Working on the research for last week’s look at “evidence mills,” I found a whole patch of autistic communities on LinkedIn. One of these communities focuses on making sense of the corporate world. I found the threads there fascinating.
One article stood out and I wanted to share. The author, Austen S Grant, is an autistic person who struggles to understand the different meanings of common words and phrases when used in a workplace context versus everyday life. Words like "accountability," "authentic communication," and "small talk" take on different connotations in a work setting that the author finds confusing and frustrating.
As an autistic individual, Grant anticipates frequent miscommunications and unintentional offenses when interacting with colleagues, despite trying their best to avoid them. The workplace communication culture is not designed in an intuitive way for Grant.
To help other neurodivergent individuals, Grant has compiled a list of workplace terminology and their implied professional definitions, with input from friends. Examples include:
Relationship management: Avoid public conflict with outside parties
Workplace culture: Balance conversation with productivity
Accountability: Take responsibility without blaming others
Communicating accountability: Express sincerity when apologizing
Overall, the article illustrates Grant's difficulties and frustrations as an autistic person in navigating unwritten professional communication norms in the workplace. Grant aims to shed light on this challenge to promote greater understanding, which I greatly appreciated.
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Thanks for this! I'm going to go follow. As an Autistic who worked in the corporate world for a long time, I feel it's a good bet that one of the primary reasons for Grant's confusion is that the nature of most corporate cultures is disingenuous at best, and downright gaslight-y at worst. The kids of words that Grant finds confusing are very often used in corporate environments as euphemisms to obfuscate the more predatory and abusive qualities of the culture, and shift blame for unreasonable demands and expectations from management to workers.
Thanks for this! I'm going to go follow. As an Autistic who worked in the corporate world for a long time, I feel it's a good bet that one of the primary reasons for Grant's confusion is that the nature of most corporate cultures is disingenuous at best, and downright gaslight-y at worst. The kids of words that Grant finds confusing are very often used in corporate environments as euphemisms to obfuscate the more predatory and abusive qualities of the culture, and shift blame for unreasonable demands and expectations from management to workers.
Interesting.