“Worst Practices” When Working With Autistic Employees – Part 2 » Community

It is essential to treat autistic employees with respect and dignity. However, many times at work, they are bullied, made to feel uncomfortable, discriminated against, or ultimately let go.

In Part 1, I described some of the worst practices when working with autistic people, and this piece explores the issue further.

Mishandling Communication

Offices might be intolerant of autism-related communication challenges. Although atypical social communication is one of the hallmarks of autism, employers can unreasonably expect autistic employees to conform with more typical communication behavior and fail to ask them about how they prefer to communicate. Offices also may not adapt to at least some atypical communication styles.

Sometimes, employers compare autistic communication behaviors to the communications of their non-autistic, or allistic, staff. Comparison, which can come in the form of verbal or written comments and even graphs or charts, is unfair and illegal. It is also an example of workplace ableism (that is, measuring performance against non-disabled people). Pressuring autistic employees to conform their emails to those of non-autistic colleagues is another form of workplace ableism.

Making Autistic Employees Less Valuable

Offices directly discriminate when they devalue someone because of that person’s disability. They might marginalize their autistic employees by removing many of their job responsibilities before giving those employees the reasonable accommodations they need, which is illegal. Supervisors also may avoid giving these individuals additional work and responsibilities.

Retaliating

Retaliation can include reducing someone’s participation in meetings, lowering their position or responsibilities, giving subpar performance evaluations, putting them on a performance improvement plan (PIP), and firing. Managers sometimes retaliate against autistic employees who try to speak up for themselves when feeling discriminated against.

Attacking Autistic Employees’ Questions

Offices can get irritated with autistic workers’ clarifying questions. Autistic people may need to ask numerous questions — to fully understand a task, not to annoy their supervisor. As some autistic people think differently than others, they could do work incorrectly if they are not allowed to ask questions. Unfortunately, their questioning frequently leads to job termination.

Making Hurtful Comments About Autism-Related Behavior

Too often, autistic employees are subject to hurtful comments that make the workplace hostile for them. An example of such remarks is “You have trained us to be scared of working with you.” Another example is, “Although I know your repetitive movements are due to autism, they jeopardize our relationships with coalition members.” Those remarks could damage an autistic person’s self-esteem and cause additional anxiety.

Being Overly Hard on Performance

Some managers review autistic employees’ work more harshly and/or lie about their performance, as justification to blame firing them on their performance rather than their disability. These evaluations often are biased and overly negative. Since they might not include many (if any) positives, they provide an inaccurate representation of what happen. The unbalanced and unfair performance review could harm an autistic individual’s self-worth and self-confidence. An autistic person may feel that whatever they do would be met with unjust criticism.

Conclusion

Offices should treat autistic workers properly, and when they do, both employers and autistic individuals benefit.

Miriam Edelman, MPA, MSSW, is a Washington, D.C.,-based policy professional. Her experience includes policy work for Congress. Miriam’s undergraduate degree is from Barnard College, Columbia University, with majors in political science and urban studies. She has a master’s in public administration from Cornell University, where she was inducted into the national honorary society for public administration. She has a master’s of science in social work (focusing on policy) from Columbia University. She is a commissioner of the DC Commission on Persons with Disabilities. Miriam aims to continue her career in public service. She is especially interested in democracy, civic education, District of Columbia autonomy, diversity, health policy, women’s issues, and disabilities.