So Much To Say: A Legal Podcast For People

“I realized the reason I was so passionate about authenticity was because I hadn't had the opportunity to be that way myself in these corporate roles.” - Sarah Ennor

What does it take to be a different kind of leader in legal?

Sarah Ennor, Founder of Growth Counsel, is a former firm lawyer, and in-house counsel and compliance for big-bank asset managers, she felt the pressure to “fit in.” After receiving an ADHD diagnosis as an adult, she is on a mission to bring simple inclusion strategies to life through relatable stories. Culture, morale, and financial results improve when we marry revenue to respect, coach with curiosity, and begin to banish bias.
 
Sarah joins Megan Senese and Jennifer Ramsey to talk about what happens when you stop chasing credibility through control, and start building it through presence, curiosity, and trust.

You’ll hear about:
  • What Sarah wishes more legal leaders understood about team dynamics
  • The invisible weight of credibility, and how she learned to set it down
  • Why coaching helped her rewire how she showed up in the room
  • Her take on legal ops, burnout, and building trust in high-pressure roles
  • What makes a workplace feel safe (hint: it’s not perfection)

About Sarah Ennor:

Sarah Ennor is on a mission to make ADHD human. She works with law firms and organizations to make ADHD human and profitable through workshops and presentations to support their talent.

Learn More:

This episode #32 of So Much To Say: A Legal Podcast For People is accredited for 35 minutes of EDI Professionalism hours for lawyers in Ontario!

Stay Connected:

Love So Much To Say? Let us know! Drop a review, give us 5 stars in your favorite podcast app, and tell us what made you laugh, think, or just go “yep, that’s me.” Every review helps us reach more awesome humans who want to make legal…well, human. 
Want to go deeper? Curious about 1:1 coaching with Megan or Jen? Or want the inside scoop on stage? Hit us up below, we’d love to chat!

Creators and Guests

Host
Jennifer Ramsey
Host
Megan Senese

What is So Much To Say: A Legal Podcast For People?

Welcome to So Much To Say: A Legal Podcast For People where we explore the behind-the-scenes of work, law, life, and everything in between. We’re your hosts, business development and legal marketing coaches Jennifer Ramsey and Megan Senese, and we’re here to showcase the human side of the legal world, from marketing and consulting to the very real challenges of balancing ambitious careers with being human. This isn’t your typical, dry legal show. Instead, So Much To Say is a human-centered leadership, marketing, and culture podcast through the lens of law. We bring you real stories, candid conversations, and thoughtful insights that remind you that outside of being a lawyer or legal marketer, what makes you human matters too. So whether you’re navigating billable hours, building meaningful relationships, redefining success, or simply trying to stay human in a high-performance profession, this podcast is for you.
Stay human. Stay inspired. Namaste (or whatever keeps you human).

[00:00:00] Sarah Ennor: Most likely it results in you saying to yourself, oh my gosh, this person that I thought was just trying to get my goat every day might actually be struggling with the challenge of A DHD. And so we learn things by just by seeing it, right? We see other people that are different from us and we say, oh, that person is not a jerk. They just don't operate the same way as I do.
[00:00:21] Megan Senese: Welcome to So Much To Say: A Legal Podcast For People. Where we dive into the beautiful chaos of work life and everything in between, outside of being a lawyer or a legal marketer, we wanna know what makes you human. And with that, let's get started. Welcome back to So Much To Say: A Legal Podcast For People.
[00:00:43] Today's special guest is Sarah. She talks all about ADHD. And if you have ever. Questioned, do I have a DHD? Then this episode is for you. If you are listening or have stumbled on this episode, and maybe you're thinking, I do not have a DHD, you should still listen. And the reason is. You probably work with someone who does, or you're supervising somebody who does, or your client probably has it, or maybe your kid or your partner, or your spouse, or your girlfriend or your boyfriend.
[00:01:22] Lots of us have different ways of thinking, different ways of approaching things, and even if maybe you don't know anybody who has it, I think it is a really helpful reframing for getting curious and being empathetic. And just taking a moment
[00:01:41] Jennifer Ramsey: Today on so much to say, we're talking with Sarah Ennor, founder of Growth Counsel: Lawyer, entrepreneur, and ADHD advocate.
[00:01:51] Sarah helps organizations and leaders see how neurodiversity can be a real advantage, turning differences into strengths. She's here to share her journey from corporate law to entrepreneurship. What her A DHD diagnosis taught her. And how embracing difference can drive success. And a fun fact, Sarah is a world champion in Australian football and represented Canada from 2011 to 2020.
[00:02:17] Welcome, Sarah.
[00:02:20] Sarah Ennor: Thank you.
[00:02:20] Jennifer Ramsey: Well, I was looking at Sarah's LinkedIn and I always, I feel like I always identify and love to hear about people have, who have like a wanderlust in them.
[00:02:34] Sarah Ennor: Mm.
[00:02:34] Jennifer Ramsey: And so I saw that you on your LinkedIn. Bio have intrepid adventurer.
[00:02:42] Yeah.
[00:02:42] Jennifer Ramsey: On it. Yeah.
[00:02:43] Sarah Ennor: Yeah.
[00:02:43] Jennifer Ramsey: And I just, that is honestly the first thing that just was like captivated my attention.
[00:02:50] Sure. I was, I mean, I wanna hear your whole story, but that I'm just like, first of all, the word intrepid. Let's just talk about how good of a award that is. Um, but then when you married up with adventure, I just wanna like, I'd love to hear all about like. That part of your life? Was it, was it like consecutive moments or did you I have.
[00:03:10] Do you like adventure at separate times?
[00:03:13] Sarah Ennor: Well, I do, but that particular thing on my LinkedIn profile is actually about my gap year. That was my way to sort of cover it off in my, in my resume as it were on LinkedIn. And so it's, it's about the time after I resigned in a bit of a rage from my in-house bank job, um, and gave two weeks notice.
[00:03:33] But what with, you know. Christmas holiday and accrued vacation more like a couple of days. I took a little bit of time off, rested in my jammies for about a month, and then went off and traveled, and so I went to Sri Lanka first. I did a 10 day silent meditation.
[00:03:48] Megan Senese: How were you able to do that? Were you screaming inside?
[00:03:52] Sarah Ennor: I actually was really surprised to notice how much you actually kind of communicate with people, even without words, and even in the circumstance of the, these silent meditations where you're not supposed to exist as if there's other people there. So, you know, you're, you're not supposed to be making eye contact and pointing at things and pretending like you're actually just talking without words.
[00:04:12] And yet at the same time, you know when the other person is tired. You know when it's okay to turn off the light when in your roommates. Presence. Right? I, I would say the harder part of that was not the silence, actually. It was very calming. So this, this chirpy mind that we ADHDers tend to have was calmed, which is what made me realize that meditation can be such a powerful tool and any kind of mindfulness, um, for a DH adhd, but.
[00:04:33] The harder thing was the physical because not only do I come with chronic physical pain, not only from a comorbidity of a DH adhd, but also playing Australian football for a decade. Sitting still on a floor on a pillow at the age of 35 was not my idea of a good time. And then I continued on to New Zealand where I'd negotiated my way onto a family owned winery and lived with a, an old South Australian, not old that old, but an older south, south Australian man and his wife from New Zealand who'd been running this winery.
[00:05:04] They have business partners from Canada. He was not really sure if he wanted to hire me at first because it's a pretty physical job, which I didn't. I personally appreciate either when I applied for it. Um, but he figured, you know, I played Aussie rules football when I was back in Australia. If you can do that, I'm sure you can like plunge grapes and do all the cleaning and drive a forklift and all of that stuff.
[00:05:24] So that was, that was sort of the bulk of that. And then at the end of my, my vintage with them, I also jumped into a camper van and drove around the south island for about a month. So partly with a friend and partly on my own. So yeah, that was the intrepid adventure, um, before I returned back.
[00:05:40] Megan Senese: I think I read that you're, you received your diagnosis later in life.
[00:05:44] Sarah Ennor: Yeah.
[00:05:45] Megan Senese: Yeah. So talk to us a little bit about that and you know, I think I pulled up some stats about there's 12% of lawyers are reporting having it, and it's probably more because I'm just, I'm sure it probably is. And, um, so talk to us about what that, what that's like and how that all came, like, what made you even decide to go and like, get tested, evaluated?
[00:06:05] Like what, what are the words.
[00:06:07] Sarah Ennor: Uh, assessed. I think maybe, um, yeah, evaluated is fine too. Um. So I was at a Bri, a baby shower cocktail party, and I was talking about my legal practice. So at the time I was a sole practitioner. I'd been running it for a number of years, uh, for quite a long number of years, but I'd been feeling stuck and I hadn't really been grabbing clients.
[00:06:28] I, I just wasn't feeling motivated for it. And so I was telling stories and like as a cocktail party with a whole bunch of strangers, and I said, oh, so this is what I was doing before, this is what I was gonna rebuild. And then, but then I realized that that would be a lot of. Still needing to know all the nitty gritty of the, the minor stuff.
[00:06:44] If I was, for example, supporting article students in my practice and I thought, but you know, internationally trained lawyers, it solves all these problems of people who have a challenge getting roles here. They're also adults that are actually really great lawyers already and don't need as much supervision.
[00:06:56] And I thought, oh, but then it's a bit overwhelming that I need to put in place all the systems because they're adults that are gonna a real business to be running around them. I this. This woman when I was telling her this story, and she said, do you have a DH, adhd? And
[00:07:13] Jennifer Ramsey: Wow.
[00:07:13] Sarah Ennor: Yeah. And I said, got curious.
[00:07:15] You know, I, I don't take offense very easily. So I thought, well, why are you asking me that? And she just said, well, you have a lot of ideas that you're generating and I'm not seeing a lot of execution, or I'm seeing you get held up on some of the more challenging. Things that are not really, they're challenging for me because they're admin and they're boring to me, but they're not necessarily the challenging things for anybody who's running a business.
[00:07:35] And so, yeah, I just, I chalked my friends at basketball afterwards. A bunch of times my phone started listening to me. The reels started getting served to me, and the next thing I knew, I thought, oh my gosh, maybe I should look into this. So I asked my doctor and she referred me to a psychiatrist. I did one of the versions of diagnosis, I would say, where.
[00:07:54] It was, he sat for an hour. He asked me all kinds of questions. He didn't just read the tick boxes that you need to be using to get diagnosed. He asked, he asked me questions that got to the heart of those things, and at the end he said, yeah, I think you have 15 of the 18 symptoms. And, uh, I'd say You have a DHD.
[00:08:10] You wanna try medication?
[00:08:13] Megan Senese: Okay. And so receiving that information, were you like, of course. What? What were you feeling?
[00:08:20] Sarah Ennor: So I have never, it never occurred to me all my life that there was a thing wrong with me. I just thought it was everyone else. I'm like, okay guys, you can tell me six ways to Sunday to work on my time management.
[00:08:31] And like clearly I don't. Have a concept of what that is, or you need to give me something a little bit more concrete that I can try. Like what, what do normal people seem to do with this time management? They're like, I think I'm normal. And so when I got diagnosed, the first thing he kept repeating to me in the, in the session was, you know, you're, so, you're gonna see that the distraction will disappear or will be reduced if you try medication as like an additional diagnostic tool.
[00:08:54] You can just take it for a week or something and see what you find. And I kept saying, I'm not distracted. I'm not distracted at all. I'm just unmotivated. I'm just undisciplined. I'm just, you know, I have these cham feeling down and depressed and anxious and like, it's not about distraction. And then the first day I took my medication, I thought, oh my gosh, I had no idea.
[00:09:12] That this is what other people experience. I didn't know there was such thing as, not silence in your mind, but being able to direct your attention where you want it to go. Being able to remember what you were working on two seconds ago. So that was a huge revelation to me. But yeah, like I, I guess I just never thought there was anything wrong with me.
[00:09:30] When I was diagnosed, I thought, this isn't gonna change anything. But as I came to learn about what the condition is, I very quickly realized that. I've been working 10 times as hard as I probably needed to be or wanted to be in comparison to others, and that there are some things that are really, really hard to rectify or to, it's not that I feel that it needs to be rectified, but just to fit into the existing paradigm at work, at school, it's not easy.
[00:09:58] Jennifer Ramsey: I have to say. I don't know much about A DHD, so I have, I have my own issues with anxiety, right? Like the, like I'm, I'm sure there's a spectrum for. Every sort of like acronym and letters, like Megan said. I'm curious, like for you, Sarah, like you, you've used some great words to describe it, like. Feeling unmotivated or undisciplined, or can you explain a little bit how it felt in your, inside your brain?
[00:10:25] How, how does a DHD feel if, is that even possible to describe
[00:10:30] Sarah Ennor: Somewhat, yes. So what I'll start with though is, is a little bit of background. 'cause I think most people are just like you. They know what the acronym is, which by the way, it's a horrific acronym that does not really describe the condition at all.
[00:10:41] Um, so we say it's. Uh, a disorder, first of all, which sounds scary, right? And then you see all these easy little things like, oh, I have some problems with attention, I have some problems with energy. I'm a little more hyperactive than other people. Uh, I might be a bit impulsive, right? But the reality is the intensity and the duration of this is what makes it rise to the level of a diagnosis, plus the fact that it's been lifelong.
[00:11:04] So I have to have been able to remember having all these symptoms back when I was seven years old kind of thing. Um, and it has to be pairing in two out of three areas, work, school, or relationships. Right? So it's like, oh, I have to, if I told someone I have to pee all the time lately, and you would be like, well, I have to pee.
[00:11:21] Everyone has to pee. And my brother pees, everyone pees. If had to pee like times a day, you might just wanna check that comes threshold, right? And, and what I'll also say is when I was looking at those reels, tons of people on TikTok, and I love the humor, but they describe these symptoms in the ways that they feel them.
[00:11:40] So you're asking about my feelings, and what I think is just important to point out to people that might be listening is that everyone is different. So I, for example, would see a reel of someone coming down the stairs and in their head, like there's voices, like, don't forget to get your keys and you have to eat breakfast still.
[00:11:55] And the kids have to be picked up at this time. And did you ask your husband this thing? And it's like all these voices talking on top of each other. And so I thought, well, I don't experience that. Like, that's not me. I guess I'm, that's not a symptom I have, I suppose. But as I learn more about the condition, I start to realize, oh, I don't envision it as voices in my head, but I absolutely have all those ideas in the background all the time.
[00:12:16] I think about how medication works, for example. And a lot of people will say something like, oh, you know, it's like taking cocaine for breakfast. Or like, you're drugging it yourself and you're turning yourself into a zombie. Well, there's a different reaction for a DH ADHD brains with. Stimulants than there is for the typical brain.
[00:12:31] Because imagine you have 10,000 ideas bouncing around in your head all the time, and you take a drug that like focuses you down, right? So now all of a sudden you're like, now I have 10 ideas in my head only and I can hear myself think and I can stay focused on a task. Whereas if you're a neurotypical.
[00:12:47] With 10 ideas to start with and you're thinking, I'm gonna take cocaine and I'm gonna go party. Well, you narrow your focus onto this party and that's where like you go wild and you have your fun. Like this is my totally non-scientific explanation. Right. But yeah, so, so in my mind for things like, um, the busy mind, it's just my attention is drawn by just a thought passes.
[00:13:07] Like, oh, I need to book that doctor's appointment. Oh, I have to remember to. I put my husband's laundry in the dryer today. I have to remember to go get groceries, like they pop to mind whenever they feel like it. They draw my attention away from what I was supposed to be paying attention to, or in my mind I was attempting to put my attention on.
[00:13:24] And I don't really have any control over it because we have an interest based nervous system. So that most interesting thing is what grabs our attention, and that is where we're drawn sort of involuntarily.
[00:13:35] Megan Senese: I have a, a client who I was just meeting with earlier today, and we were talking about a couple of ideas that I had, and again, she's the one in particular.
[00:13:43] Every time I talk to her, she's like, yeah, you probably, she likes to be like, you have a touch of it. You have a touch of it. Um, because the two of us work very fast together. But my point was picking up on the piece of interest where I was like, Hey, I think you should do, like, fill in the blank. And she's like, yeah, sounds really boring.
[00:14:01] I probably won't do that. And I'm like, yep, I understand. So like, I'm going to do it for her. And, and that's how the two of us kind of work together. But this is again, this lifelong understanding now for her at this point too. So it's interesting just to hear you talk about like what interests you and not in a way that's like, eh, like lazy, like, and don't Anna do that, but more of a like, what is going to actually keep you focused on task?
[00:14:25] Engaged. Engaged and just like not have your brain totally stop thinking about it.
[00:14:30] Sarah Ennor: Yeah. And there's ways to actually bring interest into even the boring things, right? Like you can create a competition with yourself. You can think about why you actually want to do the thing, right? Like if I said, oh, I've gotta file my taxes, like I need to, I should, ugh.
[00:14:44] Right. Like, okay, well that's a really boring task, but if I can focus on the fact that if I finish my taxes early, then I can get my refund, that'll be a good reason to actually move it forward. That's exciting and interesting to me is getting money in my bank account. So yeah, there's lots of different ways that you can trick your brain as well.
[00:15:00] Some of them work better than others. I can't trick myself on time, which is my biggest symptom, honestly, that that is the thing that just really. Thwarts every single thing. Like I was surprised I was even closed on time for you. Like I was, I think I was either at one or 1 0 1 maybe today to pick up this call.
[00:15:18] But yeah, I'm late for everything because we forget to pay attention to, to plan out all of the details of what we need to do. Right? Like I need to. I don't know, get to the physiotherapist and it takes me 30 minutes to drive there. Well, I might forget that I also have to brush my teeth before I go and I have to go down in the elevator and I have to drive four stories out of my parking garage and then traffic might kick up.
[00:15:38] So I don't plan for those things. And then I, and it doesn't matter how many times it happens, like I know this, but I will still not plan for it the next time 'cause I forget to plan for it. Our working memory is not always great for those administrative and boring things. Whatever is boring to us. Right.
[00:15:52] Jennifer Ramsey: Would you say now, Sarah, that. Now that you know that this is this part of you, would you say it's a superpower? Like can you, can you use it for superpower or for good? I, I'm just thinking about what you're doing now in your current role. Sometimes these challenges and obstacles in our lives, you know, how do we turn them into a superpower?
[00:16:16] Sarah Ennor: Yeah. So I think that there's a debate or a. Conflict, I think on the term superpower, which I doesn't mean that we shouldn't always ever use it, but I think the challenge is looking at A DHD purely as bringing all these great strengths to you, really does not do a service to the people that struggle so very deeply with it.
[00:16:36] You know, I, I feel like I would say I. I don't, I wouldn't say I have a DHD light really, but I haven't been impaired as badly as a lot of people have. Like there's such unemployment in A DHD, um, circles and that kind of thing, right? But I do think that it comes with flip sides, right? So essentially you take all the major symptoms and you flip, you put them into their extreme and think, okay, well, I'm impulsive.
[00:17:00] Well that means I'm curious. And I look around and I, I find. Ideas. I come up with interesting solutions and creative ways to, to solve problems, right? Or we have all this energy, this hyperactivity converts into. I can work long hours, you need me to stay here till 4:00 AM not a problem. You need me to sleep up for three hours.
[00:17:16] Like I can do that. Um, I will eventually burn out, but. I can do it if I'm interested or if it's important or it's urgent. One of those things that, that draws on my, on my nervous system in the right ways. So yeah, I think there are, and, and why did I decide to do this work is 'cause I can, Megan, you're always using your platform to shout out people that are, don't have that same privilege that we do.
[00:17:37] And I have the privilege to go out and talk about this condition. You know, you mentioned lawyers and 12 and half percent of them have a DHD when more like three to 5% of the adult population is known to have a DHD.
[00:17:48] Megan Senese: I hear 12%. I'm like, well, you know, it's a high number, but not really in compared to a hundred.
[00:17:53] Right. But
[00:17:54] Sarah Ennor: sure.
[00:17:54] Megan Senese: Do you know if the legal profession is the highest percentage?
[00:17:59] Sarah Ennor: The highest percentage I've seen so far is among entrepreneurs, which is about 29%, so quite a higher number.
[00:18:05] Megan Senese: This is the piece that I. Associate myself with this. I, I'm, yes. Like the energizer bunny. Yeah. Keep going.
[00:18:11] Jennifer Ramsey: Yeah. We're just being real here.
[00:18:13] Yeah. Like that causes anx. That is anxiety inducing to me. Like
[00:18:17] Sarah Ennor: Right. And slowness is anxiety inducing to me.
[00:18:20] Jennifer Ramsey: How, what? I don't know why Megan and I can work so well together actually,
[00:18:25] Sarah Ennor: because you compliment each other. Right. Like I, I do a whole talk. I've done it a couple of times where it's called Babysitters and cheerleaders, and I talk about the fact that when we have a DHD, we can do all kinds of amazing things.
[00:18:37] We just can't really do it by ourselves because we have to have those people in our lives that are gonna challenge us and, and tell us that, you know. I know Sarah, you wanna do these 50,000 things today, but should you maybe just like sell a talk and like bring in some revenue today instead of Yeah. Or send that one email or do your taxes this month when you haven't done them over months on end.
[00:18:57] Back to the babysitters. They're also the people that actually support the things we can't do. So they compliment us. Right. And I know we're bouncing all over, but I think it's really important with law lawyers and law firms where a lawyer is a lawyer. We're good at research. We're good at at advocacy.
[00:19:11] And speaking. And presenting. We're good at. Finding all the connections. We're good at administration, we're good at, you know, all these different things. And yet we all have different levels of strengths at them all. So like, why not have a team like you two where one might be the ideas generator and one might be the executor on the the important things, or the person that just pulls Megan back to say.
[00:19:34] Don't forget, we have to focus on this thing at this moment. Like, love your energy. Yes, I love this idea. Let's do it, but let's plan it out a little bit better. But you know, Megan, if she does have a d, ADHD, might not be as good at that planning and problem solving and execution stuff. She's gonna see the big picture, right?
[00:19:48] So speaking of these superpowers, we see the big picture. We, we operate excellently under pressure. You ask me to do something and tell me, oh, you know, you've got months to do it. Like, that's great to know. Also, I'm not gonna start it until two days before. So. Thanks for the, thanks for the info
[00:20:04] Megan Senese: procrastination.
[00:20:05] Yeah,
[00:20:06] Sarah Ennor: which, which I stopped calling procrastination actually, because it's actually, it's more like self-medication, right? Because urgency. Is one of those things that's interesting to us. And so I need that dopamine and that pressure in order to act. So I think about when I was in university and I had a hundred percent of my grade based on some paper that an essay that was 20 pages long or something, right?
[00:20:28] And I would go to the library and I would look at some books and I'd pull them all out and I'd sit here and I'd take some notes and about 10 minutes later I'm like, Hey, I, I'll just come back tomorrow. And I would do that a couple of times. Then I would forget it entirely. Then two days before the paper was due, I'd start writing it and I would write the whole thing in 24 hours and then I'd go back and look in the books and say like, where do I have some support for this statement I made?
[00:20:48] Like I remember it. I learned it somewhere. I have this idea already. Where can I find some support for this in. Research. Research. And so that is how I work. Well, when I do a talk, I'm sorry, but if you want the slides in advance, like I really, really don't wanna give them to you until the day before. Maybe
[00:21:06] Megan Senese: even just listening to you kind of talk through the process of how your brain is working and probably a lot of our other.
[00:21:13] Lawyer clients brains working. So I am an energizer bunny, but at the same time, I am slow and steady wins the race. Like I love to do something every day. I love to be very busy. But we also will talk to some of our clients and say like, just do like a small thing. Just like one thing a day, right?
[00:21:28] Sarah Ennor: Yeah.
[00:21:28] Megan Senese: So maybe even just like having this conversation, if they could be like, oh, actually my brain is more like Sarah's than.
[00:21:36] I micro remove suggestions of how to build relationships with just tiny little something every day. To get this long, long term success probably isn't gonna hit for them, right? They might need an art, you know, an artificial deadline.
[00:21:51] Sarah Ennor: Yeah, so it, it really depends. I think, again, there's variances all within the A DH ADHD community as well, and some brains are okay because it comes down to interest.
[00:22:00] If someone really loves being on LinkedIn and posting and having conversations with people and doing that networking, they won't mind. I mean, I'm all or nothing. I would love to go to a party and meet people live and do some networking that way. I probably won't leave until the lights are turning off and the staff are saying We have to lock the doors.
[00:22:16] Right? Where other people won't have the battery for that and they'll need to because they're introverts for whatever reason, and they'll wanna leave earlier. I also am. Inclined to jump into hyper focus when the thing is interesting or when I get that momentum going. So if I've sent out two emails to some prospects saying, oh, hey, maybe you wanna work with me.
[00:22:35] Well, now I have a bit of a template, like maybe I'll just send it to 50 people today. Right? And that's great, except I did none for a month before that. Then I did 50 on one day, and now I've gotta field all the responses. I've gotta book all the meetings. Now I'm overwhelmed with that. So I, I find I do go in these.
[00:22:51] Ebbs and flows of, um, you know, I might not do so much and then all of a sudden I'm just all out. On whatever the thing is I finally did, or for, for me sometimes, and it, it really depends on the thing. But I might do a post on LinkedIn and I'm like, look what I did. I'm Superman, I've absolutely just posted and I've, I've done my thing for the day.
[00:23:10] Now I can tack. If I can do that, I can tackle anything, right? And so then I'll start going through my other tasks and I'm suddenly have that activation to start the work and, and get going. So I think people, it's an experiment. I think we're scientists in our own life and we need to figure out how are.
[00:23:24] We best work and we have to be really, I think, self-compassionate towards ourselves as well. If we don't get it done today, we'll try again tomorrow.
[00:23:33] Jennifer Ramsey: Yes, we have to have grace with
[00:23:35] Megan Senese: ourselves. So now that you have this like insight into your brain and now you're talking to. You're giving talks to other law firms and companies, and I'm assuming then hearing other insights from other people who are like, oh, my brain works like, like two.
[00:23:49] I mean, knowing all of this and like all of this information, how long have you known, like how long have you had this? Information And how has it changed since then?
[00:23:58] Sarah Ennor: Yeah. I was diagnosed, uh, at 44, and so as I said, I, I had no clue beforehand. You know, we have a lot of energy and I have, we have a strong sense of justice oftentimes, and I had a lot of opinions always, and so I got all kinds of feedback when I was working in corporate that, you know, why don't you leave space for other people in meetings so that they can contribute their ideas?
[00:24:21] Why? Do you sound so harsh when you're busy and you tell someone, just like, get me the information in some sort of way that's not really as, as understanding. And a lot of that was me trying to achieve what I was trying to achieve. And you know, I've been given a deadline, I've waited too long, I still need the other person to look at the thing before, you know, it's final.
[00:24:39] I should have realized this a lot sooner because honestly at like that everything is an urgent deadline and it never actually is. And it just disappears into the ether after it passes. But now I just. Try to give myself all the grace in the world. There is no urgency to anything, right? I could sit here and say, oh, it's taking too long to get as many clients as I'd want, or earn as much money as I'd want.
[00:25:00] Or I can say, you know what? This is a process. Enjoy the journey. Keep trying every day. Plug away, look back once in a while and see what you've actually accomplished because. I mean, I posted something a few months ago and it was a picture of all the companies I'd worked with, and I thought, really, that's actually a lot of companies, a lot of podcasts, a lot of law firms, a lot of legal umbrella organizations.
[00:25:20] Like I've been making really good progress, right? So we have to also give ourselves credit. So I would say that's probably the biggest change, is all this grace and saying, you know what I, I, I can now look at myself and see that I also have a later circadian rhythm when I'm working. So why am I forcing myself to try to get up and start working at 9:00 AM.
[00:25:38] I'm not gonna be functional at that time. I like to work when it comes to noon and one o'clock and two o'clock and into the night. So I let myself have shorter business hours. I take meetings only when my brain is gonna be capable of meetings instead of trying to force myself out of a fog in the morning.
[00:25:54] And the other thing I think that's really important is it's, it's developed a level of curiosity in me that goes beyond just the why and the how of things into the why and the how of people. Because I'm slowing down long enough to say, well. I can't really ask other people to get curious about people with A DHD if I'm not gonna get curious about their behaviors.
[00:26:12] I can't ask people not to judge how people behave in the office or how they behave in their relationships. If I'm gonna be saying, oh, that person, you know, just 'cause I don't understand how, where they're coming from. So I ask a lot more questions. I say things a lot more softly sometimes, so when my emotions are running high, which is a, a major symptom of a DH ADHD as well, because we don't regulate them well.
[00:26:34] Yeah. So I'd say those are the biggest, the biggest changes.
[00:26:37] Megan Senese: It sounds like you know yourself more, right? Definitely. And because you are more aware of what works well, what doesn't work, and you are able to then regulate to some extent, it's also going to show up and how you're approaching with other people.
[00:26:51] And I mean, that, that's how we try to go to market too, right? And, and how we run our business. And when we're saying, you know, showing up as the best version of yourself doesn't mean pushing past all the time. It, it might mean taking a moment, which is hard to, hard to do.
[00:27:06] Sarah Ennor: You know, I remember Megan the first time we met and you asked me, I think the opening question was like, how?
[00:27:11] How are you showing up today? Or something like that. And I thought, I just was taken so aback by that question and I thought, wow, she is thinking of me. She's here to hear about what's going on with me right off. Not just how are you, that stupid question that the answer answer's obviously fine, I'm good, whatever.
[00:27:27] Yeah. It's like I really legitimately wanna know what you're. Feeling today? What's going on with you? I feel extremely fortunate to have almost fallen into this. So I was, you asked the question about sort of what was my journey and how did I get here? Well, I was lawyering in house. I, as I said, I went off on my stamping and tramping across the globe.
[00:27:46] I came back and started my own practice. It's when I started to realize too that that was, I, I was struggling there because I didn't have the support around me, right? I no longer had an assistant. I no longer had a single precedent. I had clients coming to me 'cause I was surveying entrepreneurs, like, oh, I'd like to incorporate my business.
[00:28:02] Like, okay, well I can figure that out, but. Banks, all their subsidiaries are already in existence. I don't have to incorporate anything. This is new to me. I don't have to do a privacy policy for the bank. 'cause they've had a thousand of them. We have external counsel to help us. We have, you know, timelines and checklists and things that we can look at.
[00:28:17] So I was feeling that it was really. Tough. Just not to get overwhelmed emotionally. I think about, oh God, I don't know this, I have to find it. I had to do 10 times as much work because I was not prepared to fail. Right. And then I looked at my Clifton strengths from millennia past. You know, you, you always do that test and you're like, this all totally checks out.
[00:28:34] It's like magic. Oh my gosh. And then you put it in a drawer and you never look at it again for the rest of your life. Right,
[00:28:40] Jennifer Ramsey: right.
[00:28:41] Sarah Ennor: So I looked it back up 'cause I was doing some coaching and they said, you know, you should be in your best strengths 80% of the time. And then you're doing that sort of admin and boring, not necessarily admin, if admin is your thing, but whatever is not your best strength is only 20%.
[00:28:53] And you keep recalibrating to try and retain that balance. And I just. I didn't have time to do the recommended two weeks analysis. Like my attention would not stay that whole amount of time. But I just looked at one project. I was looking at a contract. It was, took me 10 hours, but I spent eight of those hours reviewing the contract, doing some research, putting very great notes and, and, and insightful comments in this document.
[00:29:15] But what really lit me up was figuring out how I was gonna communicate this to the clients in a way that they could digest. No client that's an entrepreneurial sort, wants to read just a whole bunch of commentary and then actually answering the questions and helping them walk through examples in their business and how it would actually play out in real time.
[00:29:33] And that's what lit me up. And that was only the 20%. Right? And so I, I was doing it backwards by being. By lawyering. And so I decided, given that all my strengths were woo, and communication and activation and like all the, all the influencing strengths in, in Clifton, that I was gonna learn about speaking.
[00:29:51] And I, I first thought teaching maybe, and I thought, you know, maybe speaking, took some courses, figured out what my messaging might be. And it wasn't a DHD by the way. 'cause at this point I didn't know it was gonna be authenticity. As I in tandem got diagnosed and realized the reason I was so passionate about authenticity was because I hadn't had the opportunity to be that way myself in these corporate roles.
[00:30:12] Yet every example of where I was stopped from being authentic was a symptom of my a DH adhd, right? Like, why don't you show the right amount of face time? Why don't you know how to play the game? Why aren't you good at leaving space and, and hiding your emotions on your face, and all of these things that you need to do in maybe in a corporate setting?
[00:30:30] And so. I realized that that was. What was happening, and that was where the authenticity was being asked to mask. I'm not very good at masking, I'll tell you that. And that's when I, I thought authenticity. But then I, I was at, people said, you know, neuro inclusion is a topic that no one, it's a cutting edge thing.
[00:30:45] No one's really talked about it yet. We're interested. We're starting to hear about it. We'd like to know more. Um, and that's what sort of drew me into that particular line of work, because I can, and because it's needed and because I have a story to tell.
[00:30:58] Megan Senese: I love that. As we're wrapping up, given everything you just told us, what's one thing that you want people to know or, or people or lawyers or, I mean, I know lawyers are people, but
[00:31:09] Sarah Ennor: just
[00:31:09] Megan Senese: general.
[00:31:09] Sarah Ennor: Um, I think we've sort of talked about it a little bit, but the most important thing is just that we're on this journey together. Like I, I'm on the same journey as the people that I'm speaking. Right. Whether it's a person in the audience who thinks they might have a DHD, knows they have a DH, ADHD and sees themselves in my story, or whether it's the organization trying to figure out how to accommodate that, I, I know some things, I've figured out some of the things that work for me.
[00:31:32] I've heard all kinds of, and collected all kinds of ideas of what people can try, but I'm always learning alongside all these people and I think. The vulnerability of my stories telling and, and sharing anything and everything with my group minus I always say some things about my husband 'cause he really prefers that I don't talk about him ever.
[00:31:53] But, uh, you know, I'm an open book pretty much otherwise, like. What has medication been like? What is my experience? What is the bad feedback I've received? How did I fail? Where have I succeeded? I think it gives the opportunity for people to see themselves in the story, pick out what is relevant to them, and start their own journey if they haven't already, or continue to feel empowered that they can keep going, be successful, you know, all of those things.
[00:32:17] Jennifer Ramsey: I love that and I, I just wanna go back real quick and revisit the word you used, neuro inclusion. Just out of curiosity, with your current work, do you go into organizations like law firms and other types of companies and talk about how to create a more neuro inclusive environment? Can you talk to it just a little?
[00:32:37] I'm just very curious about that and I think our listeners might be interested in that too.
[00:32:42] Sarah Ennor: What has been most popular, I would say right now, because people are so early on, this journey in organizations is my 1 0 1. And so it starts off with some of what we talked about before, explaining what A DH ADHD really is, what makes it different from the typical brain, how that shows up at work.
[00:32:56] I also talk about, 'cause I'm also often in fast paced environments, whether it's a law firm or a big corporation, talking about what makes a fast place organization so attractive to the A DH ADHD brain. So there's 12.5%, that's probably more like 2030 probably Megan. Um. Why are we all drawn to this? Well, because it's so urgent and it's so, everything's on fire and it's interesting to us and good work and change and all this stuff.
[00:33:20] And then we go on to talk about how we can be more inclusive. And so I start off with really simple, simple tool. I call it ask, listen, believe. And that is where without any money, without any title or power of any kind, anybody, any day can just start and actually listen through their own person, get relationships and.
[00:33:43] Really from people. And then sometimes, depending on how long the talk is, we dive in as well to like, what's a formula for asking for the support that you might need? How do we focus on outcomes without having to say, I have a DH, ADHD and therefore I'm super scattered and I need to do this. No, I really wanna make sure I understand what you've asked me to do.
[00:34:00] I would really love it if I could maybe send you a summary email confirming your instructions. Is that okay? And then always thank you for the accommodation so that. People start to realize what, how simple accommodations can be. You know, it's an accommodation for me to be able to go to the doctor in the middle of the day if I have a job.
[00:34:16] Right? That's, we don't call it that, but yeah, so, so those are the, that's been the bulk of how I've been going through my, my work. But yes, I absolutely am also able, like this spans mental health. I've done talks on that topic. 'cause you know, there's the comorbidities of. Depression, anxiety, any other, you know, neurodivergence, potentially chronic pain migraines.
[00:34:36] That's, I experience those. There's also a leadership or a performance element of it, you know, so it can all be, it's the same underlying messages, but there's it slots into all these different, uh, buckets. Wellness, you know, disability inclusion. 'cause A DHD is also a disability. I should point out just one other thing, which is that I, I also do one-on-one sessions, so I, I call them coaching, but they're really coaching, consulting, mentorship, peer support, you know, all, all of that stuff together.
[00:35:04] In one, they're very short term. This is not like get a package for months on end. It's like, come for one call if you want. Some wanna tackle something. So that's another way where I can help individuals, whether they're the organization and how they wanna start doing work, or the individuals who, who might have ADHD themselves.
[00:35:19] Megan Senese: What I like too is that I think for people who have to manage teams also, right? Like so maybe you are like listening to this and you're like, I don't have any of that shit, right? Like none of this applies to me. My brain's perfect. Whatever. You can still listen and think about, well maybe there's someone on my team who I work with who's reporting to me or I report to, and the this.
[00:35:42] Just having that curiosity.
[00:35:44] Sarah Ennor: Most likely it results in you saying to yourself, oh my gosh, this person that I thought was just trying to get my goat every day might actually be struggling with, with a challenge of a DH adhd. Like they're not trying to blurt out in the middle of the meeting and interrupt me every time I'm trying to speak.
[00:35:57] Maybe they just don't have that control of their impulse, right? And so we learn things by just seeing we by seeing it, right? We see other people that are different from us and we say, oh. That person is not a jerk. They just don't operate the same way as I do, and they need different things to be successful.
[00:36:13] And that might mean that you're, you find ways to support them at work. It might mean that you find ways to support them to leave their job because it's not a fit for them, and you start to talk to them about how that might. Like maybe something else might suit. And then there's people too that so many people in this that it's nothing to do with work when they're in these sessions.
[00:36:30] They just think, my child has a DHD. How can I support them? What is this? What is an interest base? I had no idea. No one, no doctor told me about the interest based nervous system. They just said he was distracted and he is inattentive. Right? They didn't say. That there's ways that you can actually tackle this, and so that's why I love that.
[00:36:46] I just feel so fortunate. The work that I'm doing touches everybody and it's so fun to do, and I get to learn so much about myself as I go to.
[00:36:53] Jennifer Ramsey: We need more people like you.
[00:36:55] Sarah Ennor: I feel the same way about you guys. I love what you are doing.
[00:37:01] Megan Senese: That's it for today. Join us next time on So Much To Say: A Legal Podcast For People. Can't get enough of us? Visit us at www.stage.guide.