Adult Dyslexia at Work: Why It Is More Than Reading and Writing

Hey everybody, welcome to the dyslexic entrepreneur On today's episode. I have a long time person that I've been watching for 456. She reminded me as probably closer to seven years. She started I think just after I started in the podcasting world and has been, you know, if I'm honest, has been an influence. I've watched her amazing profiles, people she's influencing. She's just released a book, so I've had the opportunity to bring her on the podcast to hear her story.

Welcome to the podcast, Natalie. Thank you so much. I'm very excited to be here. Just yeah, same as you've been watching for a very, very long time and just feel strange. I've taken this long to cross paths. It's crazy, right?

You chat, you chat to somebody like this and you're like, you know, I've been watching you. And in a weird way, you just see them on Instagram or see them around and you're like, oh, I've known you for years and like, this is the first time we've ever actually chatted on a on a call. Isn't that insane? And yeah, look, let's get into it for the audience. So I want to hear your story. It's an interesting story.

It's a story that so many people will resonate with, I'm sure in the audience. So start wherever you feel the good, not even the good bit that where it really really starts viewing cases. Yeah. So when it comes to dyslexia, it's it starts early. So I was in school around six or seven, and my teachers noticed I was kind of chatty and engaging and kind of, you know, doing well in school. And then the second they got to a reading or writing task, I was quiet, I was nervous, I was struggling.

And so it was kind of quite blaringly obvious the kind of disparity early. So they kind of sent me for a dyslexia diagnosis at the time. This is the late 90s. I was born in 92. I'm six or seven. And they basically said she's not struggling enough, she's not doing well, but she's not struggling enough that we are going to give her any support.

And as a school, we don't offer anything. And my mom was really on it when it came to my education. She had a really bad experience. And so she was really passionate about my education being different. And so she whipped me out of school halfway through the term, sent me to a different school. At this point, I can't write full sentences and I'm really struggling with the kind of written element.

And so, yeah, I went to a new school with a dyslexic unit that focused on reading and writing. They kind of like smoothed a lot of the problems out that I was having and then kind of continued through school, never feeling like it was easy, but I had support. I always went to schools that had a dyslexic unit, usually for English classes or for extra support. I would go speak to specific people with experience and expertise. But then when I transferred to senior school, I think the thing that I found really difficult is the reading and the writing aspect is such a small part of dyslexia for me. Like, it's there, it's not easy, but it's not the thing that's kind of like putting my arms behind my back, making me feel like I can't access my kind of capabilities.

So I was in a mainstream school that was quite pushy. They were really, you know, trying to shoot for good grades and doing well. And it was only one subject. I was going for this kind of specialist support. And the rest of the time there was this kind of assumption that I was normal. And so I would kind of go through classes and teachers would say, you know, you're a bright kid, you just need to work harder.

You're you're a bright kid. You just need to try more. And they would kind of I would. I was going through my all my reports the other day and it was always like, you know, Natalie's trying hard, but it's not working, you know, in like history and geography and science and, and then, you know, yeah, I was getting on well with my teachers, but they were constantly reinforcing this narrative of like, it's not going well. And then when I tried to go to university, a teacher I I really admired and, and really looked up to and worked really hard for her classes because it was politics, which is the subject I did at university. She went on to say to me, you know, I just think you're not capable of going to university or like she was shocked that I was going to go to university, not that I was like, you know, which one to go for or, you know, which subject.

She was just like you university, you know, my cheeks were just kind of like beaming red from embarrassment of like speaking to her and how hard I tried and all of those things. Went to university, did fine, got a 21, which in the UK is kind of, you know, what everyone gets and is a good grade, worked hard but was all fine. And then I went into work and that's when everything really started to fall down and kind of muddled my way through work. But moving jobs all the time, every annual review, it was like things are not going well. We have. Did you see the CV look like mine where it was when I was working for other people?

It was. Every year it was a different job. Every 12 months, give or take, your job changed because you either got bored or you just knew you hated it. Dead accurate. So if I stayed in the same company, it was because I moved internally. But on average I was about two years a company and then within that, and my role is constantly evolving.

I mean, I'm just like chatting all the time, struggling to pay attention, you know, making so many errors, costing companies money because of the errors. I'm making annual reviews every single time. I like please double check your work and I'm kind of double checking my work many times over. Was it your? Was it your feed? I read on that you made an error of a couple of cents or something, A couple of zeros on a on A tag and it cost the company X dollars or pounds.

So there's two really embarrassing stories when it comes to like financial implications. I'm kind of whistling through the story of kind of the arc of of starting the sexy and adults. But my first job when I came out of university, all my friends were going for grad schemes and kind of going to work for these big companies. And I just knew if I got through all of the kind of tests and stuff you have to go through, which I didn't think I was going to, if I managed to get through those and you know, one of my friends took them or whatever you do to kind of get in, I knew that I wasn't going to fit in there. I knew that my brain wasn't meant for those kind of places. And so I didn't apply for any of the kind of high paying grad schemes.

And I had such low confidence, I was terrified of going into work that I took a data entry job at 21. I thought I was kind of too incapable and too useless for anything. So I took what would arguably the hardest option for me. I mean, just like begs belief when I look back on it, Yeah, what was like? And that's the crazy thing, right? We kind of think that once you leave school, oh, it's kind of dyslexia.

That's not going to affect me that kind of disappears after school. No one even talks about dyslexia. It's not real, you know, it's spell check all sorted out. And like always, it's funny. Just just to completely share a story similar I went into, I was in a data entry job in the investments in investment space probably around 2223. And I remember them doing one of those personality tests and that they put the whole team on this kind of like circle.

And you had all these admin people dotted over here. You had like the manager up here and you had me over in the corner, nowhere near anybody else on this, on this chart. And I was like, this should really be a sign. It's like, I'm in the wrong, I'm in the wrong place, I'm in the wrong place. So I'm I'm 100% with you. So I was doing this data entry job straight out of uni.

I think my thinking at the time was the easier the job, the more possible it must be. Now for anyone who's listening to this, that is not the way to do it. That is terrible advice. Do not, do not try that. But yeah, so I took this data entry job and I basically they, they kind of shouted over the desk at me, but we've got this special that we need to put in this offer that we're going to upload. It's £5 and I inputted it as 50P.

Then it was late Friday afternoon, they were putting this special price out. They were kind of pumping it over the weekend with all these ads and stuff like that. And then they put kind of a slither of margin on, you know, like £1. 25 or something like that. And then it sold gangbusters because what something let's say was normally like 10 lbs was pay. And you know, they pushed it all across, you know, everywhere.

And there was no mechanism to check what I'd inputted, what the market, the kind of margin team had inputted, what the final price was. So it just, it's, I think it's sold. I don't remember, but I remember it being somewhere around £5000 that I lost the company and I was like hauled in Monday morning. Like, you know this, I've been like, I've been told about 20 times this point. Double check your work. You're making a lot of mistakes.

Things aren't going well. And they were like, listen, we have to fire you. And I was just like, fair enough, just fair enough. I'm absolutely terrible as well. I hate it. And then because I didn't care, I said to them, that's no problem at all.

You have noticed this is the problem with your system and this is how you could resolve it. And this was what would work better, which actually made me redundant. That's why I never really shared it because I was like, you should do it this way. This is a much better way of running the system. Classic dyslexic person noticed a different way of doing it. And they were like, that's genius, that's brilliant.

Kept me on to manage the transfer of that change so I didn't end up getting fired. Then kind of moved into a different area of the role. I mean it's so funny. It's just classic dyslexia, isn't it? Like one minute costing them like 5000 and then I saved them 50,000 because two people were being employed. It's so, it's so funny you say that because you know, two stories that jumped to my mind.

One was similar to that. I was in the insurance industry after my investment experience and I was so good at the role. I got my 8 hour a day roll down to about two hours. So I spent two hours doing the role and then six hours just messing around on the Internet. If I'm honest, I didn't really do much, which was hilarious because it was just about systemizing and, and being creative. And then the other hilarious one was I was actually in New Zealand.

They have like the a, a does all you have driver licenses over here. So I was actually issuing driver's licenses. I and just as I was about to leave the role, I wasn't paying attention with what I did and I accepted somebody who had just failed a driver license test. And it was this is this Asian kid. I'd like he was, he'd come back for three times and failed three times in a row. And I press accept.

And the system was so hard for me to actually try and solve this. I just said, mate, just just bugger off. You, you passed, just piss off. And you know, hopefully, hopefully he'll learn how to drive. But I was just like, I cannot even deal with the paperwork to solve this. This was, this was 25 years ago, but it's, it's a dyslexic mind, right?

Like your, your brain can be brilliant. It's something you can do 8 hours of work in about an hour. And there are some days it'll take you 8 hours to do one hour of work. And you probably see this all the time, right? Yeah, no, absolutely. That's exactly how it felt for me.

Similar to you, it was. So then from this role, I jumped around a lot of different roles and then I ended up working in a tech company and I, it was so easy. I just figured it all out. I was the role, I was there the longest and I just found it beyond easy to do that. I would just find myself on my phone looking at BBC News, you know, watching YouTube. And one day I was kind of like particularly tired from quite a few meetings.

I'm like sitting watching YouTube and my director taps me in the shot. He goes, Are you watching YouTube at work? And you can't turn around and go, this job is so piss easy for me. I could do it like in about 10 minutes, but I'm dyslexic and you've kind of pushed my processing power and now I'm exhausted, so I'm going to just sit on YouTube for an hour. But that's the truth. That was what was happening, you know?

And I just didn't have the words for it back then. I had so much shame. I was so embarrassed. I didn't understand how all of this worked. I thought it was my fault. And yeah, I just was kind of mortified.

And then change my structure from, instead of watching YouTube videos, having quick naps in the toilet in my office. Priceless. Yeah. So I mean, it was a kind of one disaster from the next when it came to work. And this is what I wanted to share with you is. So I was kind of going along thinking to myself, I got so much support as a child.

You know, people really cared about dyslexia when I was a kid. I don't understand why no one seems to be struggling. It just seems to be me. I've got all of these dyslexic celebrities telling me about how amazing dyslexia is as an adult. And I've got all of this kind of like I remember the posters at school of how amazing dyslexia was going to be when I became an adult and I was really in the trenches. My confidence was low.

I was having constant challenges. One HR company took, one HR member told me to Google how to navigate adult dyslexia. It was all how to pack your backpack, how to learn to read. And I just, I really started to think it must just be me. I am the only person who feels like this. And for about 10 years I thought to myself, someone should do something about adult dyslexia.

And I thought, you know, it should be someone who was different and capable and successful and not me. And the only reason that I realized that this was a thing and that it wasn't just me was your content. So there was about an 18 months to two year period before I started. So I started November 2019. So I don't know exactly when you started where I. 17/20/17 I should give.

Up. OK, yeah, so 18 months, two years where I would watch your content and I would look and I would go it's not just me. There is someone else who feels like this. It must be a thing, and people are not talking about it. And then, you know, and then the wheels came off and and, you know, my life is where it is now. But I didn't believe that anyone else was struggling with this until I found your content.

So, yeah, just that you're a huge reason that I have to sex around adults, that I started all of this, that I was able to figure things out for myself. So I'm just, yeah, supremely grateful. That's amazing. And you've done so well. Like I, as I say, like I've, I've been watching your stuff for the last five or so years because, you know, and it's great to see more people doing this. Like when I started doing this, I was exactly as you see it.

There was nobody talking about dyslexia for adults. And I was just like, how is this a thing? Like it doesn't disappear. And, and you know, you're spot on. Like we need more people talking about the adult side. I just still it still breaks my brain how few people are discussing it because I think you know, as you would know when you actually do the numbers.

More people have dyslexia than ADHD. You. Know my point is, you know, like with the with the kind of you, you said it perfectly. We're like the ugly stepchild of neurodiversity. But 20%, you know, between 10 and 20% of people have dyslexia, About 5% of people have ADHD. And then, yeah.

And then when you think about the fact that the most people who are dyslexic are adults, the largest percentage of people who have neurodiversity are dyslexic adults. And yet with the most underrepresented, the least supported, a kind of like the just is so little advice out there. And yeah, like 1% of people have autism, 5% of people have ADHDI will caveat all of those statistics by saying that the statistics around neurodiversity are terrible, and I don't believe those numbers are the truth, but that's the numbers we have at the moment. It's all we have to work with. And I think, you know, the thing I've always thought of over the years, like I do a lot of coding with AI and stuff, I've always been amazed at how they haven't started to test all of them together. Like it seems mind boggling how they've separated them all so far apart that the actual crossing over is so minor.

And it's like, as you say, like it's, you know, the thing we do know is dyslexia are so much more prevalent than people realize and so few people understand what it really is. Like, it's not just getting your B's and D's backwards. That's that's the bit that's easy to deal with really. Absolutely, yeah, 100%. I always say to people if it was just spelling, I would be fine. Like it wouldn't be a problem.

I mean, it wouldn't be great, but it wouldn't be a problem. I just think it's, it's so strange. And and you know what's interesting is my boy, my fiance. Your fiance. You got to say fiance. You're not allowed to say boyfriend anymore.

You'll get in trouble. I'll get in trouble if I don't make sure. Exactly. No, I got I got engaged on Friday so it's still still feeling a little bit strange. But my fiance is South African and in South Africa they actually do test it all together and they do do ADHD, autism and. Makes sense, right?

Just makes so much sense. It makes so much more sense. So it just shows that it is possible and it can be done. And the other thing which really helped me come to terms with my ADHD diagnosis and kind of really accept well that I needed to get the diagnosis in the 1st place is that Amanda Kirby, who is kind of one of the experts in this space. For anyone that doesn't know her, she's absolutely fantastic. Is I remember going to a conference speech with her and she said the rule is that it is more than one neurodiversity.

So if you only have one diagnosed, then you are the exception rather than the rule. Because I always used to feel like, gosh, wow, like I think I'm dyslexic and I think I've got dyscalculia and I think I'm dyspraxic. And what do you mean? I have ADHD as well, and it was when I heard that that it wasn't just kind of an extra card that I was waving around, but it was the truth of how my brain worked and it was the missing piece of so many of the struggles that didn't make sense that everything started to get easier. Navigating things started to get better. Strategy started to really work because I was having honest conversations about my brain rather than just kind of being overwhelmed by shame and frustration and exhaustion and just trying to kind of keep going and keep trying and all these things that weren't working.

Yeah, and I think that's the point is I think what you're saying is so powerful because, and it's what you've seen as well as dyslexia is the it's kind of, it is that hidden stepchild that just doesn't get cared about because, and I don't know if you see it as well as so many people speak to dyslexic traits as ADHD traits. On TikTok and stuff like that like there are heaps of them that are just being said oh, you do that this way you've got ADHD. It's actually, no, that's the dyslexic side of the visual mind and how you operate. Yeah. And this, this is because this understanding is so poor in the world and it's, I don't know if it's worth even battling that because it just is what it is. But you know, if people don't understand that, hey, you've also got dyslexia thrown in here, which usually then leads to dyscalculia or dyspraxia, one or the other usually.

And it's it's mind blowing. And I think it's, it's such a door opener when you realize you do have that second like I would. ADHD was my second as well. I'm sure if I went for it, I'm not autistic, but I'd be on the edge if I really wanted to go down that track. And it's, it's like it's common, right? It's so common.

I think the hopefully we're going to get to the stage where we step away from a lot of these labels and we start to find different terms and words and approaches because like you said, unpicking exactly which one is which and and how each one shows up is an absolute minefield. I've often have to try and explain it to people and say, well, this is broadly dyslexia and this is broadly ADHD and like this is this and this is that. And there's kind of this massive Venn diagram in the middle, which is like, well, this is both. And so it's just really difficult to kind of actually figure out what it is that is which, and each is different. I just think we need better research, better evidence, better data and to just completely change our approach. And I think you're spot on.

And we need we exactly that need that. And I think it's, they kind of do need someone to come back and rename the whole thing because when you look at the history, things were found in isolations, all separate. We'd actually have, I think what's going to happen in the future is you're going to see the correlations between everything. And like, I truly believe this Lexia is, is not actually a negative. It's actually a few. It's actually something that's been built in our genes to actually make us better.

And it sounds crazy. I don't think humans were desperately meant to read 400 page books. They were meant to, you know, they were meant to listen to like. Stuff from Cambridge University that literally says that it's. Yeah, the the, the gene, the gene text, it's yeah. Hopefully they come out with the they keep going on that because that's the people need to realize that.

And, and I just want to come back to one other thing you said that was so important for people to hear is, you know, people like myself and Natalie, you know, we aren't perfect. I know we look perfect on this. Like I know it's, I know just sitting here, you know, we're, we're on different sides of the world. We just look so perfect. But you know, we're kind of the real people you need to look at like we have our good days, our bad days, our problem days. You know, there are days where it's Netflix in bed, You know, I don't want to work at all.

Those days exist. And when you see the Richard Branson's of the world and stuff that are fantastic and they've done really great, they can be really hard to live up to because they are a very small of the population. They are a micro micro micro dot of the world. And I think those type of heroes are great to a point, but they also make this gap between where you may be today and where you want to be so scary that you just feel like you can never get there, right. And like, I just think what you're doing around, you know, adults and dyslexia is so vital for people to kind of help lift the people up, you know, to a reasonable degree. Do you know what I mean?

Yeah, absolutely. Gosh, I have so many thoughts and points to make about that. So one of the things that I put in the book is I talked about how people talk about dyslexia and how it's kind of this like perfect exaggeration of the truth about how nerd diversity works and how does sex strengths work. And one of the things is I said is I think we need to dismantle the superpower narrative. Not because I don't think does sexy has amazing strengths, but because it sets the bar too high that people aren't able to see themselves in that narrative and unable to understand that asexual strength. I cannot tell you how many times people come to me and they'll be like, I don't know my dyslexic strength.

I don't understand them. And then I'll say, but what about this story you told me? What about this story you told me? But what about this? And they'll be like, yeah, I can do that, but it's not. I had dyslexic strength.

And I'm like, wait, what? And so I do think that having these more honest conversations about the truth of how narrow diversity is and how it shows up. And yeah, absolutely. My biggest kryptonite is I'm tragically disorganized. Like, I really struggle to be organized. And I am an executive function coach, which is, you know, mostly about organization and have so many more strategies.

I am so much better than I used to be, but it is a daily battle to be the best I can possibly be. And I think it's just really important to understand that our dyslexic challenges live alongside our dyslexic strengths. They don't take away from each other. They exist together. And exactly like that story with my workplace, there's a massive challenge alongside a huge strength. They they exist completely together.

Yeah, 100%. I think what you said, there's so true about not being able to live up to it. And I'm a great believer. I'm just, I hate the superpower thing. I think it's been overdone. It's kind of like talking to a 5 year old and saying you've got superpowers.

Like maybe that works for kids, great, but for adults it just sounds demeaning in my personal opinion. I think strengths is a great way to say it, but it's, it's like someone always said it to me with dyslexics and maybe even those with ADHD is that we can't always see our strengths because we kind of feel like we've winged it the whole time. We're very poor. Like, you know, what I learned when I did all the Davis methods work is the, you know, our cause and effect. We are terrible with cause and effect. We just don't have, we don't connect the dots.

We're kind of like cats. If you don't spray us with a bottle of water while we're taking a piss on the carpet, we don't know why you're spraying us with water. Do you know what I mean? Do you know what I mean? Like we're like our brains, like why? Why did you do that?

And it's like, I see this with a nine year old, my stepdaughter, and it's like she's neurodiverse in a way, I believe, but she's the same thing. Cause and effect is not natural to her. And if you don't have that same trigger, you actually can't see why you're great at what you do. You're just like, oh, I just did what I always do. Everyone does that, you know, I lucked out for. Do you know what I mean by that?

Yeah, absolutely. I have this kind of like really visceral memory come up into my mind from a couple of weeks ago when I do coaching clients with people and they book in a kind of free 15 minute call and they get to meet me and ask me any questions and clarify anything. And this lady came to me and she was really struggling, She was feeling really frustrated. She was a really successful doctor in the NHS and, you know, no reason externally to be, you know, coming to me and feeling like she's incapable. She had, you know, a few challenges that she was struggling with. The biggest thing was confidence.

And, you know, I said I was just kind of rolling through my spiel of what we talk about and how I work. And I just said, you know, and a lot of my clients feel like they've got this long as their arm list of challenges and they're struggling and they're frustrated and then their strengths are just a fluke. Like anything good that happens, it's just a fluke. You know, a broken clock is right twice a day. And they just had a lucky moment and she just started bawling her eyes out and just be like, Oh my God, that's exactly how I feel. Everything I do well is luck, chance, fluke, you know, just random moment.

Everything I do wrong is me, I'm a failure, I'm useless, and I just need to break out of this cycle. And it is kind of killing me slowly, this kind of constant narrative I'm coming with. And I think the thing that makes it so sad is that is almost every person I speak to and people think it's just them, that they are the only ones feeling like that. And that's why the work we do is so important to help people realize, no, it isn't you. It's 700 million people who are in exactly the same situation with lack of strategies, with low confidence, with complete 0 clarity on their dyslexic strengths. One of the things that really brought this home to me about how it is everyone, it is all of us, is Jamie Oliver recently did a an amazing documentary about the dyslexia revolution and about dyslexia in schools.

And he did a series of interviews, which obviously, you know, being someone who works in dyslexia, I was following very closely. And I read an article that he put out that he had some problems with some of his restaurants a few years ago where a kind of collection of them had to close. And he basically said it was dyslexia. He struggled to understand all the financials, all the legals, all the reality of it all, couldn't process all of the information. So relied on outside counsel, which is what we're told to do as the SAC sick people, you know, just delegate, just rely on other people, just find other people. But as an entrepreneur, you do have to understand these things and the buck ultimately stops with you.

And so he feels that a big part of the reason that he had like had a lot of these challenges and had all these issues was because of his dyslexic challenges. And he's the kind of archetype of who we're going around going. I want to be like him. I want to be like this. I think my brain could be there. And it just shows you that experts, the people that are kind of putting themselves up there on the pedestal, they are still struggling.

So we can't accept expect, you know, dyslexic challenges to just poof, disappear, and then dyslexic strengths to be the absolute shiniest, brightest, best, amazing thing. What we have to do is get the best strategies we can, try and be as consistent as we can at using them, try and understand where we're capable, what we're good at, do our best at unlocking those, utilizing those, improve our confidence so that we can kind of navigate these things more honestly and more openly and with better communication. And where we're struggling, try and find the strategies that work rather than just avoiding and kind of trying to just, you know, shrink away from it. It really, it's a journey, not a destination. And we're constantly having to, I think, I mean, I know for me personally, I'm constantly having to be like, OK, I've got strategies, but this is something different. Like this is something new and you know, OK, this is what I did for this, but it didn't work.

So let me tweak my approach. Let me think about how I need to do this better next time. I love, I love that. And I think you're mentioning Jamie. He's always been my white whale. I've been chasing around COVID.

I know that he looked at some of my stuff. He came into my Facebook group and had a look around with one of his fake profiles and I've got access to I'm talking to one of his people. I was so close in that interview series. He just couldn't sneak me in because you can imagine how busy that man is. And so I'm so close. I'm working, I'm working on him and, and I think you know, but as you say that, like, you know, you've, you know what I love about what you've done and I've watched you when you started out, you started out, you've changed, you've evolved.

And now that I'm now that I've gone from the truth about dyslexia to the dyslexic entrepreneur. It would be rude if I didn't ask you a little bit about your business advice for people on this podcast, because I think, you know, whether you're in work now and you become an entrepreneur or at some point, maybe you're an entrepreneur and you go back to work. It can go either way. But like I've seen you evolve, you know, if you would have, you know, and now you've released this amazing book, which we will be talking about. And I think it's great for any business to do something like that to share your knowledge. Would you, you know, if you were giving it a dyslexic entrepreneur a couple of tips from your experience, you know, probably similar to the same stuff you talk about dyslexia.

What would they, what would they be? What would really stand out to you? I'm just going to put you on the spot with this this question here. Yeah, I know. I love it. I know I do have an answer.

OK, before I answer, you and I need to have a conversation about Jamie Oliver and I'm also pincering. Close. Yeah, let's. So close. Our pincer movements and see what, who, who's working, but we'll do it at the end. OK, let me get back to under.

Yeah, I think that's a great question. And I, I want to share what I said to you before the podcast started, which is that I think it's amazing that you've decided to pivot into entrepreneurs because what we, what I was saying to you before, which ties into what I said earlier about how I spent years thinking, it's just me, I'm the only one struggling with this. I think the danger of the narrative that we kind of push on children, which is like, everything will be fine when you leave school is really difficult. Because then when it isn't fine, there's such a massive dollop of shame and embarrassment, and then you feel like it's your fault that you're struggling. And I think that that becomes extra deep when we look at entrepreneurs because the narrative is leave school and you'll be fine. Become an entrepreneur and you will be extra fine.

Everything will be great. And you know, I coach a lot of entrepreneurs. I've spoken to a lot of people who have their own business with dyslexia. And there are some key themes and challenges that I see all the time. And that is really common and I think it is really important that instead of we just kind of putting this narrative out there of everything will be fine, everything will be easy, everything will be perfect. We need to give these people support and give these people a way of accessing their strengths, unlocking their potential, but also navigating the real challenges that come with being dyslexic in any space that you are in.

So I just, I think it's really exciting. And I was saying this to you before, I think it's amazing. So I think, gosh, I mean, I see some real trends a lot. I think the two that I see is that where they're where you become self-employed, you naturally remove a lot of structure because you don't have that kind of external accountability of someone else. So I do tend to see a lot of executive function issues and challenges around organization getting started with work procrastination because there isn't that kind of natural accountability that we have when we are employed and there's kind of clearer dates and people kind of creating the environment to help you get started. So that's something I see a lot.

But the one I really want to talk on is I really see a culture of a lot of entrepreneurs really struggling with delegation. They might delegate some elements of their work because they kind of have to like maybe accountancy or lawyers or anything just so quintessentially dyslexic that they might have the ability to delegate on. But what I see all the time is entrepreneurs that really struggle with how to actually kind of like if they have an EA or APA, how to utilize them effectively, How to actually get that task out of their brain and explain what they want and explain what they need. Or kind of get that task out of their emails and get someone to take it on. Can't tell you the amount of times who I find entrepreneurs stacking up their workload because they don't know how to delegate, how to explain their ideas, how to really utilize someone like that in a more dyslexic friendly ways. I think.

I mean, I could kind of talk about this for a whole hour, but the one. We'll do another podcast later on once you're off the book tour. We'll do a proper business. We'll dig deep. We'll dive deep. That sounds great.

I think my 1 tip that I would do is try and just think about when you're explaining something, instead of explaining it in the really linear format that we think the rest of the world wants information in, try and communicate in a slightly more dyslexic friendly way. So use the image that's in your head, explain the analogy that you're thinking about, explain the story of how you got the idea. Utilize that more dyslexic part of your brain because that's how you communicate more naturally, more effortlessly and hopefully you will start to feel like you've got that kind of like idea across or you're able to communicate better. I'm in this entrepreneurs WhatsApp group the other day and this entrepreneur who just happens to have a really, really well known app that is connected to dyslexic people and neurodiverse people. Everyone would know it if I if I said it, but I won't say who it is. Just happened to send a message on this group being I really need help with this DAC for going to raise funding.

I'm really struggling. Got on the call and I was like, Oh my God, it's you. And and then we were kind of talking and we were talking about the deck and he was like, I can't get my ideas down. I can't explain them. I can't kind of like, you have to help me. And I just said to him, I was like, take yourself away from the deck.

Just explain to me, what are you visualizing? What are you thinking about? How do you want these slides to look? And when we started doing that, everything flooded out and he was able to really communicate what he wanted and how things worked. And he was like, Oh my God, you saved me about 20 hours of time. I finally am able to communicate what is going on.

That's what I was. That's one of the things that I find really helps. Like I said, I could go into about 10 other tips, but. Hopefully we could, we could go on forever, right? Like it's it's there's so many challenges we have and there's this, there's so many pros and cons, right? There's so many things we're amazing at that we beat everyone in and so many things we struggle.

Just touching on those ones to focus on them. So IA 100% agree with structure. We don't have the same set feedback loops when you become an entrepreneur, because it's not like you have you imagine a video game, you know what what a level looks like. You know how you're going to win through that level and you know, it gets slightly harder each time. And like that's kind of can be a little bit more like work because there's a lot more structure. There's KPI's, there's all the specifics.

But when you're an entrepreneur, you have to set what that level looks like. And if you're anything like me, my brain goes from big picture, small picture, big picture, small picture. And it can be both at the same time. So I can be hyper detail and then I can be thinking, what am I doing in five years? What am I doing with the rest of my life all in the same 32nd space? And that can break the machine.

As an entrepreneur, you've got to, you've got to learn, as you say, to work out how to structure blocks. And you know, we'll do another podcast to go deeper on that. The other one you said really well was delegation. I see a lot of same entrepreneurs that look like they look like that, you know, that big elephant, the Indian elephants with eight arms. You know, that's, that's kind of how a lot of dyslexic businesses are. There's a business owner in the middle trying to do 8 different things.

And even if they have staff, all those staff are is another arm of them. It's not another person. They're just doing more work. And so, you know, and hey, I'm guilty of that. I'm not perfect. I love trying to do too much.

But I agree with you on your final point as well as I've spent years getting good at sharing my picture in my head and asking my team, what's your picture so they can share their visual impression and using tools like Loom to do video screenshots and sharing that. That makes a massive impact, right? Yeah, that's one of the tech recommendations that's in the book because I could not live without loom. It is me too. The best thing. It is so helpful for doing exactly that of like, OK, I want you to do this and you need to say this and and all of these different things.

It just makes a absolutely huge difference. I I really agree. I do think that that kind of example of like the eight different arms and all the different, I did feel like that was just a little bit of a call out because I was redoing my website the other day and the website developer was like, so how is this different to this one? I was like, well, it's completely different because this is this is this. And she was like, but what about this one? And I was like, yeah, so this is this, this isn't this.

And she's like, it's been quite similar. And it's like the services pages, another thing and then another thing and then another thing. And exactly like you said to me, the beginning, they were like, how do you do it all? And I just think to myself, I'm not really sure to be honest. You just, you just keep running faster and faster and hope some things get finished in the meantime, right? And you just sit like it's like I look at my workload and I laugh like I've got screens after screens.

And yeah, I'm definitely with you there. And we'll definitely do it, as I say, once you get through this process, we will do another podcast. We'll go deeper into the business side because I want to hear a lot about your story around the business side. But today, what's really great and what I think is fantastic as you've written the book, and I would say this to any entrepreneur, if you've got something to share on whatever industry you're in, is write a book. You know, I know it's not easy and I it makes it sound really easy. Just write a book and publish it.

Good luck. Merry Christmas. You know, it sounds a bit simple, but from a point of view of actually sharing what you're about, it's massive, right? Maybe you could take us through a little bit about, about the book. You know what inspired it? Who's it going to help?

And we'll make sure at the bottom of this podcast there are links everywhere. But yeah, tell us a bit more about that that journey. Yeah. So it fits in very well with the theme, what we've been talking about, which is how underrepresented dyslexia is. So the reason why I wrote the book is I went to the Dyslexia Show conference in March 2024 and I published a load of content speaking to different experts at the show. And the a couple of them went really stratospherically viral.

And my publisher saw them and and messaged me and said, listen, ADHD and autism is everywhere at the moment, but no one is writing the book on dyslexia. And at this point, I've started to realize I was doing too many things. And I was like, no, I need to do less, not more. So I said no. At first I was like, I just, I just can't. Like, I cannot do this as well.

I was trying to carve out a little bit more of a life rather than doing even more work. Then basically she said, someone is going to write the book on adult dyslexia. The question is, do you want it to be you? And I was just like, damn, that really got me. And like, really like reeled me in. And I was like, I really do feel like so much of what we talked about, the way out of dyslexia is discussed, the way it's over infantilized about the superpower, the kind of over focus on strengths and not giving tangible strategies just really irks me.

And so I was like, OK, yeah, all right, let's do this. So the kind of the book is called Dyslexia Unlocked and it covers the three core areas that I feel a successful dyslexic needs, which is creating confidence, kind of creating strategies and you know, learning how to navigate your challenges and understanding what those are and then finally how to unlock dyslexic strengths. So really helping you understand what they are navigating, what dyslexic superpower really means, what being successful as a dyslexic person really looks like. And it goes through those 3 sections. It's written to cover work and cover life. And it covers examples of entrepreneurship, examples of corporate life, my clients and you know, speaking to their partners about dyslexia.

So it's supposed to be a very catch all kind of generic in like intro to this topic, depending on whether or not, you know, you want to tell your partner about dyslexia, you want to tell your boss, you want to work with your employees better. It kind of tries to give examples across different areas of life. And there's kind of stories from people who work in the police to people who are teachers to people who work in corporate jobs, people who are self-employed. It has a real range of things and I think. Natalie, can I just step in here, completely break your train of thought? Tell me it's not all about reading and writing.

That's what I want to hear. OK so the funniest thing is that I almost didn't even do a chapter on reading and writing. Thank you, Thank you. That's what I wanted to hear. I feel like, as you'd listen to my stuff, you know, I kind of feel like you're a semi disciple and I'm exactly the same. I, I don't, I don't, I go beyond reading, writing and spelling because that's, that's, it's so beyond that.

And that's what I want everyone to hear. And that's why I'm so interested in this book that you're putting out, that you've put out because of that exact reason. You know, reading, writing and spelling can be solved by AI or, you know, anything. It's all the shit they don't talk about that frustrates me. And this is the first book I've seen that isn't an Almanac because there are a few out there that are amazing books. But my God, you know, you could, you could, you could prop up a, you know, prop up a couple of doors with them and yours, yours looks reasonable.

And it looks also that you've thought about it as how does this impact adults lives? And this is where I think so many books get it wrong is they don't talk about this broad piece that when someone's just being diagnosed as an adult, what do they do? Like this should be the book that they get given, right? I hope so. Yeah, I think so. So it's 15 chapters and there is only one on reading and writing.

And it is the same chapter. And then when we're looking at reading and writing, a lot of it is about checking your work. So it talks about how to book an airport ticket and not, you know, book the wrong date or the wrong price or anything like that. Talks about how to kind of book a train ticket or deal with 200 emails and how to kind of navigate that truth. So it's very light on the reading and writing and it's very heavy on processing, executive function, confidence, learning and understanding your strengths. So yeah, I actually wrote the whole manuscript and then at the end, about 3 weeks before I had to deliver the manuscript, I was like, Oh my God, there's nothing.

You're reading it wrong. I was like, wait, people who like are first introducing this topic are gonna just think I'm absolutely mad. But obviously to people like you and I, you know, that it's kind of, it does feel like the kind of not so important part of navigating dyslexia for sure. But we're very rare animals. And I think because we've been in this industry, so industry, this is so long, we're so aware that reading and writing is the smallest piece of dyslexia. Like it's kind of it's kind of insane when you say that people out there who listen to podcasts probably get it by now, but so many don't.

And it's like, this is the the unlock is to realize there's so much more to it. You are a cocktail. You know, you've got a little bit of this, a little bit of that. You're a mixture of a bunch of stuff. And if you can understand how this impacts you as a real adult and find real solutions, you know, that's the, that's the thing. Like there's so many, like even though I'm doing this as an entrepreneur, it's so many people reach out around relationships.

So many. I get so many women. It's interesting. It's so many women go, my partner's dyslexic. I'm trying to find more out about it. I'm sure there'd be a there'd be a few books on that could could be written just on relationships with dyslexics.

It's. Really bringing that point, definitely I was, I was saying to say before and I was like, really, I never want to write another book. I probably will live to regret that statement. But my word, it's hard, hard work writing a book. But to kind of bring home the point of how just, you know, reading and spelling does feel like the smallest part. I've got 750 hours of coaching experience with, you know, hundreds of clients at this point.

I have only had one client come to me about spelling and how to navigate spelling. And it was because she had to write on whiteboards as part of her job. That was the only reason that she was like, I'm really struggling because she had to write. She was she what she had kind of big words that she had to write on whiteboards and it was really catching her out. And she, when she came to me and that was her thing. I was like, wow, it's finally happened.

Someone has finally asked me about spelling. So yeah, it just gives you a sense of of how much it is other things. Can I ask you one question? What was the hardest part of the book in your opinion? Was the hardest part of you writing the book? I'm sure there'll be, and I'm sure you'll be sure there could be a list as long as you're on.

But if there was one thing, because I know I just just give you some context, I was thinking about this the other day. I've never listened to one of my podcasts ever. I've never, ever listened to it twice. And I think that's the hardest thing I see with writing a book is I I would struggle to read or listen to the same bit of copy more than once before my brain would just kind of break or I'd get bored of myself. Do you know what I mean? I was, that was the one.

I was. There wasn't. There's been many challenges. I think that is the one that I was going to say. So we did 10 rounds of reviews. Yeah.

And it's 270 pages. It's, I think my, my first manuscript I delivered was 80,000 words. It's not 80,000 words anymore. But yeah. So my, my strategy was for anyone that wants a little laugh is one of the things I've understood about ADHD is how things like this where there's no kind of interest or dopamine or kind of accountability, you know, it's harder. So you have to do something to make it more interesting.

So what I would do is I would listen to it rather than read it because obviously that and, and you get a week by the way, to get turns around. It's not a long time. They'll be like, cool, this is the latest round of proofs. Could you send it back to us on Friday? And you're like Friday, Are you joking? And So what I would do is I would sit and I would listen to it at 2X speed and I would eat popcorn while doing it because it was the only thing that would give me enough dopamine that I could actually sit there for three hours and listen and listen and listen and listen and listen.

And I was so exhausted at the end because the processing of of trying to do that, because you're not just listening like trying to understand, you're like really listening to everyone. Have I explained myself well? Is there additional points I want to make? Could I make that story tighter? Is there a better story? You're listening in a just a completely different way And say, I would sit there with the popcorn and then I would write kind of like a little asterisks on the thing saying, you know, like this is something I need to go back to and then go back and do all of the differences.

Though it was really challenging due to the time, due to the amount, due to the kind of what they're asking you to do. I must say I could not fault the publisher. They were amazing across the board at how they supported me, how they worked with me. Nothing was too much. They were amazing. So anyone that is daunted by this process, just know that there are publishers out there that are incredible.

Mine really were incredible. That's brilliant. It's so funny, so funny. That was the same problem, same challenge I was thinking of. Just shows you how many of us are similar. And I think for anybody listening, get the book.

You know, as I say, links will be in the show notes. Thank you so much for being on Nelly. Is there anything you'd like to leave this amazing audience with? Any thoughts? Yes, I think the one thing I should probably preference is if I start talking about the book in too much detail in terms of a written copy, I get people screaming at me. Why is there not an audio book?

I can't believe you've written a book for dyslexic people. That's outrageous. Of course there is an audio book and it is read by me. So yes, there is an audio book and if you want to check it out and I have the latest figures of purchases and it's about 85% people purchasing the audio book. So anyone that is saying I'll. Get it?

I'll definitely grab it on. Audio, right? Yeah. But anyone who is sitting there thinking, I cannot believe you wrote a book for the sex, sex, Please note that there is an audio book. It was written with. The first thing my publisher said is, don't worry, we will do an audio book.

So we've been very intentional about that from the very beginning. And yeah, I'm really proud to say that all 15 chapters are read by me. And it was a really amazing process to do the audio book. And I'm, I'm really extra proud of the audio book. Fantastic. And that's brilliant because there are it's hilarious.

I've chatted to a couple of people over the years who have done books around dyslexia and they go, oh, the audio book book will come out two or three months after the original book and I'm sitting there going, how do you not know who your audience is? This is ridiculous. Like you just like, but but on that note, we could talk forever. I will definitely have you back on the podcast once we give it a little bit of time where you've had a where you're getting through book season and we will do a great podcast on on business and life and what's been learnt. But thank you so much for being on the podcast, Natalie. Thank you for having me, and thank you for this amazing resource you've created.