RHS 183 - Hiring Neurodivergent Superheroes for Your Agency with Michael Eagan

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Hello, everyone, and welcome back to the show. Today, we have a tremendous episode for you, a conversation with Michael Egan, founder of the Independence Hub.
The Independence Hub seeks to make insurance the preferred industry for neurodivergent talent. I was referred to Michael by Stacey King.
I was on her podcast. She said, you got to talk to this guy, Michael Egan.
Connected with Michael. We hit it off immediately.
And what Michael is doing is really creating a platform and a space for people with ADHD, ADD, autism, the full spectrum of neurodivergent individuals, which make up close to 20% of the population, and really on the back of my kind of coming to grips with, I guess you could say, or diagnosis of having ADHD and the revelations that I've had and just the awareness and how much it's helped me just being aware that I had this, although to you guys, it's probably obvious who've listened to the show,

has allowed me to become a better leader, a better father, a better basically everything because now I can start to understand how to craft the way I communicate, how the way I interact with people, when to kind of go full handling and when to kind of dial it back because it may not be appropriate. and we just have an absolutely tremendous conversation about how, you know,

I've just seen, you know, not so much that I care that I have this thing, but it's like the awareness of having it has led me to make real life changes in how I interact with the world, which has created massive positive, massive positive benefits. And that's why I'm spending time on it.
Not, not just to talk about the fact that I have it or whatever, that, you know, people have these things, but that we can, when we become aware of them, and then as leaders, if we're able to, to be, you know, kind of manage these individuals, we can extract an incredible amount of value out of people and really give some of these people with superpowers, the ability to run if we do it properly. So I think you're going to love this conversation.
I certainly did. I think you're going to learn a lot.
Before we get there, guys, if you're loving the show, you're going to love the blog. Go to findingpeak.com.
That's findingpeak, like findingpeakperformance, findingpeak.com. Article comes out every Friday.
We do special articles as well every once in a while. But tremendous feedback from the blog so far.
People are loving it, diving into some of the psychological, emotional, relational topics that help us reach peak performance. And then I want to give a big shout out to Tivly.com.
T-I-V-L-Y.com, T-I-V-L-Y.com. If you're looking to create a steady flow of inbound commercial leads, there is no better way to do it in a short amount of time, right? I mean, you call them, get set up, and two days later, you got live business owners on the phone being transferred to your people who are in your target market, and it's just absolutely tremendous.
I cannot recommend Tivoli enough. We just continue to invest deeper in our partnership with them every single day.
So T-I-V-L-Y.com. And lastly, if you're looking to maximize the revenue you're getting out of your agency today, check out SIA.
Guys, there are a lot of networks out there. There's a lot of aggregation systems.
There's a lot of different organizations trying to do what SIA does, but I'm telling you, if you want max value, go to SIA, period. If you want max community, go to SIA.
The things that they're doing, I was just at the home office a couple weeks ago learning about a lot of the updates to programs, to trainings, to contracts, to new

carriers, to new contingency programs. It's absolutely phenomenal.
And if you haven't,

or you've been flirting with it, now's the time and go to siaa.com. That's siaa.com.

All right. With that, let's get on to Michael Egan.
I'm going to Shaboom. Mike.
Hey. Hey, what's going on, man? I'm at the beach.
I'm in good shape. Is that for real? Yeah.
Oh, dude. Come on.
Yeah. Why you got to do me like that? It's nuts.
You're up in freeze mud country right now, aren't you? Yeah. Thankfully, the last two days has been nice, but.
It's about to get cold. Over the weekend and it's just rainy and this is the time of year.
You know, it's funny. And my kids were like, we had such a, you know, we had such an amazing winter for upstate New York.
Yeah, I know. My friends are in Vermont, remember? So, yeah.
That's right. Yes.
We had 70 degree days. And like, and it was crazy.
We had these crazy, crazy winter where like it really never, I don't think we saw single digits. Well, they started, I think like in February,ary they said it got really cold it was like there was no winter and then right before spring it became really cold winter see we didn't get that oh yeah so so albany sits in a weird place and i'm gonna i'm gonna bore this is gonna be terrible no i know i know exactly what you're talking it sits down and you get more snow too sometimes yeah yeah so like we basically sit between where the air comes down from canada and where it comes up from the atlantic yeah so like um and this is mostly for the people listening since you know the area oh i forget there's other people listening yeah so like just you and me Yeah.
So the funny part is where those two systems smash into each other is literally like almost right where Albany is. So we get this weird thing where sometimes it'll be Vermont will be 10 degrees and we'll be 40 degrees.
And like, so people know Albany, New York is 20 minutes from Vermont. Like it's really, really close.
So, um, and then there'll be other times where, you know, where 20 minutes, 30 minutes South of Albany will be 50 degrees and we'll be 10. And it all just depends on which one of those systems is pushing harder on the other.
Um, so it's a very, it's a very, you know, our weather is odd and, uh, but this is the rainy season. So, you know, it's raining crazy we're playing baseball and parkas yeah it's funny it's like yeah we basically it's basically like cold jungle weather right now like that's that's how you do it so exactly so so dude i'm um so excited to have you on the show obviously we just recently met each other but i hit it off really well and uh immediately kind of connected with what you're doing.

But I would love for everyone who's listening, for everyone who just probably has never heard of your organization, give us the 10,000 foot. Give us the origin story.
Start to take us into this. Absolutely.
Absolutely. So I have ADHD.
And like a lot of of people I didn't know I had right or I kind of said I had it and would make jokes about my ADHD you know I had kids with ADHD I you know I went to the to the to the appointments did all this stuff drove people around, went through that horror of monthly getting prescriptions renewed and driving all across Vermont and people who live in rural areas. I know exactly what I'm talking about, right? But I never slowed down long enough to realize that I had ADHD until the pandemic hit.
And at the same time, I had a consulting business that I started that just got destroyed by the pandemic. I was creating a different way for buyers, and I had committed to a bunch of these events.
So I was up in Vermont, and I don't know if people on the podcast know, but Vermont was really locked down, and probably locked down for a decent reason is that

we didn't have a lot of hospitals. It's a rural state and we're like in between a bunch of cities and people with second homes, we were afraid would come up.
So I'm sitting alone, right, for a while in Vermont. And I knew I needed to do something else as far as a job.
I didn't know what the world was going to happen, but I figured that remote work was kind of here to stay. And so I got an idea to do a remote work center that would be configured for neurodivergent people, because I started understanding that they had different needs.
And then I kind of at some point saw that 60 minutes piece. And the 60 minutes piece is specific to autism.
So kind of even three years ago when I first got into this thing, neurodiversity. So like the new neurodiversity at work group is now called, used to be called autism at work.
So a lot of these neurodiverse, and it's easier to say autism and it's easier for people to understand autism, but it was really bigger. And then I realized it included me with ADHD.
So I started the process very innocently of thinking that I was going to be able to start a 501c3, and I would just do all this stuff, and one thing would lead to another. And what I would do is I would leverage my contacts among insurance executives that I have been selling technology to over the years to create a nonprofit that addresses the talent crisis that's in our industry.
Because if you look at any stat, right, we have 400,000 people probably in the next three to five years that are going to retire from the industry. And where is that talent going to come from? Already, other industries are starting to do predictive modeling and doing alternative forms of digital distribution.
So all those resources that might have kind of naturally fell into the insurance industry are now being actively poached by other industries. And a lot of those people are neurodivergent because neurodivergent people in general, right? Because if you tried to put a math problem in front of me, there wouldn't be a good chance of success.
you put a word puzzle in front of me and I'll destroy it, right? But in general, there's the neurodivergent people have the STEM skills and the data analysis skills and the spatial analysis skills that are so necessary to do innovation in a digital environment. So I think that's kind of start of it was, had a pandemic issue.
We had a guy who was motivated by a couple things, right? I was motivated by my personal story. And I was like, wow, I could really do something about this.
And then motivated, quite frankly, by the fact that I have ADHD. And when I find something I like, Like I put my teeth into it, and there's no stopping any of us.
And I just, and the farther I get ahead with things, and the more that I hit some kind of barrier, I just think about, oh, my God, these companies are missing out on all these people. And I think that's why you and I click so much, Ryan.
Yeah, right. Because we both had face the same thing.
It's like, I keep doing all these really great things and either somebody else takes credit for it. I get blamed for something that goes wrong and it's like, this doesn't work.
So we need to do better, not for the value so much of the ADHD or the neurodivergent people, but quite frankly, the industry depends upon us. Yeah, that's one of the things that, so yeah, I love that story.
And, you know, mine is very similar. More recent diagnosis, it was probably, it started in September.
I was, you know, I was dating this woman. Yeah.
We go out on a date. And we were having a great time.
And yeah, just at some point, she turns and looks at me. And you know, we're just having a we're having a great conversation.
And it was flowing. It was awesome.
And, and, and she looks at me, she goes, you know, you have ADHD, right? Stop for a second. And she wasn't saying it as a knock.
She said, she looked at me and she goes, she goes, I have ADHD. And it like clicked that the reason that she and I were getting along so well was because she could follow this, the talk patterns.
Right. And it didn't drive her nuts or confuse her or, you know, I find, you know, and then, you know, so then that started me down the path.
And then about a month later, I went and saw my doctor and I took, you know, I took some, she gave me some, to be honest, we don't even know what it was. And she just basically said, yes.
She's like, you could do a whole battery of tests to find out what exactly the spec, you know, on the spectrum, where, but nobody really knows either. that's the thing and that's what she said she was she was one word that there's not enough science

yet to say like you're a 17 versus of this right or you're an xyz two or yeah yeah she goes and she goes to do you really care like now that you know you have it you definitely do she goes go read what it means and whatever so i and here's the thing and this is gonna you know for people who are listening i don't know and i i know i've been talking about a little bit on the podcast as i've grown but like so just like you when you have something like when your brain works this way you when you when you get a bone you can't help but like hold on to it right like you just you have to go down that path now i've been reading about about all, you know, what it, you know, how your brain works, how your, the narrative of your mind work, how the interconnectivity of ideas works. And then, and this has been the biggest key for me.
And I think I've made an enormous leap in my leadership abilities and in my communication abilities. And actually I have a quick case study from last week to share with you that I wanted to share with you as a success story.
But now that I know, so I was always branded. I've always been branded, excitable, troublemaker.
Disruptive. Yeah, disruptive.
I make decisions too fast. Just you know, all these things.
And I was like, man, I don't feel that way. You know, I'm, I'm a fairly self-aware dude.
Like I really take to heart what people say as a way to improve. And I'm like, geez, I don't feel I'm not doing this to cause trouble.
I'm not just jumping to a conclusion in my brain. I've cycled this through a thousand times.
You know, I, I don't understand, you know, so I've never understood it. And then all of a sudden when this diagnosis hit and I started reading into it, it was like, whack.
Yeah. They are, their brains work different that, you know, there's only, so 20% of the population is neurodivergent, right? From your, from your video and the research that you shared.
And I'm like, this makes complete sense because I have had people throughout my life. Most people in my life find me to be quote unquote too much.
Really that was my ex-wife's, my ex-wife's biggest beef with me is that I was too much, right? Everything I fell in love with you. I hate about you now.
I've heard that. Yes, yeah, yeah, exactly, exactly.
You've changed, you're this. I'm like, I don't really think I've changed.
I think if anything, I'm probably more of the things that I love. But wait a second, Ryan, and I'm gonna interrupt you because you'll love this if you haven't heard it.
So do you know that ADHD brains continue to develop through our lives, whereas other neurotypical people, their brains, they stop developing. So like where you'll continue to have interests your whole life, like you'll find new music, you'll find new art, you'll find new hobbies.
Your spouse is like, what is this? We already have this cool relationship and now you're out here trying to mess it up. So I didn't mean to interrupt you.
No, no, that's one. I did not know that too.
Again, these, it's like so many, when I, when this, when this finally, you know, and I know that people, people have been listening to me for a long time. I'm like, duh, Ryan, we've known for like 10 years that you've had this, you know, but like when I finally let it sink into my brain and then had, I literally had my doctor, you know, this woman that I was dating said it and in a very nice way, you know what I mean? It wasn't like you're trying to be a jerk.
And then, and then my doctor confirmed it. I was like, it was like the biggest exhale like I've ever had in my life.
I was like, Oh my God, everything. I know.
It doesn't stop either. It keeps going more and more and more.
Cause like I've got into a bunch of this stuff about eating. So I don't know if you can tell, but I'm like six, four, so I can hide weight.
But because I am also six, four, just so you know. Okay.
So, you know, like, so right. I could blow up to 250 pounds and people wouldn't really know it that well.
And that's what I did. But like I've dropped 20 pounds in the last little bit.
But the more I read about it, I'm a sugar addict. I'm also an alcoholic.
But the alcoholism is from ADHD and the sugar stuff is with ADHD, too. So all those sugar spikes, they're just riding ADHD waves.
And it just so like something as simple as nutrition for everyone is important.

But for us, it's even more important. And I know autistic people have all sorts of diet issues.
That sugar thing is really so I haven't done enough research on it, but I was reading an article about this. how because of the dynamic nature of the way our brains operate um they almost they they send out more signals for it creates dopamine yeah it creates dopamine the food becomes associated with the dopamine and we can't get dopamine so once we get it we can't get off of it and the sugar just rides the high and then it creates more because then we're excited and what happens when we get excited we get more excited that's why we're fun as hell to be around yeah that's you know it's funny you know that that's another thing that and again i'm not knocking my ex-wife because now i actually i actually said to her the other day as much as i hate to give her i hate to give we have we actually have a good working relationship in life so it's not you know whatever but like I just said to her, I hate to give it.
We have, we actually have a good working relationship in life, so it's not, you know, whatever, but like, I just said to her, like, I was like, I, it's going to cause me so much pain to say this to you, but I can kind of understand why I drove you nuts. I can kind of understand why I did, you know, it's funny, you know, and then obviously she's like, ah, you know, yeah, yeah, whatever, you're not giving me shit, but, but so, wanted to share I wanted to share a success case study success study with you so okay so for most of my career when I would present it again now looking back on it it would be like I would be like bludgeoning people with ideas it would just be idea after idea after idea, after concept, after I'm just like pounding people and people would literally be like, I could see in their physical reaction, like leaning back in their chairs, like enough, like, Oh my God, you know, it'd be too much for them.
And, and it wouldn't come off well, you know, it would be, it would be, I, I, I'd hear like things like that's an impressive amount of ideas, but they're not parsed together.

Well, yes, yes.

I'm like, but they are.

Can't you see it?

Yeah, yeah.

This, this, this, this.

Yes.

Yes.

But going right.

Yeah.

So that that's been my experience.

Okay.

So last week we had our annual review with SIA, our parent company.

So every year we go in and I take a few members of the, of our leadership team and we sit down and we present our annual results. This was the first year that we did it.
We did it at six months because it was the first year that we had bought and whatever. We'll probably do it every six months.
But so, so we sit down and this year, knowing the way that I am, I built the presentation in a way I practiced in a certain way. And literally I found, and this was crazy is that I could almost for a period of time, turn the crazy contextual, I don't want to say turn it off, but I could, I could control it.
I could say to myself, don't follow. Yeah.
I really want to go down this rabbit hole. Cause this is really interesting.
but I could say no don't do it and I stayed very focused and I and first and this was like a six hour six hour back and forth presentation and it was a lot to it yeah and at the end uh my my boss Matt Macielo came up to me and said I know how hard that was for you to do because he understands and appreciates, you know, what's going on. And he said, I know how hard that was for you to do.
Cause he understands and appreciates, you know, what's going on. And, um, and he said, and you, you did a, you did a really good job.
Right. And that was like one of the best professional compliments that I had ever received.
One, just Matt's, Matt's an incredible guy and probably one of the best executives I've ever worked with. In so much as he was able and willing to understand that I do have this crazy brain and that was difficult for me to stay on point and flow through in a narrative that everyone could follow and made sense.
And he was willing to come up and say that. And I was like, oh, my, like I've literally turned a corner, like having an understanding to what this is, is now I can, when I want to go full idea, let's just dominate.
I can turn that on. And now I know for periods of time, I don't think I could have sustained it for too much longer, but for periods of time, I could actually dial it down and it's all just, it's knowledge.
So, so and now I'll shut up. No, it's great.
No, it's spectacular, Ryan. It really is.
So two things. One, having the knowledge, appreciation and self-awareness of myself now, I can actually understand what's going on and do some changes myself, and then this is the part that I think is the most interesting and really where I want to take the next part of our conversation is having a leader in someone like Matt Massiello, who can give me the space to be the crazy idea divergent person who, who, who wants to run at 10,000 miles an hour, but, but is going to also hold me to the fact that in certain settings, I need to dial it in and appreciate when I do that type of leadership.
That's what I, okay. So here's my question.
How do we, how do we start to cultivate an appreciation for the 20% of the population who can add tremendous value that are neurodivergent? How do we start to get more leaders to appreciate this and be the type of leaders who can give those people the space they need and still hold them accountable? Yes. So I love the way one, you told me this story, and also the way you phrased the question.
And I may only like it because it just reinforces exactly what we're doing, right? What we're doing, because we know the insurance industry and the we is a group of people kind of that I've gathered over the last two or three years, as this issue has emerged in their lives and mine. But we know the insurance industry is an industry of not taking chances, right? So it's by nature risk averse.
And so human resources organizations by nature are human are risk averse. So when you combine a human resources organization in an insurance organization, that entity asking that entity to start doing things that are riskier and outside the box, I just don't think is something that can work.
So what our approach is to find those leaders exactly like you just mentioned, Ryan, and to do small pilots that that leader can sponsor within his or her organization. So it's one, two, three people.
And there's two things that need to take place. And you mentioned them both.
So the first thing is the manager needs to be trained, right? The manager needs to be aware of what's going on. The manager to get that training, it's not tough.
I mean, just to get a general level of awareness, I would think between an hour and two hours. So I've developed kind of some initial education, just basic stuff on a Learn Worlds page that we're trying to take to the level right now.
Most of the information comes from the Neurodiversity at Work people and Judy Riley at UConn. So, and I'm sorry, I'm starting to drift here, but so specifically to leadership.
So we need to get that leader engaged. Then we need to get that leader to train his manager, or maybe that leader is the manager.
And then the next thing that happens is we need to have mentorship. So if you use you as the example, right? Ryan Hanley needs to be aware that he has ADHD, right? And once Ryan becomes aware, he then needs tools that he can take that awareness and translate it into the business world.
So that consciousness gets created, right? Because the problem that people, what we have is a lack of executive function. And that executive function is what stops us and stops neurotypical people in a presentation from going down 14 different things and jamming in so much data that a neurotypical people couldn't couldn't make it couldn't make it work so i like to refer to them as normies normies i love it too yeah i know especially when i get mad at them because i don't have as much executive function right after all the hate that i've received and negativity that i've received throughout my life for my brain working the way it does, I feel completely comfortable.
I know, I know, I know, I know, I know, exactly. So you have to have that awareness among all three groups of people.
It has to be the employee or the professional, right? It has to be the manager and it has to be the leader that gives this space within the organization to make it happen. And so we're working on all three of those levels through the neurodiversity and friends organization that you joined.
And you were so nice to sponsor us. And I really appreciate it.
Yeah, yeah. No, and, and, and I'm at the, at the end, I want to get all the info out so that everybody knows where to go.
And yeah, yeah, yeah. Cause I know there's a lot of people and, and, you know, and, and what's funny is, you know, is since I've started talking about on the show and in social media and stuff, you know, my kind of journey, realizing this about myself and trying to, to not, you know, one thing that I immediately said to myself, one, it's just not my nature, but I immediately said to myself was, um, did no part of this makes me a victim in any way.
No, it's not an excuse to be a jerk. It's not an excuse to be a jerk.
It's not an excuse to blame. Like, here's the thing.
Like, you know, I can think of some of the, some of the people who fired me, right. who had problems with the way that I acted in the way, you know, like, you know, I was fired

from probably my favorite job that I've ever had, except for rogue risk. Um, uh, previous to rogue risk, which, which is my, you know, the best thing I've ever done, but like, and, and, and there was really the, the, the divergent moment, not to use that word too much, but was when, um, he believed that I was coming after his job.
And, and the reason he thought that is because just, I was, again, as I became more and more comfortable with the problems in the business and had a larger understanding of what was going on, I started to just say, I can solve this problem. And not like me personally necessarily, but like, I know these two team members together here, they can do this.
And, you know, and again, in all fairness to him, I also told the CFO to get out of the way because I would just solve the problem that he was complaining about. So, you know, I'm not- Yeah, well, you don't have executive, you have the guy, there's a doctor that describes, I don't know if you've ever heard of him, Ned Holleran, have you ever heard of that guy? So he calls ADHD.
He says, it's like having a race car engine with bicycle brakes. Yes.
And that what you have to do is you have to build up your brakes. And that's the part that's not an excuse that cognitive in its cognitive behavior therapy.
And that's why I love golf so much. Yeah, because golf, there's nobody else out there that's responsible for anything but you and you and I and that's actually how I started getting into the place where I could listen to people tell me that I have ADHD because I slowed down.
I was trying to become a better golfer. So I was doing breathing exercises and stuff.
And then I thought, wow, what if I did this in real life and it worked? You know, I, you know, I, for me, I'd say, um, and this is going to sound, hopefully this doesn't sound weird to people, but two of the things that have really helped me center and focus is I started reading the Bible and I started reading a lot about stoicism. And I find that those are the two best, in my personal opinion, if you can live by some mix of the Bible and stoicism, you probably have the best guidebook for life.
And it's all about pacing and do, you know, doing the hard things first. And, you know, all these kinds of things were like, you're not going to allow, like, look, have I have, have people, I think wrongly, you know, this is like the two sides of my brain.
Like have people, do I feel wrongly judged my mentality to think it's something other than me just trying to be incredibly helpful and, and whatever. Yes, I do.
But on the other side, that's not an excuse for the fact that I also most likely didn't position myself in a way that made them, that I probably- But that doesn't make you bad, right? It doesn't make you bad. You just made a mistake you didn't know, right? So that's the thing.
Well, people with ADHD have high suicide rates too, because we feel so much and we worry about like when you said i'm self-aware believe me i know you're self-aware yeah you're your worst critic and that's why it's hard to be around us too yeah because like i'll i may criticize other people but i think wow and not verbally criticize but just assess what they're doing very strongly i'm like wow I'm being nice to them imagine yeah you're way worse yeah you're way worse on yourself you're way worse you know what it's like it's like living 24 7 with an exposed nerve that's what it feels like like you are you are sensitive and I don't mean sensitive in like the feelings kind of way I mean you're like no like- No, you are sensitive because you can't control it. You don't have control of your executive function of your brain and it's chemical.
I mean, we're not talking about Eastern mysticism here. These are chemicals that neuroscientists are able to identify.
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So please tell me if you've seen this, is that research all changes to Ryan. I mean, you know, you, so go ahead.
Yeah.

I just, I found that the better I eat and the more I dial in my diet, the more pot, like the more positive my brain is. And the more like I day, uh, I had a couple of drinks last night, but I went about four days without having a drink.
And I'll tell you the fourth day, I felt like I literally, you could have given me any task and I could have dominated. Like I felt so dialed in.
It was like, you know, obviously I'm not as smart as that guy from like a beautiful mind, but like that kind of idea of like the, like the swirling numbers around your head and connecting things. Like it was like that kind of shit was happening.
And like at one time, and I said to myself, I was like, Whoa, you know, as much as I love fucking booze, um, because at the end of the day, I just, I have not yet found a great way to land the ship. I'm still working on that.
But, but at one time I had three Slack conversations going on. I was creating, publishing a blog post.
I was also working on an insurance account and I had three text messages, conversations going on about a little league baseball. Cause there was like some, there was like a bunch of shit happening yesterday.
All of this is happening at one time. And to be honest with you, I was cool as a cucumber.
I was just like, like I wasn't stressed. I wasn't overwhelmed.
We like it better. We're more comfortable when there there's more stress so the more stress that happens the better we do yeah it's like it's funny like I get I was talking to my counselor the other day and I said I feel like I have a 12-cylinder engine that someone threw a fucking golf cart governor on you know what I mean that's a race car engine bicycle brakes i'll send you that

little thing it's it's cool i'll send it to you right away after this yeah it's so it's so wild like um because you just like i just thought i'll be honest with you there's times when i thought that i was nuts i was like i was just saying like armor you are but there's nothing wrong with that yeah yeah well i thought i guess i thought that there was something wrong with it you know know what I mean? Like, what is, like, what is wrong with me? And I would go, yeah. Why am I bad? Yeah.
Yeah. What, why I'd say, why do I react that way? Or why do I have to be that way? Or why, you know, why, especially when I was married, because just, you know, again, my wife is a perfectly fine woman or my ex-wife is a perfectly fine woman, but we were not a good fit.
Yeah. You know, from a mental standpoint, mental standpoint i'm like yeah i don't understand why i drive her so crazy like i didn't understand i don't understand why i drive my boss so crazy i don't understand why i drive this other person in the company like i don't understand you know and now i do because if i walk into a situation with certain people yeah and i give them full fire hose, they are going to hate it.
And, and, you know, that's not their fault. You know what I mean? I used to think, I used to either blame, you know, cause I could, cause I didn't know.
I would at one time be both blaming them and blaming myself. You know, I'd be like, what's going on? I know.
You know, I don't understand that. And that's what would cause me stress.
You give me a mountain of work and, and the tools to get it done. You could, you could pile it on me all day.
It's why I'm a, I love it. I love it.
I am a hardcore. And again, this is people be like, ah, the mat, you know, I'll say I, some days I work 12, some days I'm up till two in the morning, 14 hours in still plugging along.
No problem. And people will be like, that's not healthy.
And I'm like, I like it. I like it.
This isn't like I feel obligated to do it. Absolutely.
It's like, I like it. And now, unfortunately, that I found AI, I'm like a kid in a candy store.
Now it's like, I'm piecing these tools to get, this is like a new, just a new thing that I've done. And it's, it's like, I don't know.
It has been wild, man. It's been absolutely wild.
So I have, I have a couple of questions. Okay.
How do we, so, okay. So let's say someone's out there listening to this and they've been able to make it through the first 20, 34 minutes of this conversation.
And they're like, Hey, I can, I feel like I'm the type of leader or we're the type of organization that would like to be able to find neurodivergent people that are willing to help bring neurodivergent people in, give them opportunities, harness their skills. Right? Because I do think it's a superpower.
I honestly believe I am better than all the normies. Yeah.
And that's only partially a joke, guys. It is partially a joke, but it's not a joke to me, because for some things, you are better.
For some things, you ain't. I will say better in certain areas.
What I you know, you, what I find is, um, I have friends that are leaders and I, so I talked to a lot, I like talking, obviously I talking to people and I like hearing how other people manage and the way they do things. Absolutely.
And what I find is my friends who are, who I believe are, are great leaders, um, who maybe aren't neurodivergent, they have a higher average levels of skill sets, right? So if you took all their different skills and averaged them, the level would be much higher than me. But I find, but what I think, and I've seen this in some of my friends who I believe to be neurodivergent, if they don't already know, is that they have these things that in some categories, they may be zeros, but then in other categories, they, they're, they're pinned at a hundred and they have, the spikes are much higher.
You have a much more, a much wider range in your skill sets is what, what I found is that Absolutely. That's what you find? And why that bumps into the hiring, the standard hiring process and why the standard hiring process is failing to deliver innovative skills is that risk aversion thing I said.
Because the HR people, they are literally trying to find normie. Because if you're in HR, you don't want to hire somebody who has a chance of being really great or really bad.
Because if they're really great, all of a sudden, why can't you do this over and over again? And if they're really bad, it's like, oh my God, how did you let this person who showed up with their shirt on backwards to this interview? Like you're crazy. Like, so think, but if you think about it like that, it makes a lot of sense.
We're just weeding out all of the special performers. So that is the main thing that needs to get changed on the HR level.
And that change is so big. That's why if that leader we're talking to, we need to get that leader to contact me right now as we start directly and say, hey, I'm interested in doing this.
And that's what we're gathering right now. We're trying to gather between five and 10 insurance leaders.
We probably have three right now, three or four, who will come up with a few projects. We have the talent that's sitting on the back end.
So that leader who wants to hire people, if they can talk to me, we can work out about 15 or 20 minutes, come up with a generalized job description. And then Connor and the people at Mentra.
So Mentra is a group of autistic graduates of Georgia Tech, and they've created a platform for identifying talents early, because with neurodivergent people, the important thing is, let's see how Mike grew over time. So how Mike learned how to show up on time, Mike learned how to do what you said before about the presentation, get that presentation down.
And if somebody who's hiring can see that as a freshman, Mike was doing this, but as a junior, he was doing this. Wow.
That's a huge gap. I can take a chance on this person because of this kind of consistent behavior.
And then that platform carries that neurodivergent skills, how they were able to work, what accommodations were needed, so that eventually that data base gets built up enough where we can start automating searches, right? So that's the place where we're at right now. We're gathering data so that we can move to an automotive environment.
I like the idea of a more systematic approach because like we need less people finding out that they're neurodivergent in their forties, right? Like, you know, if I knew, if I knew in my early thirties or even my, my mid twenties or earlier, even, you know, I don't know when it really hardcore presented. Um, I feel like as I've gotten older, it's gotten, well, now I'm going to say better, but before I would have said worse, um, how old are you late thirties? Is that what you said? I'm 42.
Yeah, see, I think that kids that are maybe five to 10 years younger than you, I don't think that's as much as a problem.

I think that the, I think you're might be right on the edge of it because most of the data that I see says the problem we're having right now is kids are graduating to their parents' couches who've been able to demonstrate success in secondary school and even at the university level with an individual education plan. And that individual education plan says where you're going to work, how you're going to work, and it's just a set of guidelines that is built for the person.
And a couple of my kids had, I don't think I ever had a kid with an IEP, but my kids were, two of them were on kind of regular counseling and medication for ADHD. One, we never, the poor thing, we denied that I can, I can, and we, my wife and I, it's probably me more responsible for anything.
But we came to the conclusion that my middle child didn't have ADHD, but she did. And we didn't realize that until now she's 21 or 22.
And I helped there because now I understand it more. So I guess that's a long-winded way of saying, I think some of that's happening.
The point that I'm trying to put my finger on, which is why I'm working with Judy Riley at UConn, is that place where you move from the university into the workforce. And to me, there's the most value there because that's where we can maybe help the universities fine tune what they're doing, right? Because once again, make it a two-way street instead of a one-way street.
So we make a group of people in the industry who are already there aware of the fact that they have ADHD. And I think that happens in general.
But what we want to do is offer the tools to say, okay, you just found out you're 44 years old, 56, however old you are, right? You just found out that you have ADHD. And what does that mean for me as an insurance professional? So Neurodiversity and Friends is the association of neurodivergent insurance professionals and their friends, because I didn't want to get into a disclosure issue that anyone who joined it would have to disclose something.
So that organization that you joined then becomes kind of the place where we can have mentors. So I realize I'm neurodivergent.
I take education. I become a mentor.
And that's happening kind of on the industry. And then on the other side, we're working with recruiting people because that's where the real bang for the buck is for the industry itself.
Who's going to pay for this stuff? Because at the end of the day, somebody has to pay this huge money in it, too. That's the thing.
I mean, I think I'm personally, as far as supporters work, we have no money right now and we really need support, but eventually the industry is going to understand enough of what we're doing and they're going to be able to. Well, one of the things I'm going to help you with for sure is getting some fundraising.
There are plenty of people out in the ecosystem who would be, I think, more than happy to help support this cause and help support this. Cause look like talent's the biggest issue.
And I know, you know, a lot of the people that I run with, you know, in the, in the industry, they're, they're, they're success driven, right? That that's what it's about. It's about, you know, we, you know, people laugh at me when I joke about world domination, but like the conversations and the people that I talk to, we're looking for primetime players, right?

We're looking for moves.

We want to move the needle.

We're not involved in people.

And if you can find out, you know, if we find out that someone who has autism is just a dominates as an underwriter or as a as a account and eight, you know, people with ADHD, put them out, you know, give them some training and some tools and put them out on the front lines as a producer and they digital producers. Yeah.
I mean, you put a person with ADHD as a producer with the right kind of tools. Jesus.
I mean, yeah. So it's like, there are plenty of people that I think that I believe will, will are going to be very interested in what we're talking about.
It's why I was so excited to get you on. I am obviously, you know, I've already told you, I want to be a mentor.
I want to be part of it. You know, we're the sponsorship that I gave was just to get involved.
I know that buddy. We're not really, we haven't been ready to be able to, because I don't like taking people's money unless I know exactly where every penny is going in exactly how things are going to be done.
Right. And we're there right now.
I think it's especially good, you know, that it's a nonprofit organization and all this kind of stuff. And I think you're going to have a tremendous amount of success.
So, um, you know, I, I, I think, uh, I think I'm going to follow up on that point with one thing. So I was talking with a woman from Liberty Mutual.
And one of the things that she's she recognized that Liberty and Liberty is a kind of a leader in this area, specifically around autism. They work with Mass General's Aspire program, and that Aspire program is specific to autism.

But they have been doing that for a while.

Actually, Liberty was one of the companies that one of my friends said, hey, you should look at what they're doing to try to copy it. Well, this woman and you'll meet Kara, too.
Are you do you go to Pima in New Orleans? OK, so we're going to be now. Yeah, we're going to be down there and Matt will be there.
I mean, we can talk later about that. Anyway, so what she was saying was that Liberty knows that they need to do mentorship, right? They have enough knowledge of the issue, but they don't want Liberty to be the mentor.
Because if I am an employee of Liberty and I'm asking someone who's my mentor about, should I disclose the fact that I have ADHD or should I disclose the fact that I have dyslexia and I've been hiding it as part of my, like, there's a lot of things there. So she was so happy to say, yes, we need an extra or a, you know, a nonprofit third party organization to be the AGEUS and to be the sponsorship for this mentorship organization and to have the certification of knowledge that we're not spreading a bunch of nonsense around.
Right. And have, and people, people want to do the right thing.
They just need guardrails. Yeah.
Yeah. You know, I do think that, you know, I love that.
I love that. And so I, I guess my one, one, I guess, how do we, all right, I have a couple of questions.
Sorry. So my first question is one, I think it's very, you've mentioned it multiple times and I think it's very interesting.
I am, I am by nature, a very transparent person. So for me talking about the fact that I have ADHD, I don't care if you, I just simply don't care.
But, but I can understand that some people would. And could you maybe just briefly talk about some people who maybe might not understand what, why do people have to hide the fact that maybe they have a neurodivergency and, and, you know, what, what does that look like? Because it's interesting to me that someone who like say is dyslexic, sorry, would hide that because they'd be worried that maybe they'd be retaliated against or put in a box or possibly not given a promotion? Is that the idea? It's absolutely it.
So one of the biggest issues in neurodiversity is, and the term if you want to do a search on it, is disclosure, right? Should I disclose or not? And when I disclose and how I disclose are all of these issues. So if you think about should I disclose, right? Well, if you're going for a job interview and one of the things of the job interview, so say I'm me going for a job interview to be an executive salesperson and I tell them that I have ADHD.
And what goes on in their mind? This guy's not going to show up. This guy's going to miss his plane.
This guy's not going to follow up on emails. That's the, and it's legitimate too, right? Because if I just say I have ADHD, that probably might not be the best thing.
But you might say I have a certain set of skills that are associated with my ADHD that need to be managed to get the best out of me, right? So there's a whole bunch of playbooks for how to disclose, when to disclose. And a lot of that is the work that the neurodiversity at work group that SAP founded.
But that's the gist of that. It's like, is this going to hurt me for a job? And it's on, and when you fill out a job application too, right? It's that same thing.
Do you really want to do it? And it's mixed up in the fact that a lot of neurodivergent people, because they have those executive function challenges, they don't have control of their emotions when they're doing it. So they may be making a mountain out of a mohill.
Yeah. Anyway, so they're happy.
And when you live in a secretive world that you're always different and you're doing workarounds all the time, right? So I grew up just doing workarounds. That's why I won't listen to anybody because when I listen listen to people, it doesn't work when I do it my way.
It may be a little messy, but wow, it turns out a lot of times I'm better at things than you. Yeah.
So does that does that answer your question? It does. It does a lot.
You know, yeah, it's also ADA. I mean, it's also HIPAA, too.
Yeah. Right.
So if I start collecting information about all these people who've told me that they have an ADA covered disability, all of a sudden that brings a level of responsibility. I mean, I messed around with that just before I could even put up my CRM together because I was like, oh my God, I'm, to me, it's a, it's a, it's a two, I think one way to solve that problem as well

is finding, we'll call them neurodivergent, neurodivergent friendly organizations who you

can feel comfortable disclosing that information to, and who will understand, Hey, you know, yeah,

maybe I have to send two Slack messages instead of one to get this person to take action. But I think but the awareness, it's exactly what you're talking.
So it's leadership awareness. And then we can make a few companies, the neurodivergent friendly companies.
And then within the industry, we want our industry to be the place where if someone's neurodivergent, you go, oh, the insurance industry is the perfect place for you. If you're a college guidance counselor, that's what I want to have happen.
I want the college guidance counselor at your local college to have a group of neurodivergent students that they've identified and say, hey, you know, you really should think about the insurance industry. And here's why, because they employ people whose brains are like yours.
These people have had success and to be able to do that. Now that take 10 years, but it's worth it because the industry, if we don't start attracting people, there's nobody to do.
And you talk about a hero underwriter, a hero underwriter might be somebody who shows up to work because there's no underwriters. Yeah.
You know, it's, it's funny to me. Our industry complains so much about talent, right? We can't find talent.
We can't find talent. Well, we just said 20% of the population is neurodivergent.
Okay. Now I can tell you as someone who's in that 20%, when I walk into your stuffy ass office with your eight to three, the only way I get hired is through friends.
Well, you walk in, that person walks in, they're going to walk in, they're going to 180 and walk right back out. They're going to look at that environment and go, there's no way I can exist in this space.
Insurance is not sexy. People don't, when you're in college, you don't say, Hey man, I want to go into the insurance industry.
Well, maybe for this group, it could be sexy. Yeah, exactly.
This was my whole mission at agency nation at agency nation and like Sid Rowe and everyone there could, could tell you back at, you know, back in 2014 to 2018, my entire mission building that platform was to shit was to basically convince, independent insurance professionals that what they did was important it was fun it was exciting it was sexy right that you're selling shit you're a fucking salesperson like this is fun stuff it doesn't have to be boring and we're nerdy as shit right like we read these policy forms and it's crazy and it's like you know and and i and, and, and I look at it and I'm like this, you know, things

like, you know, when you think about like some, like, and people who don't have ADHD

may not understand this, but like when you, when you have this thing in your brain, when

you get something on your brain, you cannot get it off.

And I don't mean that as like an excuse or whatever.

I mean, it's like, it owns space in your brain until you satisfy whatever research

Thank you. mean that as like an excuse or whatever i mean it's like it owns space in your brain until you satisfy whatever research nerdy deep dive you have to do to to satisfy that it literally just rents space in your brain you can't get it out so like exactly you find these people you know if you could find someone say say with adhd i don't i don't know the other types of neurodivergent as well I would say just the way I'm experience and the research I've done absolutely just speaking to people with ADHD yeah give them you teach them how to sell show them they can make shit tons of money on their own time with their own schedule in their own way in the areas like like I have a woman who works for me who is ADHD and she came to me and put a whole proposal in front of me about how she wants one of her, uh, one of her primary niches to be adult toy stores.
Right now, a lot of, a lot of agency principles would have ran for the freaking Hills. It would have been like warning sign warning.
I was like, I'm looking through this thing going, wow, this actually looks like a pretty cool frigging. There's a lot of risk there that a lot of people don't want to cover.
Good for you. Yes.
And I was like rock and roll. Right.
And for her and I can, one, I can tell she was ADHD, but just by talking to her and us being able to communicate the way we could, the way she approached this particular niche and the way she defined it and the fact that she even considered it. Right.
Yeah. Showed me that, you know, that this was the thing I'm going, wow, this could be a nice little niche, very profitable, very consistent that no other agents would go after.
But because this, I gave this person the space to kind of think to what she wanted to go after and let her do her own research. Here's, here's, here's this thing.
And that to me, like, guys, you're looking for talent, you know, open your minds. Maybe if you, if your brain doesn't work this way, do some training, like, you know, working with, with, when you get your trainings up and getting involved there, this opens up a whole world of talent that we could bring in.
That could be, that could help you dominate what you want to do. I just, I just can't believe that more, but yeah, you know, you're, yeah.
Uh, Mike, this has been incredible. I'm sure it'll be the first of many times.
Um, uh, okay. So we've gotten to the point of the show where I want, where do people go? Where can they donate? Where can they learn more? How do they get involved? What are the, where's the place that they go? So the easiest, there's a couple places, but the easiest place to start would be the Independence Hub.
So theindependencehub.org. And that's our website.
I'm also, we have a LinkedIn webpage. Okay.
And both of those places are great places to store. Okay.
And we have all of our information on there. Guys, I will have the website link as well, the LinkedIn page and Mike's LinkedIn all in the show notes too.
So if you're listening- Give them my email too, Mike at the Independence Hub. Just drop me an email.
So if you're listening to something, yeah, if you're listening to something, treadmill or in the show notes too. So if you're listening, give them my email to Mike at the independence hub, just, just drop me an email.
Yeah. If you're listening to something on a treadmill or in the car or whatever, just, you can go to the show notes page at ryanhandley.com.
You can find all the links or just Google everything. You'll find it.
But you know, I think that this is one, just being a capitalist. I think that working with people who are neurodivergent and finding ways to bring them into your organization is just a pure growth plan.
The business imperative, Kelly Greer, who worked at, I mean, she's not there anymore at Ernst & Young. She was the highest executive that I've seen.
I'm going to send you to that 60 Minutes article. But she said, for us, make no doubt about it.
This is a business imperative because they need people who can spot trends that they don't know are happening. This is an innovation economy.
It's not a resource exploitation economy. And then the faster that you realize, the more different kind of brains that you have on the problem, the better off you'll be.

Yeah, I love that.

The last thing I want to say before we wrap up here is if you're listening to this and you are neurodivergent or you think you are, get involved, follow along. And really, you can talk to Mike or guys, you can also, I'm always here.

I'm going to be a mentor as part of the official program. But if you need to talk to somebody or you have questions or you're frustrated by something,

I'm always here. I'm going to be a mentor as part of the official program.
But if you need to talk to somebody or you have questions or you're frustrated by something, I'm also always around and willing to talk specifically. You know, right now I'm very interested in this topic.
So I'm happy to help you guys. I'm happy to talk about things that I went through.
And, you know, again, give me the space that really my awakening has really only been September of last year, so less than a year. But I feel like I can share a lot of, just in that short amount of time, awareness has changed a lot.
So I encourage you guys to dig in, to not feel different, not feel weird, not feel wrong, not feel like a troublemaker. Even if you are, you most likely are, but don't feel bad about don't feel bad money for troublemakers.
They're called disruptors. I mean, every single company in the world wants disruptors except for their HR organization.
Mike, appreciate the hell out of you, man. Love that we got connected.
Big shout out to Stacey King who connected two of us. Big shout out to Stacey King.
Thank you, Stacey. Yeah, who connected to us.
All right, everybody. We're out of here.
Awesome. Thanks, Ryan.
Bye. Bye.
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