People First! with Morag Barrett explores the human side of leadership: workplace relationships, leadership trust, Meaning-FULL Connectivity™, and the Ally Mindset™ practices that drive real results in business and life.
In each episode, keynote speaker, executive coach, USA Today bestselling author, and Marshall Goldsmith 100 Coaches member Morag Barrett sits down with authors, business leaders, and everyday humans to uncover practical ways to strengthen connection, collaboration, and culture in an increasingly disconnected world.
Because success in business is powered by relationships. And success in life is fueled by connection.
Learn more at skyeteam.com/speaking
Morag Barrett, SkyeTeam.com (00:03.214)
Welcome to this week's episode of People First. And my guest this week is Sandra Crespo, a sought after speaker, executive coach, and mental health professional who helps organizations build workplaces where neuro-spicy talent can thrive. Her work sits at the intersection of mental health, systems thinking, and leadership development, reframing how ADHD shows up in high-performing environments and leadership development.
Productivity fixes to real world experiences like communication, burnout, creativity, and decision-making. She has spoken on major stages around the world, helping organizations to turn neurodiversity into a meaningful advantage. And she collaborates with the National Association of Social Workers, or yes, Social Workers, serves on the board of CHAD, and is pursuing doctoral research focused on ADHD.
Sandra, welcome to People First.
Sandra N. Crespo (01:05.889)
Thank you. Thank you for having me. I'm excited to be here. Thank you.
Morag Barrett, SkyeTeam.com (01:09.556)
Me too. And as I said, when we were in the green room, what really caught my attention when I started to learn about you and your work was the whole idea of the spicy framework. So we're going to come to that in a moment, but I want to go back to the beginning. When you were a wee girl, imagining all the adulting you were going to do, but when you were a little girl, what did you want to be when you grew up?
Sandra N. Crespo (01:21.847)
Yeah.
Morag Barrett, SkyeTeam.com (01:36.39)
And in what way does that show up in who you are or the work you do today?
Sandra N. Crespo (01:43.851)
You know, believe it or not, growing up, I grew up in, I guess, Puerto Rico and Boston, Massachusetts in the States. my early memories of living in the island was developing such a respect for nature and for animals. And so as a little girl, I dreamed of becoming a veterinarian and I really wanted to work with animals.
I found that veterinarians not only do amazing work, but they also have to do really sad work when, you know, animals have to be put down and, you know, that kind of stuff. And I genuinely could not wrap my head around that and that becoming a norm for me. And so I switched gears. But I would say that that love for nature, for things that are vulnerable for
Morag Barrett, SkyeTeam.com (02:22.734)
Mm-hmm.
Sandra N. Crespo (02:42.539)
beings that require defense, that require advocacy has translated into the work that I do today. And so I've always been empathetic to the invisible struggle. I've not always had words for it, you know, hence my career development and my research, but in the very beginnings of it, I believe it stems from that. It stems from this, you know, core empathetic approach that I've always had to...
either individuals or just beings that didn't have a voice.
Morag Barrett, SkyeTeam.com (03:15.662)
Mm-hmm.
So thank you for sharing. And I'm curious then with that empathetic thread that has woven through from your youngest years, why the passion and fascination for neurodiversity and ADHD specifically?
Sandra N. Crespo (03:35.413)
Yeah, so it's very personal. I will share that. It's lived experience. And so I have this whole philosophy and you know that lived experience is professional experience. It's just a matter of learning how to reframe it and translate it. But when I was around 35 years old, I was diagnosed with ADHD. My journey to that diagnosis was
really heavy. I went through my entire life absolutely killing everything that I set my mind to and I was very academically successful. I had a lot of friends. I for the most part from the outside in you can kind of say that she's pretty well rounded individual and has a lot going on and is doing really well in life but internally I
was chaos. did not ever know how to explain myself. My brain was always, it always felt like it was sputtering, going a mile a minute. I always, and I was very hard on myself for that because I was measuring myself with these outside metrics, you know, and the society, I guess that we live in and its expectations. And so when I measure myself against that, I just always felt like I was not doing enough.
or I wasn't doing well, or if I did do well, it was at the cost of my own sleep and I was a zombie, you know, and I'd have to work 10 times harder just to hit sort of that quote unquote normalcy of workload and work expectations. And I entered into this one particular position working for a cybersecurity company and it was a shift from my profession. I am a clinical social worker.
licensed clinical social worker and I shifted to tech because in that moment I just had I was so exhausted of working in social work and I didn't have a lot of words for it. I just felt like I just I blamed it on the profession, right? Like I was like I'm done. I cannot do social work anymore. This is too much. So I switched gears and I went to the tech world and it was fine. But what I will say is that the position that I held at the cybersecurity company, which was pretty high up
Morag Barrett, SkyeTeam.com (05:45.847)
Mm-hmm.
Sandra N. Crespo (06:01.855)
required a different pace. And that pace was what put a mirror to me of like, hey, you sum things up. And what that mirror looked like was really the procrastination that we, you we use that term procrastinating. It was at an all time high. And I had the executive paralysis that, you know, accompanies the ADHD diagnosis. And I didn't know at the time, but
There were certain things that I just couldn't get myself to do. And I saw it directly affecting my work. And personally, I was in shambles. just couldn't, I wouldn't sleep. I wasn't eating. I was kind of going on a spiral of like, what the heck is wrong with me? So I talked to my doctor, my primary care. I let her know what was going on. And she was the one who suggested and said, hey, have you ever thought about ADHD? And I was incredulous because I'm like,
I'm a social worker. I've been working with ADHD, or it's pretty much my entire profession. I would think that I recognize it in myself, and I absolutely did not. Because I was, I wouldn't say blinded, but I was almost validated by my success in basically saying nothing was wrong, right? Like I was succeeding, so therefore I just needed better systems. It wasn't an approach of like, I'm succeeding in spite of, right? I didn't have that.
Morag Barrett, SkyeTeam.com (07:03.918)
Mm-hmm.
Sandra N. Crespo (07:29.751)
So when we went through the conversation, the diagnosis was indeed official. And she was like, you're very textbook, actually. This is what it is. I had a little bit of a grieving moment. I don't know that a lot of ADHDers have a lot of language for this. I didn't at the time either. But at the moment, I kind of felt I cried because I'm such a fixer.
Morag Barrett, SkyeTeam.com (07:42.126)
Hmm.
Sandra N. Crespo (07:56.399)
And I'm very task oriented. And so in that moment, I was like, okay, so I have ADHD. How do I fix it? Like, how do I get better? And my doctor whom I've had for years now is amazing. And she said, this is not something you fix. This is something that you learn, right? You learn how your brain works. And you learn how to create an environment that is conducive to your brain design. And that has never left me. Her words have never left me and is the basis.
of the career change that I made in that moment. So I left tech, I came back to social work, I came back in the position that I'm in now, and I oversee a psychiatric clinic. And in that role, I started to really see from an outpatient therapy perspective, this is how it plays out. I see it in others, I started to really see it in myself, and I became...
completely consumed with understanding the neuroscience behind it, understanding the social factors of it, understanding the cultural angle to it. And because I have such a niche angle to the diagnosis, I started talking about it. And I started getting on platforms and I started receiving that feedback of people leaving my workshops or my speaking engagements with clarity.
Morag Barrett, SkyeTeam.com (09:10.869)
Mm-hmm.
Sandra N. Crespo (09:20.547)
and language that they didn't have before. And that just, you know, little by little, it continued to refine my lane. And then that's what I that's when I chose to go into my doctoral program to really contribute to this, this language and this research on something that we don't. We know plenty about from a medical perspective, you know, neuroscientists, psychiatry from that medical angle, ADHD is has been talked
you know, a lot and there's a lot of information about it. New information has come out as well. But my angle is social work. My angle is mental health. And so when I take an ADHD medical conversation and I introduce work, I introduce organizational wellness, culture, intersectionality, that's when the conversation starts to Right. And so I
I have a huge passion for it and it came really from my own lived experience and seeing other people benefit from me sharing it.
Morag Barrett, SkyeTeam.com (10:28.406)
Well, thank you for sharing your journey. And it's interesting to me that, especially as a licensed clinical social worker, the turning the mirror on yourself and recognizing the signs and symptoms that you are helping others with were also within you. It also caught me by surprise that as a licensed clinical social worker who understands this is part of what makes somebody
special and unique. One of your first reactions, grief, yes, for the, maybe for the person who you thought you were or the label you now get to wear. But that was the word that caught my attention when you're, one of your first reactions was how do I fix this? And certainly in my professional network and in my friendship network,
Sandra N. Crespo (11:08.107)
That's right, they couldn't fix it. I was grieving. That's right.
Sandra N. Crespo (11:17.655)
That's right.
Morag Barrett, SkyeTeam.com (11:25.142)
You mentioned how you were diagnosed at 35 or in your mid late thirties. Here I am a couple of decades ahead of you. And I also have friends and colleagues who at this point in our lives are getting that ADHD diagnosis. So first off, why now then? Why is it that we have successfully navigated
Sandra N. Crespo (11:30.348)
Mm-hmm.
Sandra N. Crespo (11:42.284)
Mm-hmm.
Morag Barrett, SkyeTeam.com (11:52.063)
the world for decades but suddenly friends and colleagues are hearing that they have some neurodiversity and letters that go with it. Why now and why so long and late in life do you think?
Sandra N. Crespo (12:09.525)
Yeah, I would say the conversation is not new per se. I think the United States has been a little bit, they've lagged a little bit. Internationally, neurodiversity has been really pushed. The UK is one of the main leaders in this field. They have a lot, a lot of lobbying actually.
when it comes to neurodiversity and really infusing it in law. The conversation in the States, what I have found is that it's very fragmented. There is a lot of individuals who are very passionate about this work, who do this work and dedicate themselves to this work, but it is just so fragmented and very siloed. There's not a lot of unification of services of
Morag Barrett, SkyeTeam.com (12:44.866)
Mm-hmm.
Sandra N. Crespo (13:08.105)
sort of one message, you know, and so you have many soldiers kind of heading into their own individual battles without kind of organizing one movement. You have organizations like Chad, which, you know, as you mentioned in my book, I sit on the board, they are a national organization that focuses on children and adults with ADHD. But how many people know them, right? They are doing amazing work and it's
Morag Barrett, SkyeTeam.com (13:33.559)
Mm-hmm.
Sandra N. Crespo (13:37.205)
you know, an association that should be recognized and has been in small pockets. But I think the conversation just hasn't been unified. I would also say that for me, the why now piece is more why not? I don't think there's any particular timeframe that we need to ever really talk about.
invisible disabilities or disabilities in general, advocacy, how to help individuals feel better and live better, to give language, you know, it's better, I guess, almost late than never kind of thing. But yeah.
Morag Barrett, SkyeTeam.com (14:19.03)
Yeah. So, so how can leaders then recognise and leverage neurodivergent traits as strengths rather than defaulting to the stereotype of it's a weakness, a gap, something to be fixed. So whether they're looking inward at themselves or looking at their team, their organisations, what are those first steps to recognising and leveraging?
Sandra N. Crespo (14:44.396)
Mm-hmm.
Morag Barrett, SkyeTeam.com (14:48.118)
neurodivergent traits and talents.
Sandra N. Crespo (14:52.257)
You know, I think it starts with one, a commitment to understanding it, ADHD, and I think neurodiversity in general, which includes other diagnosis like autism spectrum disorder, OCD, dyslexia. There's many different diagnoses that fall under the neurodiversity umbrella. But it is number one, as a leader.
having an awareness of self and a commitment to understanding. So if you have a, for example, I will give you a personal example. I have an employee who is a therapist and she initially before I came into my role was being given a lot of cases with adults, working with adults.
she has a diagnosis of ADHD and ASD. So it's all you ADHD. Now the previous director that she had when I first took the role basically had said to me, she's so problematic. She just doesn't understand. You tell her things she doesn't remember. She has a lot of transfers of care. People don't want to stick with her. You you may want to just look into kind of letting her go. And I said, okay, that's interesting. Let me go ahead, you
me by practice, I always make my own opinions. So I started working with her and I recognized, you know, the previous director didn't say anything about her diagnosis. Neither did the employee, but I recognized through my own awareness and my own knowledge that there were some traits there. I've never once ever been, you know, asked her about that. However, because I had that knowledge, I said, you know what, I know the traits of
these diagnoses, let me change her caseload first." And so I spoke to her and I said, hey, would you be willing to work with children and adolescents and actually use art therapy as one of your modalities? She's certified in art therapy, but she wasn't using it. And she was like, yeah, I would be open to that. She is one of my most booked therapists today. She has a crazy wait list. Why? Because I've been able to look at her
Morag Barrett, SkyeTeam.com (17:06.274)
Mm-hmm.
Sandra N. Crespo (17:13.341)
And the previous directors saw deficit. They didn't have any knowledge of what ASD and ADHD may look like and may be showing up as. She's very direct. She's very black and white. She doesn't like to be told things that don't make sense. And if it doesn't make sense to her, she's going to ask you about it. And to those that don't understand what that looks like, it can feel like she's challenging you. And when I understood that,
I was able to actually put her in a position that she was able to thrive and that she then started to feel really good about herself. She's like, no, I'm actually good at this. And she went ahead and got her clinical license and she did the rest of the stuff that she had to do. And it's not because I am some godly leader. It is simply because I made a commitment to understand disability. understand. I made a commitment to myself as a leader.
Morag Barrett, SkyeTeam.com (17:47.863)
Mm-hmm.
Sandra N. Crespo (18:11.489)
to take the time to understand invisible disabilities at that, right? We have a lot of language and lot of accommodations for physical disabilities. We have ramps, we have all the things that we need for those that have those disabilities, but we don't really have a lot of conversation nor a lot of support for those invisible disabilities. And what happens with organizations is that they leave that to the employee to advocate for themselves.
Right. And so there is.
Morag Barrett, SkyeTeam.com (18:42.137)
So I want to come onto accommodations in a moment and those sort of conversations, but two questions before that. So you've used the letters ADHD. Many people will have used those words, think they know those words, think they know what it stands for. To be honest, I'm not sure. So you said ADHD and you said ASD. For the benefit of viewers and listeners, what do those two acronyms stand for?
Sandra N. Crespo (19:10.007)
So ASD is Autism Spectrum Disorder and ADHD is Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder.
Morag Barrett, SkyeTeam.com (19:13.369)
Okay.
Morag Barrett, SkyeTeam.com (19:17.761)
Okay. And in your own lived experience and in that fantastic example for somebody who worked with you, you talked about shifting responsibilities and environments to better tap into the strengths. So I'm curious when it comes to the workplace, what workplace systems are currently unintentionally creating friction for neurodivergent professionals?
Sandra N. Crespo (19:38.196)
you
Morag Barrett, SkyeTeam.com (19:45.515)
And how can leaders redesign them to support clarity, access and effectiveness?
Sandra N. Crespo (19:49.761)
Yes.
Sandra N. Crespo (19:53.153)
That is such a big question. And I don't believe that there's a silver bullet. In my office here, what I have done is pull from my own employees. This is another leadership quality that I wish more of us had, is going in with the humility that you don't know everything and that it is OK. And so I have a goal of doing
Morag Barrett, SkyeTeam.com (19:58.608)
Mm-hmm.
Sandra N. Crespo (20:23.097)
exactly that, how can I design an environment that is more conducive to my employees? Instead of me sort of thinking that I know all of this just simply by my research alone, I think step one is for leaders and organizations to hear from their employees, Like let's whether it be through survey, whether it be through groups, I don't know, whatever which way, whatever vehicle makes sense for the organization, depending on its size.
But for me here, I gathered through a survey and personal conversations, right? So I said, you know, let's what works, what doesn't work, what's helpful. There were things that you wouldn't even think about lighting, you know, so they said, you know, for my NeuroSpicy employees, the the lighting is too bright. They're like, no, I can't concentrate when it's just like they call it big light or we call it big light. And
I understand that. So what did I do? I bought lamps for the offices and so that there's soft lighting in the offices as a choice. The other thing that my staff basically said was for the administrative staff when they check in, they're like, you sometimes we feel very uncomfortable having conversations around declined payments. So, you you come in, you check in, you pay your copay.
If a person has a declined payment, I don't know how to communicate that because you have a room full of people and that can be embarrassing, right? Now this is all coming from my staff. And so I said, you know, let's think about how we can make that experience better for the staff, more comfortable for the staff to communicate something that we need and also for the client. My office manager literally was like, you know what, we can write out in a paper.
a small paragraph that says, you know, your card payment has been declined. Please update your credit card. Write it in this, you know, form. We will input it and then we will erase it. So she laminated it so it was able to be dry erase and she put it in a clipboard. And whenever somebody has a decline payment, she just gives them that clipboard. They're able to read it. It's a nonverbal communication. So their information is not shared and it puts the staff in a space that they don't have to
Morag Barrett, SkyeTeam.com (22:42.327)
Mm-hmm.
Sandra N. Crespo (22:45.419)
communicate that verbally. This is understood by the client, the client goes back to their chair, and it looks like they're just filling out an assessment, right? Like anybody else is using something to fill up a clipboard, they come back, she inputs that information, and she's able to erase that and show the client it's gone, right? So there is it that is such a simple interaction and transaction, but it makes such a huge difference. And what
Morag Barrett, SkyeTeam.com (23:12.109)
And it's such a simple example of an accommodation that can be made when we are curious about what are those systemic barriers or points of friction and what is potentially possible individually or collectively to resolve it. So do you have one other example of accommodations or how we can talk about accommodations in a way that is helpful versus labelling or diminishing others?
Sandra N. Crespo (23:15.969)
That's right.
Sandra N. Crespo (23:29.046)
Mm-hmm.
Sandra N. Crespo (23:39.093)
Yuck.
Sandra N. Crespo (23:42.903)
I always, so the reasonable accommodations term is always one that gives me friction because I challenge it because what is reasonable, who determines reasonable.
Does it work for one? it work for the other? I think the same way that we look at, for example, ramps for wheelchairs, they are part of the design of the building, right? You don't wait for someone to need a wheelchair, I mean, to need wheelchair access to then build a ramp. It is part of the design because by law, there needs to be access. And so there needs to be reasonable access for individuals who are physically unable to, you know.
get around. Why don't we think about that when we're thinking about neurodiversity? Why do we have that weight and advocacy on the individual to ask for these reasonable accommodations and then essentially leave that decision up to HR, up to whomever it is that decides this, and they decide if it's reasonable or not. And it's based on what exactly, right? So
I think the reasonable accommodations is something that we need to rethink when we talk about design. So when we are designing programs, when we are designing teams, when we are just talking about organizational wellness, we have to embed it into the beginnings of its infrastructure rather than saying, okay, how do we accommodate? Because one of the things I'll always say is the anything that we do,
Morag Barrett, SkyeTeam.com (25:24.47)
Mm-hmm.
Sandra N. Crespo (25:28.149)
that quote unquote accommodates ADHDers is actually beneficial for all. You know, we're talking about another example that I do here in my office is very specific agendas and I call them ADHD friendly agendas, which essentially just gets to the point. They're bulleted. This is what we're talking about. We're speaking for this much time on this topic. At the end, we're gonna have 20 minutes for questions. And so people know exactly what to expect and they know how much to sit through.
I think one of the cringiest moments for an ADHD brain is going into something not knowing how long it's going to be, right? Not knowing, do I need to sit here for an hour? Is it 20 minutes? Is it like, long do I need to actually keep myself together? You know, especially if it's a topic that isn't of interest, but it's just those types of things are thoughtful, but they're also massively effective in building teams.
Morag Barrett, SkyeTeam.com (25:58.382)
Mm-hmm.
Morag Barrett, SkyeTeam.com (26:13.902)
Mm-hmm.
Morag Barrett, SkyeTeam.com (26:27.119)
So mentioned in the introduction that you have created what you call the spicy framework. So I would hate to leave listeners and viewers hanging. What does spicy stand for?
Sandra N. Crespo (26:32.979)
Okay.
Sandra N. Crespo (26:39.925)
So SPICY is a framework I came up with when I was trying to, through my doctoral research and identifying my leadership philosophy and what is leadership for me and how do I actually identify as a neurodivergent leader? And I use neuro SPICY because one, the spicy is catchy, right? But it's also how I actually think about our brain. Our brain is spicy. It's definitely on the up and up, right? That's what I always say, we're thinking quickly.
And so I broke it down to a very simple framework for myself. And then, of course, it kind of just took off. But SPICY stands for Self-Awareness, Purpose, Innovation, Courage, and Yielding Transformation. So a quick little thing on each. Self-Awareness is as a spicy leader, understanding how your mind works is one of the most powerful leadership skills you can develop. Right? So
Self-awareness is very important. Purpose anchors your leadership beyond just productivity. So you need to have purpose in your leadership. Why are you doing this? Who's your team? Do they matter to you? Are you connected? Innovation thrives when we embrace different cognitive styles and ways of thinking. So as a spicy leader, I want to be able to hear new things. I am open to innovation and I am open to different cognitive.
lanes. C stands for courage, right? I think it's extremely courageous to stand on your own and say, you know, sort of disarm the world by owning your own. And it's the willingness to challenge these outdated systems and redefine leadership norms. And then ultimately is a yielding transformation. It means being open to change and allowing ourselves and our organizations to involve into something better.
Morag Barrett, SkyeTeam.com (28:22.851)
Mm-hmm.
Sandra N. Crespo (28:34.729)
So I live by this and this is how I identify myself as a leader and these are very important principles for me that are also very conducive to how my brain is designed.
Morag Barrett, SkyeTeam.com (28:46.051)
Well, thank you for that quick introduction. And so I'm sure it will have piqued the curiosity of many listeners and viewers of People First. So how and where can they learn more about you, your work and your research?
Sandra N. Crespo (28:49.13)
you
Sandra N. Crespo (29:00.233)
sure. You can I have my website. So it's the NeuroSpicySW which stands for socialworker.com. And you can reach me there that would be the most direct way to access what I'm doing, get some information around some of the things that I've done some podcasts, some papers, publishing, etc. And even if they want to contact me directly, you can do it right there. You can also sign up for my newsletter. I'm also on LinkedIn.
Sandra and Crespo. But yeah, those two would be the direct ways to get in touch with me.
Morag Barrett, SkyeTeam.com (29:36.569)
Sandra, thank you for joining me here on People First. It's been a fascinating conversation. And for those of you who are just joining, where have you been? You will wanna catch up on this conversation. Sandra Crespo is a sought out speaker, executive coach, and mental health professional helping organizations build workplaces where neuro spicy talent can thrive. Her mission is to help leaders build cultures where people do not have to wear a mask.
Sandra N. Crespo (29:46.007)
you
Morag Barrett, SkyeTeam.com (30:05.719)
burnout or fit the mould in order to succeed and that is music to my ears and warms my heart. So thank you again Sandra for an amazing conversation.
Sandra N. Crespo (30:17.303)
Thank you, thank you for having me, Morag, it's been great.