Starter Girlz Podcast

Unleashing ADHD Superpowers: Leadership, Creativity, and Empathy with Elle O'Flaherty

• Jennifer Loehding • Season 6 • Episode 61

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Discover how ADHD can be a catalyst for exceptional leadership and innovation as Elle O'Flaherty, an executive coach and performance optimization speaker, shares her transformative journey. From her career as a federal attorney and trade negotiator to becoming a champion for ADHD professionals, Elle provides actionable insights and inspiring anecdotes. Learn how embracing unique brain wiring drives career success and personal fulfillment while challenging societal norms. Tune in to redefine what it means to lead, create, and thrive with ADHD.

Takeaways

  • ADHD can be a professional superpower, with strengths like creativity, hyper-focus, and outside-the-box thinking.
  • Aligning career goals with personal interests and strengths enhances success and fulfillment.
  • Empathy, humor, and curiosity are essential traits for effective leadership and communication.
  • Supporting neurodivergent individuals through workplace accommodations and community connections fosters thriving cultures.
  • Self-care, reframing negative self-talk, and addressing mental and emotional needs are crucial for productivity and well-being.
  • Coaching can unlock potential and help individuals embrace their unique wiring for personal growth.

To learn more about Elle and her work, visit https://www.interlacesolutions.com/

Jennifer Loehding:

Welcome to the Starter Girlz podcast, your ultimate source of inspiration and empowerment. We're here to help women succeed in every area of their lives career, money, relationships, and health and well-being while celebrating the remarkable journeys of individuals from all walks of life who've achieved amazing things. Whether you're looking to supercharge your career, build financial independence, nurture meaningful relationships or enhance your overall well-being, the Starter Girls podcast is here to guide you. Join us as we explore the journeys of those who dare to dream big and achieve greatness. I'm your host, jennifer Loehding, and welcome to this episode, welcome. Welcome to another episode of the Starter Girlz podcast, wherever you are tuning in today. We are so glad to have you and I'm so excited about my guest today. I know this is going to be a great conversation, so I want to start this off real quick. We all know the challenges of navigating professional life, but what happens when you add unique brain wiring to the mix? Today we're exploring how one executive coach has mastered the art of guiding professionals and executives to thrive in their careers, even when faced with hurdles like ADHD. With a background as a federal attorney and a trade negotiator, she now helps others unlock their full potential in an engaging, insightful and often humorous way, and so I'm so excited to chat with her today. I know we were going to like I have a feeling we're going to be bouncing back and forth through this episode, so it's going to be great. But before we get her on here, we do need to do a quick shout out to our sponsor.

Jennifer Loehding:

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Jennifer Loehding:

Before I do that, I do want to make a mention to head on over to startergirlzwithazcom, and there you can find all of these episodes, aside from all the other platforms, but also you can sign up to get on our newsletter so you can keep in the know what's happening with the show and who all of our fabulous guests are that are coming on here and bringing all these stories to you. So that is Starter Girlz. Make sure with the Z in therecom, all right. So Elle O'Flaherty is an executive coach and performance optimization speaker, specializing in ADHD coaching. As the founder of Interlace Solutions, she helps professionals and executives unlock their full potential with engaging and practical strategies. A former federal trade or, excuse me, former federal attorney and trade negotiator with 17 years of experience, elle brings unique insights to her work. Her groundbreaking ADHD coaching course has been celebrated by career coaches and educators, solidifying her as a leader in the field. So, elle, welcome to the show. I am so thrilled to have you here today.

Elee O'Flaherty:

Thank you so much. It's such a pleasure. It's going to be so much fun. I'm excited to chat with you.

Jennifer Loehding:

I Thank you so much. It's such a pleasure. It's going to be so much fun. I'm excited to chat with you. I always love my ADHD friends. They're so much fun. I've got lots of them in my world. You know. It's always funny because when I go networking I feel like I always know those people because we have like the most as somebody told me one day, spirited conversations. I had never heard anybody say that before, but I am like, oh my gosh, is that what it is? It's spirited conversations, so it's all good.

Elee O'Flaherty:

So you've locked into one of our superpowers, which is creativity and outside of the box thinking, which really leads to those spirited conversations, as you say. And I always say, if you're looking for someone who's going to get excited for you and cheer you on, find an ADHD person, because it really is common amongst us. Yeah.

Jennifer Loehding:

Yeah, and it's funny too, because I don't know about you, elle, but for me personally sometimes I feel like I just I've never really fully like I've had. So I have two kids that have ADHD in my house and on my three. Two of them were diagnosed with it, one of them not till later in life younger. The youngest got weak because he had the classic signs. The oldest did not. But I've never fully. But I look at them and I watch the way they operate and I'm like I think like several of us in here just have those same patterns. But you're right, and the creativity is so big and sometimes I feel like and maybe you feel this way too that like my brain just thinks differently. Sometimes I just see things differently and I'm kind of an optimist. You know I'm a pragmatic person but I'm an optimist. I can look at something and see the overarching and be like there's something there we just got to figure out what it is, you know, even in the midst of something, and sometimes I feel like it's like it is.

Jennifer Loehding:

It's a superpower, because when a lot of people feel stuck, like I can see opportunity. I don't know, is that?

Elee O'Flaherty:

for you, yep, and you know, it's actually because our brains filter out less information than neurotypical folks, and so we are literally seeing more, and we also have super fast brains, which can sometimes lead us to trouble, but we can make connections really, really quickly, which means that we are seeing and coming up with ideas that other people wouldn't necessarily be able to, which is why a lot of us were overrepresented in entrepreneurs and in leadership and startups, things like that, because these kinds of skills are impactful, they're great, and so, when we can harness them correctly, it's it's amazing what we can do.

Jennifer Loehding:

Yeah, I want to talk about your story, but I wanted to mention something that I thought was funny because I did. You know they have the whole. I studied the DISC, you know, when my previous career and I know there's different, there's like Meyer Briggs, all these different things but I had this one. I worked with a firm for a little while and these guys were big on doing leadership coaching for these large companies. They would have people come in and do the leadership with the executive team and he told me one day when he went through my, he had me do this whole thing where they did the DISC and then they did the adaptive DISC, which is how you act, like you adapt to, like your D or your.

Jennifer Loehding:

I may shift a little bit, like my eye comes up when I'm in a social situation, whereas in other times my D is really high. And he was telling me that the way that I process information scares people, because I can take a situation, I can look at it and I can find a solution quickly, and then I'm already ready. I'm already ready with the solution and everybody else is over here still trying to figure out what to process Right, and I'm already on to the next space. Well, it's funny because when I think about, like, how I interact with people and I know one of the big things with ADHD people they interrupt and I am notorious for doing that. My brain is working so fast, so by the time somebody gets done, I've already figured out their solution.

Jennifer Loehding:

Like I'm listening to everything they've said and I'm already in my brain. You're probably doing the same, like calculating all possible scenarios of how we're going to solve this problem, and I'm listening to everything they've said and I'm already in my brain. You're probably doing the same, like calculating all possible scenarios of how we're going to solve this problem, and I'm ready to go, you know, before they're done. So I think it's a very interesting thing and I'm really glad that you're on here to talk about these things, because I think there are a lot of entrepreneurs that don't know. You know they have these similar traits or whatever, and they're thinking, oh my gosh, there's something wrong with me, right? And I think it's kind of a gift in a way you know, oh, absolutely.

Elee O'Flaherty:

And when companies hire me to give trainings and kind of work with their team about neurodivergent brains, I really like to start with how we are doing reasonable accommodations for neurotypical brains and one of the examples I use is exactly what you said.

Elee O'Flaherty:

Right, we'll have a meeting about something that needs to get done or solved, and in the first five minutes we will see all the things, we'll have the solution and we're ready to implement it. And then we have to sit through the rest of the hour, or 10 meetings, or a year of meetings, and it's painfully boring for us. And so us sitting through that processing time is us accommodating their brains? I love it.

Elee O'Flaherty:

Similarly, when we have an idea and we want to explain it to a neurotypical person, if you and I were talking about an idea, we would say A plus B, so F, and we'd be like yeah, yeah obviously, but I teach my clients you have to say A plus B plus C and all the way get to F, so neurotypical people can follow you, and I love seeing the look on the crowd's face when they realize that I'm talking about us accommodating them. It's really fascinating. But it's absolutely true. We do have these amazing gifts, but unfortunately that's not something that a lot of people talk about. With ADHD, it's starting to change a little bit, but still.

Jennifer Loehding:

So true, and I love that. I've never really thought of it that way. You know, because, like I said, you just I think when you, when your brain is like that you don't realize it. You know, when you get into like situations where you're like I say sometimes I, you know, like people just give me too much information, like I don't need it all, Like give me a couple pieces of information and I'm going to process.

Jennifer Loehding:

I'm good. Once I start hearing too much, my brain just goes poop, it shuts down, so it just and that's why, you know, like sitting for me personally, sitting like through a meeting, it can just be so painful, it can be awful because I can get what like I will be like at the end of that and I'm like somebody's like what did you learn? I said I got one thing out of that whole thing. I had the rest of, I think I just tuned out, like I just stopped listening at some point, you know. So I'm terrible, like I'm just terrible as a student. Like I just have not that like I just give it to me and streamline for formation. I just need a few things and we're good. So, um, so, yeah, so I'm I'm glad that we share this.

Elee O'Flaherty:

Oh yeah, Isn't it funny how you just said that you said I'm terrible while you were describing this super capability, where you need a lot less information than other people, and then you followed it with I'm terrible.

Jennifer Loehding:

That's because that's what we do right, that's how we feel. We feel like we're different, different than the other. That's why I said I'm so glad you brought up the accommodating that it's, that it's a superpower and we're talking in terms of You're accommodating because your brain's thinking differently, because we do, and even like you think about like kids. You know, like both of my oldest and youngest were in my gifted and talented programs and stuff, and so they isolate them and make them kind of like my youngest he's now 20. But when he was little he was in a destination imagination program. My oldest was as well and it's kind of a creative. It was really good for my oldest because it was like creative thinking. It was like they had to take a subject and create something with it and they could bring any type of ideas to that. It's just like a hodgepodge, right.

Jennifer Loehding:

But I remember my son going through this and I remember the instructor at the time telling me every time I go talk he hides under the table and he would just do all these little quirky things Right, and I got so used to it, you know, because he just didn't like fit in the way, the way everybody else did, or he didn't think quite the way everybody else did. And I remember telling a teacher I'm like you know, you teach, gifted and talented, so you should know that these kids are kind of different. They just they operate different, think differently, you know. But I think when you're around it you recognize that, when you're not, you don't. And the whole point I'm making here is that they do, they try to make a stigma that it's, that it's because you're not with everybody else that you're different and that's why you hear this language, you know, coming up for us. So but I like that you said that.

Elee O'Flaherty:

Thanks for bringing it up autism spectrum disorder and we've started seeing more people understand and embrace ASD, and so I mean to the point that we have movies and TV shows that depict it. It used to be sort of Rain man, which was very negative and it had a lot of stereotypes, and now we start seeing shows where it's celebrated and some of the strengths that come with it. Admittedly, it's almost always the savant aspect of it, but we're starting to see positive representation and you almost never see that with ADHD characters. We're always the ones who are crazy and irresponsible and whatever, and so, yeah, just the impact of that is really interesting if you're really listening and trying to reframe that, as we're just special and different in a way, but the society isn't built for us.

Jennifer Loehding:

Yeah, well, I like that. You said the superpowers. I think it's great. I'm telling my kids that too, when they get going I hear my daughter used to be telling me she's like I don't want to be this way and I'm like you got superpowers, you're gifted, you can read fast, you can do lots of things efficiently. It's all good. I love it. Well, I want to talk about your work, because you've had kind of an interesting career and you moved into this, really focusing on how to educate you know ADHD individuals, and so I love that. You're that you kind of found your gift, like you found your path and where you need to go. But let's back it up Talk, tell me a little. Tell us a little bit about the journey. What brought you to this place?

Elee O'Flaherty:

Well, it was definitely a winding path. So, as you mentioned, the first nearly 20 years of my career was in the legal community. I started out as a traditional sort of federal appellate litigator and then I moved into trade negotiations and I represented the United States in front of the World Trade Organization and the United Nations, and on paper it was a great career Trade Organization and the United Nations and on paper it was a great career. But the day to day of reading dense text and sitting by myself while I'm doing it was very challenging for my ADHD brain and I assumed it's because I was lazy and irresponsible and all the other fun things that we tell ourselves. But I noticed that what I really loved was coaching my team and helping to develop them, and so I started taking some courses on coaching and it just felt like, wow, this is where I need to be.

Elee O'Flaherty:

And I moved into executive coaching and then eventually ADHD and knowing now, which I wish I had known in the 80s, but knowing now that I have an interest-based brain and whereas neurotypical people have importance-based brains, so they prioritize things based on importance to themselves or others, we are very much driven by interest and so aligning our career with our interests and the things that naturally motivate us and get us excited is so critical, absolutely essential for us to be satisfied and happy in our career.

Elee O'Flaherty:

So as I started doing that and I opened my business and I it my husband jokes that I've actually had like five successful businesses, cause it keeps morphing. But as I've gotten closer and closer to the things I love, and now I do a lot of presenting and training for organizations and keynote speaking and all that stuff, as well as coaching, it doesn't feel like work. It feels amazing because my interest-based brain is like, yes, let's do this. And so when I talk to my clients about that and I say what I really want to do is tease out what your strengths and interests are, as well as asking and do you want to do that? Because I can absolutely negotiate the heck out of a treaty, but I don't want to. And so figuring out what you really enjoy and what interests you and then getting as much of that as possible in your career while either eliminating delegating or and thank goodness for technology automating the things that we tend to struggle at doing. It's just a surefire way for an ADHD leader to find success.

Jennifer Loehding:

I love this and I love that you really honed in on the, you know, finding your strengths and finding what you want to do, because I think that is so important. Somebody asked me the other day about Mary Kay because I was in that. I was actually in the company for 22 years and seriously thought I was never going to leave. And here's the funny thing I don't really care about the makeup. I mean I wear makeup, but I was not. I'm not one of those people that is like I gotta have. I mean there are certain things I like Like I like my eye brand just because it stays on well, or my primer because it keeps it in place, but I've never been like that girl that was like I needed like special this and this or this and makeup. And so I told somebody I said I realized there were some things that kind of led to me ending pulling out of that. Not really bad things. But I think what happened is I realized that as much as I love the opportunity and I loved helping people, like you said, like I was coaching, I was mentoring, I was leading a team I enjoyed that aspect I just wasn't really enjoying selling the makeup. I just didn't really care to do makeup classes, like I mean, like you want to talk about something else? Okay, I just didn't care about that. And so, interestingly enough, when I started moving into my own thing, I you know, it wasn't like I woke up and I'm like, okay, I'm going to do this. It's like you're talking your five businesses. I feel like I've had these little micro bit things that just kept leading up to the big ultimate.

Jennifer Loehding:

And now, you know, people ask me I'm like, you know, I like what I get to do, like I like every day what I get to do, I like that I get to have conversations, I like that I get to be creative and I love building things. I hate the minutia, but I love creating, like I love manifesting ideas and pulling them into things, and and that's the kind of stuff I get to do. You know, like I'm finishing up this program right now and I don't. I will tell you, perfectionism is like one of my things. And it's funny because in this program I'm talking about blocks, like subconscious blocks, and there's six of them, and one of them is perfectionism. And I realized in the middle of this oh, my gosh, my perfectionism likes to take over and so I have to give myself deadlines. It's like we to take over and so I have to give myself deadlines. It's like we're getting this done by this date so that I will get off of and stop doing revisions a hundred times, you know. But overall, you know, when I look at all the work I get to do, I love that I have the ability to get to do that. You know.

Jennifer Loehding:

And someone asked me on a podcast the other day she's like how do you define wellness? And the reason she asked me that is because she knows I do. I have two really weird, rare conditions that I have to navigate my health with. And I told her. I said when I'm happy about what I'm doing and I'm excited about my work, then I know I'm feeling okay, if that makes sense. So tie that back to what you're saying, this whole idea of finding what you enjoy doing, and then we take our strengths and match that up and when you find that, yes, it makes such a huge difference.

Elee O'Flaherty:

It really does. And just, I mean, I will say it absolutely does. It also takes a lot of bravery and hope, because if you told me 10 years ago that I would be doing this, I would have thought you were crazy. You've been doing being an attorney, yeah yeah, leaving a very secure legal job to start my own business. When I did it, I, I, I was freaking out, you know it. It does take, uh, to make changes like this. It really does take bravery and hope, the idea that the changes will impact you in a positive way, um, which I think, as coaches, we are peddlers of hope, honestly, when it comes down to it, right About the idea that things can improve.

Jennifer Loehding:

Yeah, yeah, yeah, I had someone tell me what like healers you hear with, like light seekers, right, like we're and it's neat because, yeah, I think we're, I like that peddlers of hope, because I think we spread the optimism in whatever we focus on. It's funny, though, because I you know, when I'm, as I'm talking to you, like I told somebody one day all my clients like I have a variety of clients, but a lot of my clients that come to me are ADHD people Like they're just attracted to it, they find it. They're like that girl's hyper, she's got we're going to her and I tell people I'm like I don't, I don't stay in the minutia, I really like to just give people hope and I'm going to get you across the finish line. We're going to get to the end of this. We're going to walk our way to that end.

Jennifer Loehding:

You know, and I think that's good because I think you know a lot of times you know, in coaching and there's a lot of great coaches out there, but sometimes they get hung up in the weeds and I think that seeing a macro picture and being able to be a cheerleader for somebody sometimes is what they need. They don't always need to be told what to do. They need to be encouraged to make their decisions themselves and have somebody to say you got this, you can make this decision and there's power in that.

Elee O'Flaherty:

I absolutely agree. The other really important thing that I think that for the ADHD community, as a coach, I've noticed is helping to connect people to our community and what's normal for us. That's good, because our society tells us that this is how you should be and this is normal and it is very neurotypical looking. So when I start working with clients and they're describing some things that are going on, some of their symptoms and traits, I will say, yeah, it's absolutely normal for our community and so many of them it's like all the stress leaves the room because they've been carrying around this guilt and shame their whole life, thinking that there's something terribly wrong with them, when really it's that we just do things in a different way and it's not good or bad.

Elee O'Flaherty:

It just is.

Jennifer Loehding:

Yeah. So let's say, somebody listening to this right now, because we get we get a lot of people to listen to this and maybe we've got somebody in there right now that's going. I don't know, am I doing things that are kind of indicative of an ADHD type entrepreneur leader, Like, what are some things that you like notice and we talked a little bit about some things here, but maybe some more things that you've noticed in patterns of behavior, the way they operate on their day to day, perhaps Well, I think, definitely being a and I wouldn't even say outside the box thinker, I would say we don't realize that there is a box and so coming up with ideas that it takes a while for other people to socialize to because it is so different, very, very common.

Elee O'Flaherty:

You know, I know the last decade we've talked a lot about interrupters and people who are sort of making big changes in whatever industry, and that's often us, because other people wouldn't necessarily think of these things that have never existed. I would also say that we tend to be highly empathetic and curious, we're really interested in other people and we tend to understand when other people aren't feeling well. Now, I don't know if that's inherent or if that's because we've gone through so many people kind of sending us negative messages about ourselves, but it is interesting. And then one thing, and of course I want to stress that ADHD is not monolithic, right. So we're not this, but I will say a lot of us.

Elee O'Flaherty:

It's really common for us to be funny, for instance, because we're fast on our feet, we make connections, and so a lot of the most famous comedians are some outwardly and some likely ADHD, and so that can be a real strength too. I don't think that we utilize humor enough in the workplace in an appropriate way, of course, but things have gotten so serious in the workplace and so sort of, I don't know. It just seems like a win-lose situation a lot of times. I think having a leader who uses humor and who encourages levity in the workplace can be incredibly helpful.

Jennifer Loehding:

It's good, these are all really good. I like it. I really want to jump back on this being empathetic and curious, because I personally can relate to this a lot. You know, like, and again, and I don't you know, I don't know if it's having come from a place where, like, I just had to talk to a lot of people, but I really think this, these are powerful, this empathetic, and that may be something to that, what you're talking about. Maybe it's just because we had to feel, we had to accommodate, right, like we had to pick up on other people's things, because I've said this often, like I can.

Jennifer Loehding:

For the most part, I can read a person, like I'm not perfect all the time, but I can tell when somebody is kind of uncomfortable or when somebody's saying something that's not aligning with the body language unless they're just a sociopath that those are hard people to figure out. But most people, right, like most people we're dealing with on the day to day. This is why I don't like to do phone interviews, because I can't. I need to see the person, I need to see their body language and is it aligning with the way they're talking to me? And because it gets, I just get mixed up, totally get mixed up.

Jennifer Loehding:

You know, and I think that's because I pay attention to cues a lot, I pick up on people's energy and that, and I don't know about you, but you, you tell me if you feel this, I can walk in a room and I can just immediately either I like it or I don't like I get into the room and if the energy feels off, even if I'm in conversations with people, if the energy feels off like I can feel it, I just wear it and I have to like get out of it, like I have to find like another group or leave or do something, because I just pick up on that. So I think this is really good that you brought this up and also about the curious, being curious about other people, right, which is partly why I do this show, because I'm curious about other people I like. I personally like to learn what other people are doing and how they're succeeding you know, and it's fun, it's fun to me to um, you know, learn that.

Jennifer Loehding:

And also I've said often that having these conversations for me, like they empower, I like I, I like it when they're like this, where they're positive and they're good, Like I have, I just feel better, like after I have one, you know.

Elee O'Flaherty:

Yeah, well, I should tell you that I have several people in my freezer, so in case that throws you off. But but no yeah. The psychopath thing Sorry.

Jennifer Loehding:

There's a funny thing. See, there's a funny thing.

Elee O'Flaherty:

Yeah, but yeah, absolutely. And what you're describing, you know we, our brain, as I said, filters out less information, so we're noticing a lot more things about people and able to make some of those determinations quickly without us even realizing. Um, and we also, um, you know, we, because of this empathy, we tend to be people who understand when someone else is going through it, which is which is really nice. Um, again, I don't know if that's because we've been there, because most of us, uh, received very negative messaging from our peers and others when we were growing up and, frankly, throughout our lives. Um, but again in the workplace, that's amazing. Having an empathetic leader who isn't just sort of authoritarian can make for such a great culture.

Jennifer Loehding:

I agree, I agree, yeah, no, that's good, and I mean because I talk about that all the time in culture. Yes, it's important to. I saw something the other day that Gary Vee just put out, and he was talking about. A great leader is someone who can put their people in the right places, and I think that takes an empathetic leader, right. That takes somebody understanding their people in order to figure out where they're going to thrive the best. Right, like you have to, and a lot of times, leaders are really managers. They're not quite leaders, right, like those are two different types of people. I mean you could be both, but those are two different types of people and a lot of times, I think leaders get into managing, so they aren't really able to put people in right places and they're not empathetic to understand that, you know. And so I think this is a really good thing because and I think they go together because being curious and being empathetic curious allows you to ask appropriate questions, right, and being empathetic allows you to put yourself into somebody else's shoes.

Jennifer Loehding:

So they're really both great to me. Great traits, whatever you want to call them, characteristics, whatever they do, rings, you know. Whatever they are, I think they're great gifts.

Elee O'Flaherty:

I agree and also to deliver your message in a way that resonates with other people. That empathy, that humor, creativity is great, because I think of leaders and managers. The difference there is that managers are sort of overseeing what's happening and moving the right widgets in the right place, whereas leaders are inspiring. And if you know how to reach people and how to deliver a message in an inspiring way, that's a completely different experience and a completely different workplace. That's a completely different experience and a completely different workplace. And I don't know if that's cultivated enough that having being an inspiration to the folks who are working under you, but I think it's really critical.

Jennifer Loehding:

They need more people like you, elle, to come in and get them all inspired. Right, that's what I say to you. I'm like I hear, you know, like I hear things. My husband works and he's a chemical engineer, so he's been in the place where he's been with this company like 20, you know long time. And I'll hear things and I'm like Ooh, like I'm just like no, no, no, no. And part of that is too because I was at Mary Kay for so long, so I was sort of in a bubble for a very long time and everything there is like positive, right, like that's my wheelhouse, you know wheelhouse. You know everything is clapping and rah, rah and cheerily, and then you come to the real world. You're like majority of people are not like that at all. You know like I'm like sometimes I just want to be back in my little bubble, my pink bubble, where it's all positive rose-colored glasses, you know why aren't more places like that I?

Elee O'Flaherty:

mean, that's the kind of place I would want to work exactly can you imagine I do see them sometimes.

Jennifer Loehding:

You know, like I will see, there's a company here called Very Space and I have not personally had the opportunity to talk to the owner, but we follow each other in LinkedIn and I've toured his facility and when I walked in, let me tell you, when I walked into the building to tour the facility, like I got in and I just had this warm feeling come over me, like nobody even had to say anything at this point, it's like I told you, when I walk in a room, I was like these people like working here, like I could just tell the way they had open spaces, like they weren't in cubicles, they were in open spaces and they work like different days, like different teams come in different days, so that they're not all in there together, but it just the whole.

Jennifer Loehding:

I could tell, when I walked in, the whole environment, like the energy. I think these people they've got a great culture. Well then, I follow, I follow the CEO of the company and I see what he's posting on LinkedIn and he's all about community and you know and all this stuff, and I'm like, ah, he's got it. That's the leader, that's what I'm talking about right there, and he's created that culture in there where people want to be here. They're probably feeling heard, they feel included, they feel like they're part of something you know and I don't know. I think it's a cool thing and you can't, and so I say that there are some out there, there's just not a lot of them probably.

Elee O'Flaherty:

Yeah, I agree, and you know I'm all about productivity. That is definitely something that I help people with. But you have to think of the long game when it comes to productivity. Right, if you are having a super productive day today, at what expense? Right. And so, for instance, with ADHD people, we fall into hyper-focus. It's one of our absolute superpowers, where we can work tirelessly for hours on end on something.

Elee O'Flaherty:

And a lot of my clients will come to me and say say, when they aren't, when they don't have a hyper-focused day, they feel like they're failing.

Elee O'Flaherty:

And I tell them you just did, in four or six or eight hours, the work of several days, which means you used the energy of several days, and so you have to assume that there needs to be a rest and recovery time and it is not reasonable or fair to expect yourself to do that all day, every day, because you would just burn right out.

Elee O'Flaherty:

And I think extrapolating that out in the bigger picture, burn right out. And I think, extrapolating that out in the bigger picture, that expecting workers or anyone really to be these like hyper productive machines for eight or more hours a day is not looking at the long game where we don't want people to burn out and we do. I mean you can't buy or manufacture a great workplace where people want to come and work for you or a great workplace where people want to come and work for you. But you can create that by thinking long term and thinking about longer productivity so that people stay for longer, so that they are more knowledgeable and trained and so that they feel refreshed and they're coming into work excited rather than completely burned out and forcing themselves to get things done excited rather than completely burned out and forcing themselves to get things done. So I'm not sure how we got this fixation on like micro productivity, but I would love for us to expand that out and to look at it more holistically Love it.

Jennifer Loehding:

I love what you're saying here, which I want to, which kind of leads me to what I want to ask you now. This will be good, we can talk about this real quick. I do want to talk about your course in a few minutes, so don't let me forget that. But so one of the things that I have to do and and and some of this is because of, like health stuff, right, like put that over there. But one of the things that I was telling someone the other day that I have to be really like mindful, so talking about this going hard and then coming off, because, yes, I don't know about you, but I will tend to plug hard and then I crash and burn, it's like I go and then I fall over and then I'm just out, right.

Jennifer Loehding:

And so what I started doing you know, not recently, I've been doing this for a while is I've really started carving out these times in the morning for myself, like where I forced myself to actually, like I call it detox just sit down and don't move for a minute, ok, just don't move.

Jennifer Loehding:

And a lot of times what I do is I read in that time, you know, and I'll do like some kind of a little nervous system type thing to kind of reset my body.

Jennifer Loehding:

You know, sometimes I just come in here, I'll sit in the room, my little cats will sit on the futon, read a book and just relax, you know. But I have to be really mindful of that because it's so easy to get caught up and just go, go, go, go all the time and my brain will just be like we got more work to do, we got to get this done, let's keep moving, we got to keep this moving, you know. And then I'll have to say Jennifer, you need to like. You know. So for me, actually implementing that stuff in the morning and I'm not perfect at it every day it's been hectic this week because we've had contractors in there, but for the most part I'm pretty consistent with that, you know, every day, and it seems to help me have some of that unwind time and I and I also just kind of show up better when I do that.

Elee O'Flaherty:

I love that you prioritize and do it first, so I want to make people think about doing that at the end of the day. I think that's really cool.

Jennifer Loehding:

Yeah, I get up at five every day and my friends laugh because they're like you don't like get out, you don't know, you like to get out of your house, moving to like 10. I'm like, because I like my mornings, I like them for myself.

Elee O'Flaherty:

Yeah, well, you know I this is making me really excited because you've landed on a topic that I work with so many clients on, and I think that this is a challenge for, in these days, everyone, but especially ADHD folks, because our brains are action oriented, which means we want to go, we want to do, we don't want to stop and pause and plan, and so for a lot of us, those kinds of self-care things or taking time to pause or to sort of plan out our day, it feels like we're wasting time, so we don't want to do it.

Jennifer Loehding:

Our brain is like oh, you, know, I just want to get the thing back.

Elee O'Flaherty:

Right, yeah, but it's sort of like that, that again looking at micro productivity versus macro, when we stop and take care of our physical and emotional needs and when we plan out our day in a way so that we have thought about what we're doing instead of just letting things happen, um, we actually end up in the long run being much more productive. Um, but we, as especially ADHD people, but again, I would argue, kind of everyone um, we tend not to notice our needs. We don't notice our physical needs, like thirst or needing to stop and eat lunch or whatever. Um, we also don't notice our emotions until they get really big and in our face, which can lead to a lot of other things. Um, but helping to train yourself to pause and just sort of scan for what your needs are throughout the day, um is really powerful and at the end of the day, like we're just a machine, right, we're putting in food, we're getting out typed pages, or whatever.

Elee O'Flaherty:

Yeah, but making sure we're taking good care of that machine is super important.

Jennifer Loehding:

Yeah, I tell people you really can't afford not to. And I think you know I haven't always, obviously haven't always been that way, right, I think that because I've had health conditions, it's forced me to have to be mindful of that right. And I've had health conditions, it's forced me to have to be mindful of that right. And it's funny I laugh because I have this little sleep watch, you know this Garmin sleep watch, and it can be a good thing and it can be a bad thing, and I'll tell you why. Because it's a good thing when it gives me a good score on my sleep and everything looks good. I'm in a good mood, right. But if I get up the next day and I look at it and I've got orange in my sleep and my heart rate variability was all over the place and my heart rate didn't drop, then I'm like, oh, I'm mad about it. But I will tell you there's a direct correlation between this thing and how I'm taking care of myself.

Jennifer Loehding:

And you know there's a lot of this talk like you think about, like going to bed at night and you're wound up, and if you've been, you know, doing all these things and then you try to go to bed. It's hard for the body to relax, and so that's. I think, having had gone through those things, it kind of forced me to have to do that, to be more mindful of that. But it's needed, right, it's needed for everyone. But, like you're saying, even because we're in this zone where we're always thinking we need to push, and sometimes you can keep going, and then sometimes your body tells you, hey, you can't keep doing that forever, like you're going to have to grow out of something or do something. I say grow out of it. You're going to have to be a big kid and put your big girl panties on and say you know what, today I'm going to start taking care of myself, right, because I can't do that every day you know, yeah, absolutely.

Elee O'Flaherty:

And listen, I am not perfect, I am horrible about drinking water.

Jennifer Loehding:

It could be raining outside.

Elee O'Flaherty:

It's like the Sahara here. So absolutely all of our challenges, yep. But I will say, the most critical thing and I really try to start from the very beginning when I'm working with people is not beating ourselves up over it. You know like we're all doing the best we can and I think that that sort of self-flagellation and blame and shame and guilt is absolutely not helpful. And if there is one thing I wish everyone could experience after years and years of being a coach and talking to different people, everybody has pretty much guilt and shame, and it's often in the same areas, about the same things, and I'm like I wish people could see from my perspective how everyone is doing the same thing and feels bad about it. Yeah, it's true.

Elee O'Flaherty:

And it is, it's like the same One of the reasons why, like, uh, I am really out and proud about my ADHD, because a lot of people can't be, and why I do talk about things like my failures and things that are still a challenge, because I don't want anyone to think that somehow I have this like perfectly put together life, absolutely not right, um, but we're all just doing the best we can, and so there's no reason to to treat ourselves meaner than we would ever treat another person.

Jennifer Loehding:

I agree, and I think that goes for anybody listening, whether you have ADHD or not. Right Like it's. It's about taking care of you and and self-talk is important. I agree with you. I mean, these are all the things we talk about in. You know and it's funny because, like in this thing, I'm the course I'm going to go back to that we're talking about blocks and, obviously, self-worth. You know imposter syndromes in there and fear of success and all of those things.

Jennifer Loehding:

But so much of and I'm sure your experience is too when you're working with people so much of it goes back to the inner dialogue. It's the inner thoughts about ourself, how we see ourselves. You know, you could ask this same person. I always use this example. You could take a person and tell them. They go into an interview and the interview person says to you, tell me about yourself. And they're going to say all these great things about themselves. Right, they're gonna be like I can do this, I can do that, I'm pretty good at this, I'm good at this, but then they'll go home and have this awful conversation with themselves about how bad they are, they suck and all the things, right. But I'm like you just told the interview. You know, your interviewer, all these great things about you, but now you're over here and beating yourself up and so there's yeah, it's that inner dialogue.

Jennifer Loehding:

Everything we do really just comes back to how we feel about ourselves and you know, and these beliefs really run deep, and that's a lot of the work that I do is trying to help people reframe those thought processes so that they can actually, you know, around money or whatever it is, which, for women, money is a big thing for a lot of women, you know, asking for what they're worth, and you know, and so it's yeah, it's getting back to that. So I like that. You pointed that out several times, because I think it's no different with something like this. Well, if we're talking ADHD, it still goes back to what's your self-talk saying to you.

Jennifer Loehding:

When you work on reframing that and look at like I love that you said in the beginning about the superpowers and all that, because I think, yeah, when you look at it from that perspective, it's like you got something kind of cool that you can do, you know and it's, and in some ways, if you figure out how to use that in the right way, it can become a huge gift for you. Exactly, I love it. You're awesome. So tell us about your course, tell us a little bit about this, this, this thing you got going on. I got a fluzzer.

Elee O'Flaherty:

Well, you know, I actually have two courses. I've been busy. The one that is really generally applicable for so many ADHD people. Again, just having this sort of unique perspective of being a trained career executive and ADHD coach, I put together a course that is soup to nuts everything you would need as an ADHD person to have a very successful job search from what am I going to be when I grow up, and aligning those interests and talents to your work all the way through. How do I successfully transition into my new job, and everything in between I give out a million resources. So everything down to resume templates and just advice on how to prepare and think about interviews, salary negotiations. So it's everything I was really trying to think.

Elee O'Flaherty:

If I were looking for a job without knowledge of my ADHD brain, or with knowledge of it and still having some negative thoughts, what would be really helpful to motivate me and get it done? So that is on my website, which is interlacedsolutionscom. And then the other course, which is a little more specific. I created it for coaches and counselors, particularly folks who are working in career development, but really anyone, and it is again. I build these like holistic courses. It is soup to nudge, everything you would need to work with an ADHD person or an ADHD client and help them with their career, and it gives everything from basic information on ADHD all the way through more advanced information, of course, and also, again, that's sort of everything. You would need to be a great advisor to someone as they're trying to figure out what they want to do, be a great advisor to someone as they're trying to figure out what they want to do, how to get there and beyond.

Elee O'Flaherty:

And really my goal is you know my whole reason for doing this. I have two. It's my life mission. The first is to reduce the stigma around ADHD. We are so stigmatized and I think it's so detrimental that I think it's important that we just get our message out there about us and that we're here. And the second one is I really want to help service providers and other folks who interact with us, like when I'm hired by companies, so that people can understand how to work with their ADHD and how to work with their ADHD colleagues. I want to get that message out there so that we can have service providers who are ADHD informed and who work well with our unique brains, and so I'm doing everything I can to do that, which is why I really appreciate being on your show. I think it's so important and somehow I don't think our message has gotten out there enough.

Jennifer Loehding:

Yeah, no, I think it's good. I think it's good. I feel like I know lots of ADHD people. We need to listen to this right now. Maybe they'll follow your way. Which leads me to my next question. If our audience surely somebody listening to this is going to be like, hey, I want to check out this program or I want to get in touch with Elle. Maybe they want to follow you. Whatever that be, where would you like us to send them?

Elee O'Flaherty:

definitely go to my website. As I said, it's interlace solutionscom. Um. I'm also very active on LinkedIn. If anyone wants to connect there. Um, it's very easy to find me and um, and I have lots of resources and things, as well as a newsletter through LinkedIn and also my own website where I give out all sorts of tips and information and tools and things every month. So check it out, I would. My whole goal, as I said, is to help our community and to sort of lift us up, so let me know how I can do that.

Jennifer Loehding:

That is awesome. All right, well, I will find you in LinkedIn, because that's where I'm at. That's where this podcast is really is. The most active is in the LinkedIn community. This has been great. Oh, I'm so glad that you were able to get on here and talk a little bit about this. I feel like we have kindred spirits here in this world, definitely. I'm glad that you were able to get in here and share your story a little bit and, who knows, somebody listening to this may decide you know, hey, I'm there or whatever, and they want to reach out to you and or maybe pick up the course. I'm interested in looking at your stuff. I want to get back on your site and look at what you've got going on. When this gets ready to go out, we'll make sure we get the links in there so they know how to find you and get whatever they need from that, so thank you so much.

Elee O'Flaherty:

You're awesome, of course. It was such great chatting with you.

Jennifer Loehding:

Yeah, and, of course, to our audience. We appreciate you If you found this episode informative and inspiring, which we hope that you did. Head on over and do your thing. You want to hit that, subscribe, like, share, comment, do whatever, help us support the cause for this show and keep sharing these fabulous stories. And, as I always say, in order to live the extraordinary, you must start, and every start begins with a decision. You guys, take care, be safe, be kind to one another. We will see you next time.

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