Asperger's: the IT industry's dark secret

IT is a uniquely attractive industry for the autistic

By Tracy Mayor, Framingham | Monday, 23 June, 2008 - Computerworld [New

Zealand]

"Ryno" is a 50-something ex-sysadmin, by his own account "burned out and

living on disability" in rural Australia.

He loved the tech parts of being a system administrator, and he was good

at them. But the interpersonal interactions that went along with the

position — the hearty backslaps from random users, the impromptu

meetings — were literally unbearable for Ryno.

"I can make your systems efficient and lower your downtime," he says. "I

cannot make your users happy."

Bob, a database applications programmer who's been working in high tech

for 26 years, has an aptitude for math and logic. And he has what he

calls his "strange memory". If he can't recall the answer to a question,

he can recall exactly, as if in a digital image, where he first saw the

answer, down to the page and paragraph and sentence.

Bob has some behaviour quirks as well: He can become nonverbal when he's

frustrated, and he interprets things literally — he doesn't read between

the lines. "I am sure [my boss] finds it frustrating when I misinterpret

his irony," he says, "but at least he knows it is not willful."

"Jeremy" excels at being able to see an engineering problem from the

inside out, internalising it almost from the point of view of the code

itself. He's great at hammering out details one on one with other

intensely focused people, often the CEOs of the companies he contracts

for. To protect his anonymity, he doesn't want to mention his

programming subspecialty, but suffice it to say he's a very well-known

go-to guy in his industry.

What Jeremy is not good at is suffering fools in the workplace or

dealing with the endless bureaucracy of the modern corporation. If

someone is wrong — if their idea just plain won't work — he says so,

simply states the fact. That frankness causes all manner of upset in the

office, he's discovered.

These IT professionals are all autistic. Bob and Ryno have Asperger's

Syndrome (AS); Jeremy has high-functioning autism (HFA).

Though the terms are debated and sometimes disputed in the medical

community, both refer in a general way to people who display some

characteristics of autism — including unusual responses to the

environment and deficits in social interaction — but not the cognitive

and communicative development impairments or language delays of classic

autism.

People with Asperger's, widely known as "Aspies," aren't good at reading

nonverbal cues, according to the American Psychiatric Association's

Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders. They can have

difficulty forming friendships with peers, they form a strict adherence

to routines and rituals, and they may exhibit repetitive and stereotyped

motor movements like hand or finger flapping.

Dr Tony Attwood, a world-renowned Asperger's clinician and author in

Brisbane, Australia, defines Asperger's in a more human context: "The

[Asperger's] person usually has a strong desire to seek knowledge, truth

and perfection with a different set of priorities. ... The overriding

priority may be to solve a problem rather than satisfy the social or

emotional needs of others."

Problems over people? Hmm, sounds like a techie.

A paper on Asperger's from Yale University's Developmental Disabilities

Clinic continues down the same path: "Idiosyncratic interests are common

and may take the form of an unusual and/or highly circumscribed interest

(such as in train schedules, snakes, the weather, deep-fry cookers or

telegraph pole insulators)."

Or technology. When Ryno spoke with a receptionist to make an initial

appointment for an evaluation with Attwood, she asked him, what is your

"Big Interest?"

"She inadvertently gave me a diagnostic question I have found

invaluable," he recalls. "The Big Interest is a great start to

Aspie-spotting."

Ryno's Big Interest is computers and communications. He's not the only

one, not by a long shot.

The Asperger's-IT connection

Autism, though first identified and labeled in 1943, is still a poorly

understood neurodevelopment disorder, and nearly every aspect of its

causes, manifestations, research and cure is mired in controversy.

Asperger's and HFA, being hard-to-define, often undiagnosed or

underdiagnosed variants on the high end of the autism spectrum, are even

less quantified or understood.

Diagnoses of autism, including Asperger's, have skyrocketed in the US in

recent years — the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention now

estimates that one in 150 8-year-old children has some form of autism.

It's not clear if the increase is because of better detection, a change

in the diagnosis to include a wider range of behaviours, a true increase

in case numbers, or some combination of those or other factors.

It's even less clear how many adults have Asperger's. Because Aspies are

usually of average or above-average intelligence, they're often able to

mask or accommodate their differences socially and in the workplace,

meaning many of them make it well into middle age, or live their whole

lives, without being formally diagnosed.

A spokesman for the National Institute of Mental Health says the agency

is not aware of any government organisation or academic research that

tracks the incidence of AS in adults.

Where statistics come up short, anecdote is happy to take up the slack.

Ask an Asperger's-aware techie if there is indeed a connection between

AS and IT, and you're likely to get "affirmative, Captain".

When the question is put to Ryno, he emails back a visual: "Aspies-->

tech--> as fish--> water."

And Bob, the database applications programmer, says, "Yes, it is a

stereotype, and yes, there are a higher than average number of Aspies in

high tech."

Nobody, it seems, has more to say on the subject than Temple Grandin, a

fast-talking PhD Aspie professor who's the closest thing Asperger's has

to an elder stateswoman. Grandin made her mark designing

livestock-handling facilities from the point of view of the animal; she

now has a thriving second career as an Asperger's author (Thinking in

Pictures, Unwritten Rules of Social Relationships) and speaker.

"Is there a connection between Asperger's and IT? We wouldn't even have

any computers if we didn't have Asperger's," she declares. "All these

labels — 'geek' and 'nerd' and 'mild Asperger's' — are all getting at

the same thing. ... The Asperger's brain is interested in things rather

than people, and people who are interested in things have given us the

computer you're working on right now."

Career opportunities, career limitations

Grandin has compiled a list of jobs and their suitability to Aspies and

autistics according to their skills. No surprise, tech jobs are cited

early and often. Her list of "good jobs for visual thinkers", for

example, includes computer programming, drafting (including

computer-aided drafting), computer troubleshooting and repair, web page

design, video game design and computer animation.

Grandin's "good jobs for nonvisual thinkers", which she further defines

as "those who are good at math, music or facts," includes computer

programming, engineering, inventory control and physics.

Why do Asperger's individuals gravitate to technology?

"Adults with Asperger's have a social naivety that prevents them from

understanding how people relate. What draws them in is not parties and

social interaction, but work that allows them to feel safe, to feel in

control," explains Steve Becker, a developmental disabilities therapist

at Becker & Associates, a private practice in the Seattle suburb of Des

Moines, Washington, that conducts ongoing small group sessions for

adults with AS, among other services.

"What's better for that than a video game or a software program?" Becker

asks. "When you're designing a software program, there are rules and

protocols to be followed. In life, there is no manual."

While careful to protect his clients' confidentiality, Becker confirms

that he sees many adults and children of adults who work for the

region's tech powerhouses — Microsoft and Boeing — and the hundreds of

smaller companies that orbit around them.

Some of the Aspies he counsels are at the very top of their tech game:

software and aerospace engineers, computer scientists, PhDs. But for

every research fellow with Asperger's, he says, there are a legion of

fellow Aspies having a much tougher time in the middle or lower ranks of

the industry.

"The spectrum of success is much broader than one would expect," agrees

Roger Meyer, the Oregon-based author of The Asperger Syndrome Employment

Workbook who runs one of the oldest peer-led adult Asperger's groups in

the country. "Adults who have grown sophisticated at masking and

adaptive behaviours can either bubble along at the bottom of the market

or do very well at the top."

It's that "bubbling along at the bottom" that has Becker, Meyer and

other Aspie specialists concerned. Employees with Asperger's might do

well for years in data entry or working in a job like insurance claims,

where knowledge of ephemera is a prized work skill, only to flounder

when they're promoted to a position that requires a higher degree of

social interaction.

"The more technical the job, the better they do. But for some, managing

people in a supervisory capacity can be a problem," Becker says.

That can leave Asperger's employees stuck on the lower and less

remunerative ranks of IT, sometimes in jobs that are vulnerable to

outsourcing, says Meyer. For example, certain tech support situations,

where sensory distractions are minimal and human interactions are

reduced to a screen or a voice on the phone, are a natural fit for some

Aspies.

"They're good at diagnostic work. They can get in and slosh around in

the computer, use their encyclopedic knowledge of applications and

work-arounds, and arrive at a solution that may be unorthodox but

effective," says Meyer. As those jobs increasingly become automated

and/or outsourced, Aspies' chances for employment are diminished as well.

IT's dark little secret

Becker and Meyer say they have yet to hear of a single corporation that

has any kind of formal programme in place to nurture and support

employees with Asperger's and HFA, aside from covering the costs of

therapy through standard health care plans.

Which begs the question: If Aspies are everywhere among us, why isn't

the IT industry doing more to support them or even to simply acknowledge

their existence?

High-tech companies, after all, have been at the forefront of supporting

workers with nearly every type of social, ethnic, physical or

developmental identification. Microsoft, to take just one example,

sponsors at least 20 affinity groups — for African Americans, dads, deaf

and hard of hearing, visually impaired, Singaporeans, single parents,

and gay/lesbian/bisexual and transgendered employees, to name a few.

Just nothing for autistics.

A Microsoft spokeswoman confirmed that the company has no group or

formal, separate support for Asperger's. On rare occasions, an employee

with AS has requested accommodation, she says. When that happens, the

employee is paired with a disability case manager to determine

"reasonable accommodation" on a case-by-case basis.

Intel and Yahoo didn't respond to requests to discuss their policy

toward Asperger's employees, and a Google spokesman says the company was

"unable to accommodate the inquiry".

To be fair, the question of whether and how corporations should support

Aspies is a thorny one to untangle.

For one thing, unlike a disability that confines an employee to a

wheelchair or the language barrier that a foreigner faces, autism is

something others can't see or easily understand.

"A readily visible disability is easier [for co-workers] to cognitively

take on board, it seems," Ryno laments. "Ah, if only Asperger's made one

turn green!"

"If you meet someone from another country," Jeremy elaborates, "people

know they're from a different country and they cut them some slack."

And by their very nature, Aspies are not uniters. Microsoft's clubs and

support groups are all initiated and chartered by employees. That leaves

Aspies out by default: It would be highly unusual for an employee with

Asperger's to voluntarily organise any type of social group, with or

without other autistics.

Finally, many Aspies aren't "out" in the workplace; they haven't

acknowledged their condition publicly or to more than one or two

individuals.

Whether they should is a matter of contention. Ryno revealed his

Asperger's at only one job (his last) and lived to regret it, even

though his boss happened to be a young Aspie as well.

"It's the first time I've had an AS person as a superior," he says. "It

was definitely a refreshing change not to have to explain why I didn't

do eye contact, hated meetings and could not suffer fools, let alone

feign gladness."

In retrospect, however, Ryno regrets having told anyone he has AS. "I'd

say there were many disadvantages and few gains. The gains were

short-lived, too." Specifically, systems that Ryno and his boss had

designed both to help users and to minimise interruptions to their own

workdays were resented and little used.

Now that Ryno is gone — he quit after being ordered by an executive to

restore internet access for an employee caught downloading pornography

against company policy — "the other AS employee is being forced into

meetings, crowded social gatherings and many of the situations we had

previously been allowed to keep to a minimum," he reports.

Jeremy has found that when he asks co-workers and bosses to accommodate

his differences, it doesn't help, and in fact always seems to lead to

the same end: termination.

"I don't blink. I stare. I don't understand boundary issues very well. I

don't have a feeling of group membership, but other people have a very

firm idea of membership in groups," he says, struggling to define the

problem as precisely as possible.

As a result, where other employees are able to correct their mistakes

and adjust their behaviours day to day in the office environment, Jeremy

isn't. "People won't give me negative feedback. I don't know what I'm

missing until it's already become a problem. I pick up on a lot of

stuff, but I miss some cues. They're like little black holes, and the

little black holes accumulate, and I end up being forced out. It keeps

happening."

It isn't a question of work — he is sought out for his programming

specialty and always busy as a contractor — but of social relationships.

"I get the feeling what they'd like to do is put me in a black box, give

me an assignment and get it out the other end in few weeks."

Building a better workplace?

The subtle social engineering that Jeremy and other HFA and Aspie

employees struggle with may be beyond the ken of even the most proactive

human resource organisations. But that doesn't mean the industry's

heavy-hitters can't and shouldn't proactively fashion a more

Asperger's-friendly workplace, a kind of "if you build it they will come

— and work" scenario.

These changes needn't be monumental, or limited to Aspies only,

specialists say. Bob, the database applications programmer, was just one

of several Aspies interviewed for this story who spoke admiringly of the

work/life accommodations in place at internet companies like Google.

"I would not demand it from anyone, but I do wish every employer were as

accommodating as Google, supplying prepared meals and encouraging people

to bring their dogs to work," he says.

Physical changes to the office environment can help as well, Grandin and

others point out. Many Asperger's workers are debilitated by blinking or

flickering lights; the mechanical noise of an air conditioner,

photocopier or ringing telephones; or simple office chatter. A quiet

corner, an office or cubicle with soundproofing or a white-noise machine

may be all it takes to turn the situation around.

And more than one person spoke highly of the rumours that Microsoft

offers a "buddy system" for Aspies, pairing an Asperger's employee with

a neurotypical — that is, nonautistic — colleague who coaches them

through the whys and wherefores of meetings and other social

interactions. A Microsoft spokeswoman says there is no official

information available on any buddy programmes, but says there is a good

chance such initiatives are conducted on a team-by-team basis within the

company.

Beyond that, Asperger's individuals hope only that they be given a

chance to find a niche in the modern corporate landscape. Companies have

evolved to accommodate everything from workers' physical height to their

hearing ability, sexual orientation or ethno-religious status, Ryno

points out.

In the same way, he says, "employers of Aspies should look at the person

and the tasks, environment, and communication structure and adjust for

the best viable fit."

Seattle-area psychologist Becker has seen some early signs that

forward-looking high-tech companies may be doing just that. "I have seen

cases where [a client] will say, 'I have Asperger's,' and receive a

positive response from social workers employed by the business or the

insurance companies," he reports.

On the whole, Becker is willing to cut IT some slack — for now at least.

"Most corporations have never dealt with Asperger's. It's a fairly new

diagnosis, even newer for adults," he points out. His general feeling is

that high tech wants to support Aspies as valuable employees, it just

doesn't yet know how. But that too shall change.

"In the next five to 10 years, we'll see more businesses treating autism

spectrum disorders as routine," he predicts.

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