Autistic bosses, yes ? no?

[Aspychata]

So since coming to this site, l now recognize a little more our type, and surprising, they like to hire us. I now notice stimming and l feel comfortable with this type of boss or co-worker.

Have you had many bosses or co-workers on the spectrum?

 

[Judge]

That's one thing looking back in hindsight that I nearly delight over. Can't say I recall any supervisors over me who were on the spectrum. Yet I worked right along side one for many years. Funny to think back how we had so much in common in how we did our jobs. We just understood and respected one another in a way we couldn't relate to with so many others around us. And we had no idea why.

Sadly though, the evolution of the job towards marketing did him in faster than it did me in. I still recall seeing him sitting in his cubicle, with his head down on the desktop, quietly sobbing. He had enough, and age 62 he took an early retirement.

Strange to look back and realize that I pretty much followed him. I got out too, and survived to tell about it!

Though bear in mind that my recollection of such people is strictly a matter of hindsight. That at the time and even many years later I had no understanding of my own being on the spectrum of autism. I sometimes wonder if he ever discovered at a late age that he was on the spectrum as well...

 

[clg114]

So since coming to this site, l now recognize a little more our type, and surprising, they like to hire us. I now notice stimming and l feel comfortable with this type of boss or co-worker.

Have you had many bosses or co-workers on the spectrum?

No bosses or co-workers on the spectrum that I know of, but through most of my working career I did not know that I was on the spectrum. I did know that I liked working alone and working on my favorite thing, machinery. My service managers just left me alone because they did not know how to do what I was doing (but I did not know how to what they were doing ether) and I turned in a lot of work orders for billing. It just made their job easier to leave me alone.

 

[Peter Morrison]

The biggest handicap with ASD is when you don't know you have it. I don't know why I would get along very well with certain individuals at work. I don't like making my workplace a social club. I just clicked well with certain people. Like Judge says, it is about respect and perhaps patience. I like being more effective than just friendly.

 

[Aspychata]

l work with a few people that l seem to understand better then others. NT's seem to not get me but l now don't care. It's a job, we defintely don't have to like each other.

 

[Mia]

Did have one in hindsight, a female boss at a tax firm. I could practically read her mind. We didn't get along outside of work though. But, as hard as she was on many other employees, we seemed to be able to automatically understand one another.

 

[Bolletje]

I think my boss may very well be on the spectrum, although I don’t think he’s aware. Working with each other is a little hit or miss as he’s not the best at communicating and has some very persistent quirks. But as long as I do my work exactly the way he wants, we get along well.

 

[hiraeth]

I recently attended a job interview where after the standard set of questions, something very strange happened:

Him: *looks at phone* well do you have any more questions?
Me: *sees him looking at phone* well I know you are busy and so I'll keep this short, ...
Him: oh no worries, I am just waiting to pick up my brother in 1.5 hours, so we have plenty of time. He has Aspergers. He is a really fascinating character.
Me: (uhh) oh yeah?
Him: yeah! *proceeds to go on a long ramble about weird quirks of the brother and how cool they are because they are "weird"* ..... I probably have Aspergers too, I can relate to a few of those things, but obviously I can work and he can't, but that's ok tho, he has tons of talents, they're just not so compatible with the structure of the modern workplace

When I walked out of there 1.5 hours later, the world looked a bit different than before.