Neurodiversity Discrimination Tribunals: Employers Need Better Guidance 

Research from legal firm Irwin Mitchell has found a significant rise in neurodiversity discrimination tribunal claims against employers over the past five years.

Behind each of these numbers is a person often experiencing their worst time at work. Employees and their families are anxious and fearful for their livelihoods; managers and HR professionals are ruminating on what went wrong and unsure where to turn.

Increasingly, Occupational Health companies are deployed to “solve the problem”. However, these providers often lack neurodiversity specialism and can give unclear or redundant advice, as seen in the Khoram versus Cap Gemini case last year. In that case, the assessor recommended adjustments that simply didn’t make sense.

At Genius Within, we work with hundreds of businesses and thousands of neurodivergent employees each year. We’ve spotted a few key themes that may be contributing to this escalation in neurodiversity discrimination tribunals:

Over the past 25 years of working in this space, and indeed being a manager myself, I am yet to see a workplace problem get better on its own.

Employees struggling with the quality or quantity of their work, or with relationships and conduct, do not magically recover without support. Neurodivergence can sometimes be like working across cultures: colleagues may have the best intentions and still miss the mark when agreeing deadlines, giving feedback, or explaining tasks.

In many cases, this can be easily corrected and even laughed off. But sometimes, a wedge forms. A conclusion that a colleague was deliberately not listening, doesn’t understand protocol, or doesn’t care about the work. It can happen on any side of the interaction. And then it starts to unravel.

This is the moment when rapid intervention can make all the difference. Our coaches can work with employees who aren’t self-aware of their impact, with managers who doubt neurodivergence, or with well-meaning colleagues who simply don’t understand each other.

We’ve been doing this work for fifteen years. We are highly trained, specialist, and have an internal safeguarding system, complex case review dial-ins, and escalation all the way up to me, should there be difficulties. You can act now and stop the spiralling.

Increasingly, we are asked to step in after a relationship has broken down when there’s already a grievance or disciplinary process underway.

Typically, the manager has tried to cope alone. They may have tried to cover for their neurodivergent employee out of goodwill and run out of steam. They might be neurodivergent themselves and assumed they’d know what to do, only for it to backfire. Or they might have avoided adjustments altogether.

Our HCPC-registered Occupational Psychologists are trained as expert witnesses and understand the delicate balance of what’s “reasonable.”

We start with a brief call, followed by a recommendation for a full review, a psycho-vocational assessment, or an in-depth workplace needs assessment. A full review includes consent, record analysis, possible interviews, and clear recommendations.

We’ve had success helping managers make a case for internal transfers, highlighting where earlier recommendations weren’t implemented, and facilitating discussions where colleagues walk backwards through events to share their perspectives.

We don’t sugar-coat. We’ll tell you where things went wrong and how to prevent them next time.

If a case progresses to a neurodiversity discrimination tribunal, much of the groundwork is already done, and as an employer, you can demonstrate that you genuinely tried to resolve the issue.

We can help you solve tricky cases today and reduce stress for everyone involved.

It’s a challenging market for neurodiversity services right now. People whose broader diversity work has dried up are pivoting into neurodiversity, often after only short training. There’s no benchmarking or quality control.

Some products even promise “diagnosis apps” that claim to work by measuring iPhone interaction. A modern kind of snake oil.

That’s why I’m proud of Genius Within. We’ve been doing this work for decades. We’ve invested in real expertise, including sponsoring three PhDs and seven Masters degrees for our neurodivergent staff.

We won’t send you a report full of jargon or meaningless advice like “give clear instructions.” We won’t let you down.

Learn more about what we do or contact us today.

Written by Dr. Nancy Doyle, Chief Science Officer and Founder at Genius Within.