How much for coming, I really appreciated that you, I mean the room is full and sorry about
the text to speech, unfortunately I didn't prepare for that and also I have to at different
type of tool for the presentation.
So yeah, first of all I wanted to thank you Mike for the previous presentation that was really
awesome because there are society and committee generally so underprepared about accessibility
why I'm saying that because nothing changes your mind as a normal person unless you're
going to have a child with a disability so that is my case when my first born was born
with a life disability that changes your perspective on life drastically.
Not to mention put the kind of mental overload on your head so yeah that's totally something
worse talking about. So I'm going to get right into my presentation so I'm by and I'm a developer
experience engineer, Victoria Metrics, I'm also an open symmetry member and contributor,
cognitive days are many organizer and the colleagues of CNCF merge forward neurodiversity group.
So today I wanted to talk about neurodiversity how many of you know about this word like
awesome and how many of you let's say identify if you want to tell obviously with the whole
neurodiversity spectrum yes that's what I thought. Imagine my ignorance when I first found out
that there is actually word called neurodiversity that was last year in the same time when
merge forwards I'm going to speak about that later created the whole community around neurodiversity
so I'm guilty as charged but yeah let's go forward because we have a bit of step backwards
because yeah so this is not for obviously you because you don't need a research or before this is
for people like me that's not exactly what neurodiversity really is so I did a bit of research
and it looks like neurodiversity is a way of saying that the human brains are different to each other
right so it's a biological fact right we are different in our minds and also you know neurodiversity
includes every human being right so that's that's actually pretty pretty cool then begin deeper
into neurodiversity and neurodivergence what does it mean so actually it's a neurodivergent
neurodiverst is a term point actually not long ago in 1998 by a judiciary singer no Australian
sociologist and from neurodiversity there comes the term neurodivergent right so if you identify
with being in the spectrum of neurodiversity then neurodivergent cool because I was used
the wrong guy said oh I'm a neurodiverst English is not my first language so probably that's why
so there are some particular strengths or superpowers to being a neurodivergent
like better memory able to mentally picture 3D object easily okay the ability to solve complex
mathematical calculations in their heads like that's some of the superpowers but also some challenges
right medical disorders learning disability is many many other things so for me it was really interesting
to find out that if you are like normal so what we think about like normal in the neurodiversity
you know like framework then we should address to ourselves as being neurodipical and neurodivergent
isn't actually a medical term it's just like maybe a better way to describe people
a normal or you know abnormal so for example I used to think that I'm a neurodipical person
up to the moment I wasn't right why so because at 17 I was diagnosed with depression and that
things sticks to you right so it's like you're never really healed or you know something like that
but depression is so checking on that and I was actually pretty surprised to find that it is not
on the normal list of neurodiversity of like you know potential conditions because you're not born with
it so you're not born with depression so hence you cannot actually add it there right but there
many people that disagree I'm one of them right so because we don't really truly have the brain
worked out so we don't know that many things about the brain and all you know the other senses around
it there's a big chance that we are wrong right so let's let's keep a how can I say a mystery
around all these classifications so how many of you let's identify with whatever you see here on the
board that's what I thought so yeah it's nothing to laugh about but it's really cool because we
can also actually talk about it I think that's the first step and also an interesting thing I found out
if neurodiversity is an actual disability what do you think is it a disability right yeah so
definitely it may be a disability depends on which degree right so you can be something that you can
cope with so I can definitely cope with me being depressed person like you know normal depression
goes up and down it's just like like that like with many other mental issues and I'm I'm
let's say one of the lucky persons that I'm functional right so I can do my job I can focus
I don't need to take medication etc etc but one do we have to actually say it's a disability
up to the moment where we are not able to function when we are not able to you know to the
our jobs when we have to like complete a form when you sign up for a job like what's like the
the actual line so the whole idea for me like the whole discourse around it is that there are like
people that struggle with specific system or processes because they cannot show up their full
strengths around it right so they need some kind of adaptability around that and some of some
of the normal day-to-day you know actions they become challenges so this is why we should address
a bit neurodiversity in the whole in the whole framework of disability something also interesting
is that neurodiversity is like a puzzle right it's also like a maze it's also like like something
really really that that intertwines right so it's not like one box here the other box there is not
not like a super well done classification like we once you know I mean some people might have
on a depression ADHD bipolar or like little little elements from many other things
well we talked about neurodiversity a bit going backwards and and realizing all like what are the
terms etc but what does he have to do with tech right we are most of us we're working tech
that's why we're here like no fosemines is this big conference are all technology
and it's really nice to see that there are actually some websites or some societies and companies
that realize there's a talent there's an actual talent in the workforce so they appreciate
neurodivergent people in the you know working field so because of this let's say unique range of
scales and strengths but also maybe weaknesses we gain a competitive advantage right in the workforce
so it's really nice first to acknowledge neurodiversity so you know popularize it talk about it
it's also important to accommodate for neurodiversity so that's the whole speech around
on best practices whether it's a disability or not whether you should talk about it or not
with your employer and obviously support the neuro talent I mean I would be interested to find
about that right and here's the part with the community I was seeing that beginning about the
merge forward merge for these community around underrepresented groups in tech that that
don't encompass just neurodiversity neurodiversity just a later addition last year actually to the whole
group it also encompasses like other groups like death and heart of hearing blind and visual impaired
stuttering and speech diversity women in called native deep roots friends of Dorothy neurodiversity
so that's you know like like a lot of groups and the idea is to build more diverse sustainable
opponents of community where you know everybody seen everybody can communicate safely
so definitely sorry about that the merge forward has a QR code so you can definitely check it out
sign up that's actually why I'm giving the talk because we want more allies here and neurodiversity
we also have like a set of group on official group where people join sign up we have a Slack
a CNC of Slack where we have monthly meetings and we talk about a lot of things right
for example the first time we we came together like the whole groups the whole seven groups
were at Kupkin at Lanta last year in the United States and we talked about for the very first time I
think about neurodiversity and we also had like a panel we also had like some activities and that was
actually really really great more particularly around the neurodiversity like I said we have
this monthly meetings that obviously you can join and we are very very glad if you can join us
and we're talking about specific neurodiversity issues so first of all we want to welcome more
people because we are very few right now we want to identify and gather neurodiversity specific
resources I mean I know there's like a lot of resources depending on which country we are
checking in you know like for example what is made each country has their own dedicated society so
we want to make it a bit more kind of like condensed and talk about what what we should have so
first of all right now we are creating some some best practices around you know interviews
for employers or for conferences what would be well what would be nice to to have Kupkin
Hemey yeah okay but also mentoring so CNCF we are right now creating the whole groups of mentors
and mentees so for example if you want to be paired with a neurodivergent to work on I know let's
say around conferences or talks CFPs or technical issues we can pair up and that's something
really really nice for me what I really understood when joining this this group and also
refer to have this extended more in the workforce mental health is fundamental right because health
is fundamental you cannot just show up and pretend you're fine and happy and start working
if you're not healthy right and mental health that's also very very important and to be honest
up to last year like I said I never heard the term neurodiversity spoken in public which you
know it's it's a shame but yeah depends obviously a lot on each community right on the regions
on the geographical regions I mean neurodiversities spread probably in other countries then you know for
example I know maybe Europe or other parts of the content of the universe so it really is important
to establish and contribute to the whole speech of mental health and because of that I would like
to leave with the idea of neuro inclusivity hopefully you know just by being within a community
and joining and speaking about it thinking about the practices thinking about the workforce we can
also speak about neuro inclusivity so definitely that's something we would like to have first what's
next from the community side we will be at coupon Amsterdam in in March and the March we'll have
two panels the first panel will be at coupon and neurodiversity will not be there but the second will
be a platform engineering they you have there directly the panel session that will happen on
Monday and neuro inclusivity sorry neurodiversity will be there and will also host a community
hub session that means like a mini workshop where you can join we're gonna have activities and talk
about a lot of topics practical topics so yeah give it a go also if you haven't scanned the QR code
you have it there thank you very much and the slides are already on my GitHub repo you can download them
and yeah thank you for for your attention
right folks we have five minutes for some questions anyone question
yeah I wanted to ask you about what's your meant by neuro terence
because I mean there's come on misconception about the genius autism and think like that and it
can be confusing and maybe not really as inclusive as we meant it too yeah sorry is this
I was working all it's alive right so to be honest I don't know really what that means I just like
I was googling because I'm a nickname around neurodiversity and I wanted to find
was there especially because I've never heard it I'm 43 I never heard about neurodiversity at work
but yeah I did some googling and I was pretty interesting that there were like
this specific website in the UK talking about neuro talent and had like a whole speech around it
you know I wanted to include it and actually that's pretty great I mean I would like to see this
kind of best practices or this kind of discourse being extended right I don't know what's in
the minds of of employers I don't know what they classified as being neuro talent is not like the
I don't know the typical icon you know all the typical character you have in a Rayman right
or yeah so there are for me so there are a lot of flavors I've worked with a lot of developers
and some of them like my friends they have a lot of them HD HD and they have like really
high pigs of productivity but then also they crash and the same with bipolar people so it's
really interesting to actually define you know what that means and see how the workforce actually
perceive neurodiversity so definitely I would like to have more clarity myself on that
and my name is Calvin Nuri and I work at the European Disability Forum and I actually have a
ADHD myself I would say that on the one hand when you have a disability you do have
some areas where you are not functioning as well that's why you need support and without the support
you are not able as you say to take full advantage of your potential but then as you for example
if I take myself as an example I do also have these periods of like extra productivity where I can
really go into something but it also I can also crash more often because of this and having a boss
that supports me has been really important to make it work one good thing about talking about
neurodiversity is respecting that we work in different ways but at the same time I also personally
think it is important to talk about it as a disability because the legal system and the right
to get support is framed as having a disability and from a human rights perspective it's important
to not forget that although you want to create a very inclusive environment simply and then
I just wanted to say that I have brought some pamphlets about how to make inclusive design
inclusive AI because I come from a policy background and I came here because we wanted to create
contact with people who are actually working in tech so also one question would be like
except for coming to conferences like this if you have a policy background I want to connect to
programmers do you have any other suggestions on what to do except for coming to conferences like this
okay you do mean to spread the word around neurodiversity well the first thing is that's why
we need more people to join the meetings because we are like all I mean the majority of us have some
we are considered we can identify within the neurodiversity spectrum but we don't have any like
formal training right we don't have that training where I say oh yeah we need to do this because I
know that this is what should work I mean the first thing that we're trying right now to do this kind
of community hub sessions to invite people to have sort of like workshops around it and definitely
the online monthly meetings help because like this we can brainstorm and find out where we can
be more efficient and how to create these resources right now we are working on some best practices
around neurodiversity so like I don't know what to do in the case of conferences or going to
like big events or for for employers but it can be so much more so definitely I agree with you and
what else should we be doing to spread the word around neurodiversity that's my open for all
solutions. I think we're all the time thank you very much everyone thank you Diana.
we're done