Guide

Keeping and growing neurodivergent staff

How to help ADHD, autistic and neurodivergent staff stay in work and make progress. For managers and HR and People teams, once the first adjustment is agreed.

Nine short chapters. Go to the one that made you open this page. Each one stands alone and tells you how long it takes to read.

Chapter 01~2 min read

Start here

After this chapter you will know what this guide covers and who it is for.

Most advice on neurodiversity at work is about the start. How to tell your employer. How to ask for an adjustment. What the law says. Our other guides cover that.

This guide is about what comes next. How do you keep a good person once they have joined? And how do you help them grow? It is for managers and HR and People teams. It is about staff who have attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), are autistic, have AuDHD (autism and ADHD together) or are neurodivergent in other ways.

Here is the main idea. An adjustment is not a single event. It is agreed once, then it needs care. People leave when that care stops. They also leave when their good work goes unseen. So this guide has two parts:

Staying in work (chapters 02 to 04). Why people leave, how to notice problems early and how to keep adjustments working.
Making progress at work (chapters 05 to 07). How to make good work seen, how to help people move up and what to measure.

Most ideas here help everyone, not only neurodivergent staff. You do not need to know who has a diagnosis to use them.

This guide is general information, not legal or HR advice. Use the chapters in any order.

Chapter 02~3 min read · staying in work

Why do neurodivergent people leave jobs?

After this chapter you will know the common reasons. Most of them can be fixed.

The short answer: people rarely leave because of the work itself. They leave because support fades, or because good work is not noticed. Both happen slowly. So both are easy to miss.

What is true

Many neurodivergent people find it hard to stay in work. For example, only about 3 in 10 autistic people of working age have a job. That comes from the UK government's Buckland Review of Autism Employment (2024). Many more want to work. The gap is not about skill. It is often about what happens at work after day one.

Common reasons

Adjustments stop. A change is agreed in a meeting. Nobody writes it down. Months later, nobody remembers it.
A new manager. The person who agreed the support moves on. The new manager does not know about it. The employee has to explain it all again.
Hiding it costs energy. Many people work hard to look like everyone else. This is often called masking. It can lead to burnout, which means deep tiredness that does not go away with rest.
Reviews based on memory. A review asks what you did this year. People with ADHD can find it hard to remember. So they undersell their own work.
Promotion goes to the loudest. Quiet, steady work is easy to miss. People see others move up and feel stuck.

Each of these has a simple fix. The next chapters cover them.

Chapter 03~3 min read · staying in work

How do I notice problems before someone leaves?

After this chapter you will know what to look for, and how to ask about it.

The short answer: have short, regular check-ins. Keep them about the person, not the tasks. Ask what has got harder. Then act on what you hear.

Signs to look for

Small changes in work. More small mistakes than before. Deadlines that used to be easy start to slip.
Pulling back. They speak less in meetings. Their camera is off more often. They reply later than they used to.
More sick days. Short, frequent absences can be a sign of burnout.
A big change at work. A new manager, team, office, tool or way of working. These are times of higher risk.

A sign is not proof of a problem. It is a reason to ask.

What helps

Keep two questions apart. "Where is this task?" is about work. "How are you finding things?" is about the person. Do not mix them in one meeting.
Ask what has changed. "What is harder than it was a month ago?" is easier to answer than "Are you OK?".
Offer more than one way to reply. Some people say more in writing than out loud. Let them answer later, by message.
Write down what you agree. Share it with them. Then you can both see it next time.
Act on it. If nothing changes after a check-in, people stop telling you things.

Chapter 04~3 min read · staying in work

How do I keep adjustments working over time?

After this chapter you will know how to stop agreed support from quietly fading.

The short answer: write each adjustment down. Give it a date to check it again. And make sure it moves with the person when their job or manager changes.

What helps

One written record. Write what was agreed, when and who agreed it. The employee should have a copy too.
A date to check it. Set a review, for example after one month, then every six months. Ask: "Is this still working? Does anything need to change?"
Check it at every big change. A new role, a new manager, a new office or a return from leave. Support that worked before may need to change.
Hand it over. When a manager leaves, they pass the record to the next one, with the employee's permission. Then nobody has to explain it all again.
Think about an adjustments passport. This is a short document the employee owns. It lists what helps them. They can share it with each new manager. The UK government has a free one, called the Health Adjustment Passport. It can also help with an Access to Work application.

Access to Work

Access to Work is a UK government scheme. It can pay for support that goes beyond what an employer must provide. If someone gets Access to Work and their job changes, they should tell Access to Work. Their support may need to change too. Our Access to Work guide explains more.

Chapter 05~3 min read · making progress

How do I make sure good work gets noticed?

After this chapter you will know how to base reviews on what happened, not on what people remember.

The short answer: keep a record of finished work all year. Use it in reviews. Then quiet, steady workers are seen as clearly as loud ones.

Why it matters

Many reviews ask people to list their own wins. This is hard if you struggle with memory or time. It is also hard if talking about yourself feels wrong. Some people find this harder than others, so the review is not fair to everyone. A record of real work makes it fairer.

What helps

Keep a record as you go. Finished tasks, projects and thanks from others. Not a list made the night before a review.
Share the record before the meeting. Let the person read it and add to it first. No surprises on the day.
Let people prepare in writing. Give the questions in advance. Let them answer in writing if they prefer.
Notice how the work was done. Some people fix problems early, so nothing goes wrong. That work is easy to miss. Name it.
Say thank you in a way they like. Some people do not want praise in front of the team. Ask.

Chapter 06~3 min read · making progress

How do I help someone move up?

After this chapter you will know how to make growth and promotion fair for neurodivergent staff.

The short answer: make the path clear and written. Make the steps small. And plan new support for the new role before it starts.

What helps

Write down what the next level needs. Clear examples help more than words like "shows leadership".
Make the steps small. Give one new task at a time, with a clear goal. Check in after each one.
Offer adjustments in the promotion process. For example, the interview questions in advance, a quiet room or a written task in place of a talk.
Plan support for the new role. Managing people can mean more meetings and more switching between tasks. Talk about what will help before day one, not after problems start.
Do not hold someone back to protect them. Ask what they want. Some people want to lead. Some want to grow as experts. Both are progress.

Training and new skills count as progress too. Ask how the person learns best, for example by reading, watching or doing.

Chapter 07~2 min read · for HR and People teams

What should HR and People teams measure?

After this chapter you will know which numbers show if your support is working.

The short answer: measure what happens after the adjustment is agreed. Is it still in place? Do people stay? Do they move up at the same rate as others?

Useful measures

Time to agree an adjustment. From the first request to the change being in place.
Reviews done on time. How many adjustments were checked again on their review date.
How many people stay. Compare staff who have adjustments with everyone else, at one and two years.
Sick days. Look for changes over time, not single days.
Promotions and pay rises. Do staff with adjustments move up at the same rate as others?

Handle the data with care

Disability and health data is special category data under UK data protection law. Ask people before you use it. Report numbers in groups, never by name. Only show a group when it is big enough that no one person can be picked out. Our guide for HR and People teams covers this in more detail.

Where Humble fits

Humble is a second brain for work: one place for your notes, tasks and calendar. It is built with people who have ADHD, autism and other kinds of neurodivergence. These are the parts of this guide it helps with most:

A record of adjustments (chapter 04). An employee can keep a private record of what they asked for, the emails, what was agreed and when to follow up. See keep a record of your work adjustments.
Good work that is seen (chapter 05). Finished work appears on a timeline by itself. Nobody has to write it down. So there is a record ready for every review.
Less to remember each day (chapters 02 and 03). Tasks, notes and meetings sit in one place. It takes less energy to keep up, which lowers the risk of burnout.

An employee's own data is never shared with their employer. It is one option. It is not the point of this guide.

Book a call See Humble for People teams

Chapter 09~1 min read

Sources and about this guide

Who wrote this, what it is based on and when we last checked it.

The team at Humble wrote this guide. Our team includes people with ADHD. It uses our own research on work and the official sources below. We checked them on 20 October 2026.

Last reviewed: 20 October 2026. We review this guide again every six months.

This guide is general information, not legal or HR advice. For help with your own situation, see our reasonable adjustments guide or contact ACAS or a qualified adviser.

Is something wrong or missing? Email us. We read every email.

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