One of the most encouraging things for me as a neurodivergent person is talking to someone on the autism spectrum who serves in a position of leadership within their company. That’s why I was thrilled to speak to my old high school pal Sean Corbett, a wonderful human being who’s not only a team leader at Datavant, but they’re actively taking steps to help employees of all backgrounds thrive in their workplace.
RM: Tell us a little bit about what you do for a living.
SC: I am thelead engineer of the DevX team at a company called Datavant. What I do is basically build software, libraries, and a lot of types of processes and documentation that our four hundred plus engineers use to accelerate their work and help them do their job better and more efficiently.
RM: What do you enjoy about the work you’re doing?
SC: I’d have to sing my team’s praises! I love my team. I built this team! I hired every single person. I love the sheer scope and freedom of the work. Building a team is always an interesting time. A given team’s needs can vary so wildly based on the problems that they’re facing, and no two teams that we help are alike. Datavant gives me a lot of freedom and responsibility to try things and fail fast and learn from it. I also just like the sheer technical challenge of it. For example, we have these things called dev containers that we’ve implemented. Other times, it’s building things like a distributive performance testing engine. Sometimes it’s implementing a little bit of some logging or metric stuff. It’s a lot of fun.
RM: Can you tell me a little bit about how you came to discover your own identity as a neurodivergent person?
SC: I was diagnosed with autism in 1996 when I was five. With repeated diagnoses at ages 13, 17, and 25. I first discovered it when I was a child, and as a child I didn’t really understand what it meant beyond the fact that it came with a lot of coaching from my parents on how to interact with people in certain conversations. I came to truly understand it with the last diagnosis I received at 25, and at that point I really appreciated and had a more encompassing understanding of what it means to be neurodivergent, and in my case, what it means to be on the autism spectrum.
RM: I can relate to that a lot, actually. Even though I was diagnosed as an adult, I was also diagnosed more than once. The second time around, it was like I was better equipped to understand myself because I already had the tools and resources to understand my brain, and it sounds like that’s what happened for you.
SC: Absolutely. Being a product of the nineties, when you were diagnosed back then, the approach was a lot more corrective as opposed to the holistic approach we’re seeing today. We’re equipping an individual with perspectives and tools and building them up to succeed. Back then, it was still about shaping people and bending them to “fit in”. Growing up, I had that expectation of myself that there was something wrong with me that I had to hide or not talk about and deal with in my own way and own time. When I was diagnosed at 25, I realized I needed to take a different approach. I needed to embrace it as a different system of thinking. Because it’s a different system, I can identify patterns. I can identify mechanisms and identify mental models for how to work with this. It takes a bit more time because I had to unlearn the other way at first, but it’s been a very successful and helpful experience.
RM: Along those lines, in what ways would you say being neurodivergent lends itself as a strength in your current job?
SC: One of those things involves special subjects. In my case, I’ve learned how to turn something into a special subject. I can trick my brain into thinking about a subject that way. By doing so, I can turn things like computer science and applied mathematics and engineering into special subjects. It’s allowed me to rapidly digest sometimes very technically complex concepts and ideas to implement various sophisticated solutions and visualize things from the bottom up. I have this fantastic ability to granularize and reconstruct very sophisticated solutions. Case in point: my distributive performance-assessing framework. I don’t think anyone just casually takes that sort of project on. And yet by taking the approach of breaking it down and treating it as a set of subproblems that I can build back up. By familiarizing myself with each sub-area, I’ve been able to construct something that’s a very convincing product solution. I also feel like it helps a lot with keeping up because tech and software engineering is constantly shifting. There’s always something new to try out. It’s the perfect endless rabbit hole!
RM: What are your thoughts on teleworking as a neurodivergent individual?
SC: In terms of remote work, you have that additional distance. This forces people to speak more openly since they’re sitting behind a camera. It kind of levels the playing field that way. Neurotypical folks tend to communicate more with things like body language. Remote work levels that playing field in the sense that it makes it difficult for everyone to use things like body language, so people have to be much more direct and open and use things like written documentation.
RM: You hit the nail on the head! Remote work levels the playing field so much it’s unbelievable!
SC: It’s great! It’s one of those things where there’s nothing necessarily wrong with working in person, but you definitely feel that shift in power dynamics a bit more. It’s one of those things where I think it intimidates me less now having been in the field for a while, but it’s something I still have to very much account for. When I first came to Austin, for the first six weeks I was back in the office for the first time in…forever! And immediately I noticed that I needed to turn back on relearning everyone’s body language and voice and asking a lot of clarifying questions and all these other things. I forgot how much energy I consumed to maintain all those mechanisms. For any company looking to attract neurodivergent individuals, having a strong remote work option can be a huge boon, particularly for those on the autism spectrum. We’re able to communicate a lot more effectively via a lot of the remote work mediums than with in-person communication.
RM: I think I already know the answer to this question just based on our conversation so far, but do you feel like your employer supports you? If so, how?
SC: Absolutely, particularly within the organization I’m in, which every engineering department has. The platform org we have has been very much intentional with inclusion, like with neurodivergent, POC, queer folks (we have a lot of queer folks here, myself included!), and it’s one of those things where it’s by intentionally ensuring that diversity that we’ve created an atmosphere that caters much more to neurodivergent individuals. With the team itself, as the lead, I’m very much responsible for setting the tone. And the people on my team are neurodivergent. This means setting the example in terms of being aware of my tendency to overwork and holding myself accountable for that. This way, my team isn’t compelled to match that and thus we all end up in autistic burnout or some degree of burnout in general. It means encouraging honest communication, and also encouraging each other to take time off when we need it. Everyone thinks tech is a very cushy job, and in a lot of ways it is, but it can also be very demanding. The best and worst places I’ve worked in have all been in tech! The biggest and most supportive thing, I think, that my employer does is that we have no tolerance for brilliant jerks. At Datavant, if you show up acting like a brilliant jerk, you’ll quickly be shown your way out the door. It’s just part of the culture! In order to build an organization that supports neurodivergent people, you need to build a culture that supports intention, communication, and trust. These can’t be values that you just post on the wall. They need to be practiced.
RM: What are some of the recommendations you have to employers who want to foster a workplace that’s more inclusive for neurodivergent people?
SC: Again, it’s all about intention. First with hiring, and then having good, well-documented communication lanes with lots of trust. And no backchanneling! Backchanneling happens, but if there’s an excessive amount of it, the work environment might not feel safe. Employers don’t need to penalize people who do it, but if they see it happen, they need to encourage more open communication lanes. Additionally, when it comes to being neurodivergent and working in places that make me feel welcome and wanted, encourage neurodivergent folks to pursue ideas and passions to their fullest ability. Let them go for the things and the work where their intuition guides them. A lot of neurotypical folks might dismiss those passions as tangents, but that intuition is such a powerful guide for neurodivergent folks, and it can provide incredible insights and a powerful impact for an organization. Take the time to listen to that intuition and respect it. Recognize that for neurodivergent folks, the biggest thing is communication. Trust that they can do what they need to do, and when you create those open communication lanes, you can also trust your employees to ask for help when they need it or want it.
RM: What advice do you have for neurodivergent job seekers?
SC: If you have the ability and time, get your resume reviewed. Automated tracking systems are horrific! They’re often the first stronghold we face when it comes to getting employment somewhere. Also, speaking to my industry, tech interview processes are known for being grueling! I won’t hide the fact that they aren’t! When you’re interviewing for a job and you know the process will be very involved, be sure to communicate as openly as possible what you need. Don’t be afraid to ask questions about what they’re looking for. When it comes to take-home interviews, be very wary and ask lots of questions. There are plenty of companies that are catering to alternative interview formats like take-home interviews. Unfortunately, there are a lot of companies that abuse that to garner free work and are happy to pilfer the brilliance of neurodivergent folks. In terms of keeping employment, be sure to develop a good relationship with your manager and open those lines of communication about your neurodivergence. It’s a good way to get ahead of the curve if you start to suffer from burnout. If you do not have a supportive manager, be sure to watch your own resources carefully and monitor yourself for signs of burnout. Remember that this is a marathon and not a sprint. The biggest thing I can recommend over the course of your career is to build a good support network of fellow neurodivergent folks. Find your people!