideas and solutions to problems both old and new, the time has come for a revolution of hidden genius and life-hackers to rise up🚀 and deliver on our potential🎯 …… we just need to get some pesky management processes, centuries of social stigma and an unacceptance of ourselves out of the way😏. But we’re use to dealing with challenge in our own unique way!

Main points covered will be:

1. Management processes developed out of the Industrial Revolution🏭 have had their day yet we persist in standardising our workforces and the processes that govern them. The beer-belly of the bell curve has reinforced both conscious and unconscious biases around the entire Employee Lifecycle meaning the barriers to entry for some Neurodiverse people are insurmountable. If they do manage to ‘cut the mustard’ and convince a panel looking for ‘minds like mine’, then their struggles have only just begun.

2. Workplaces must harness the edges of the Bell Curve - a cohort that exists in every workplace but to date has been excluded, stifled and underutilised due to stigma, shame, fear and misunderstanding perpetuated by ignorant and misguided portrayals of neurodiverse people in popular culture🎭.

3. As much as 20% of a given workforce could be underutilised meaning there’s huge potential for greater performance and economic return AND returning a greater, more rewarding experience😁 for people in the workplace - both neurodiverse and neurotypical as the changes required benefit everyone along the bell curve.

4. If disruption and the pace of change💨 truly is increasing, and COVID’s impacts will reverberate for years to come, we must do things differently - including changing the way we recruit, develop and retain people in our workplaces …. and that doesn’t just mean working from home - it means thinking differently about different thinkers💭, and harnessing their ‘hack-abilities’.

5. We hold business leaders and entrepreneurs up as gurus, and the most well-known are themselves neurodiverse (think Branson, Musk, Jobs, Gates, Spielberg, and Henry Ford …. yes, it IS ridiculous they’re all men!) yet we don’t hold the ‘everyday’ Autist, ADHDer or Dyslexic up in such high regard. Instead we view them as flawed, disordered or disabled. AND, everyday us ‘disordered’ thinkers have to ‘hack the system’ in a world not designed with us in mind. This creativity, savvy cleverness🕵️‍♀️ and tenacity can benefit everyone because ….. our cleverness can be taught!

6. And, behind the mask of our face everyone has a brain - some are wired differently; often we wouldn’t know ….. and certainly we can’t assume to know the angst individuals go through to ‘fit-in’ today.

7. One thing we can control is the workplace - after all they’re called ‘organisations’ because presumably there’s a lot we can control. It’s time we turned the workplace from a Prison ⛓into a Prism 🌈

…………. Who knows - maybe Wellington could be the neurodiverse capital of NZ?!!

The Rim (minority) supports the Dome (majority)

The primary model for this talk is that of a Dome comprising multiple Bell-Curves. It’s a model I use speaking to schools, universities, membership organisations, corporates and public sector agencies.

We all sit on many bell curves and everyone safely sits in the middle of some of those curves. But on those curves that govern how society, education, the economy and especially the workplace operate, some of us sit at the extreme ends. As a result, we don’t fit and in a society that comprises a sea of sameness, where distinguishing ourselves is lauded yet fitting in is rewarded, those at the edges continue to be stifled.

When we put all those bell curves together, you get a DOME. In the middle resides a reinforced ‘authority for the majority’ and at the edges a band of fewer members. When these edges are joined they form a brim - like that of a hat, or a reef around an atoll (and we know that the greatest diversity occurs at the edges of reefs and forests) - we have a band of outliers residing in what I call the ‘Rim of Innovation’ because where difference lies, lies the ability to make a difference.

To successfully navigate COVID in 2021, I believe organisations must wrangle the rim!

Examples of me speaking ….

Here’s a cheeky video of me speaking👇 ….. OMG I’d love to share my big idea on your stage and create a spark of change that sees everyone think differently about those who themselves naturally think differently.

Here’s a couple of clips some mates and I used to promote an event in 2019 called Get Sh!t Done, held in Wellington and Auckland 👉

I’ve written a little on this topic too …….

In October 2020, I collaborated with some friends and colleagues in Australia, the UK, and the USA to publish an 18 chapter book designed to offer new ideas as to how leaders and organisations can prosper through and out of the COVID-19 crisis.

Titled What The Hell Do We Do Now?, we launched on Amazon.com on Thursday 8 October selling enough copies in the first 24hrs to hit #1 Best Seller status in Australia, the UK, USA and Ireland, with all proceeds going to Foodbanks Australia.

I was the solo-Kiwi on the team and my chapter was called ‘Tilt’ which references my thinking behind harnessing Neurodiversity. I’ve spent my life having people lean their heads to one side when they hear my ideas (which of course are brilliant, it just takes a while for others to catch up😂). They tilt their heads in bemusement or bewilderment.

Now, more than ever we need to tilt our perspectives if we’re to solve the problems we face in the COVID era.

Indeed, as Einstein* said over 100yrs ago:

“We can’t solve the problems we face today with the same thinking we used to create them”.

Its the neurodiverse among us who offer the greatest chance for businesses, communities and even whole societies to salvage the first quarter of this Century.

*Einstein was also Neurodiverse BTW

Please contact me directly on:

📳 021 880 162

💻 callum@callummckirdy.com

Hey, regardless of how & where this goes from here, please take care of yourselves in the almighty busyness in putting TEDx Wellington together.

All the very best in selecting an amazing lineup of speakers & thanks for tuning in!

Callum McKirdy

Some useful links to info about me:

1. Here’s my homepage to see what I do most often in my work building Radically Authentic Workplaces (that’s right R.A.W!)

2. Here’s a pick-a-path version of my own story so far

3. Here’s some specifics about the work I do promoting Neurodiversity at work

Here’s some research to back up my argument:

1. Adult Dyslexics can be superstars … and ... here’s some more qualities …….and a pain in the arse, despite holding the keys to future-proofing the workplace

2. Diversity within Neurodiversity is a complex myriad

3. Neurodiverse people are over-represented in homelessness statistics

4. People with ADHD can turn their hand to anything

5. Doubling-down on the stereotype that neurodiversity is about creativity

6. Yet we still need to clear up some common misconceptions …….

7. 10 ways we shame Neurodiversity (ouch this one hurts)

8. How Neurodiversity in the workplace is a competitive advantage … and why companies DON’T take advantage of it, while this study explores further benefits of making the effort

9. One aspect of inadvertent discrimination against Neurodiversity comes in the form of psychometric tests

10. Why Neurodiversity needs to be part of your D&I Strategy

11. There’s actually a lot of work happening overseas to support Neurodiversity in the workplace with some great ideas about designing workplaces to include and harness neurodivergent thinkers ….. and this place has 75% of its workforce as Neurodiverse!

12. But let’s not be all Pollyanna now, here’s what workplaces should think about and here’s what the HR folk think might work best

13. But let’s not take HR’s word for it, here’s what an Autistic manager thinks works best from their lived experience

14. So, do great minds think alike?