DARTmind

I’ve never felt comfortable with some of the words we use to describe ADHD.

Deficit. Disorder. Disability.

Don’t get me wrong, I understand why they’re there, and I’m not minimising the challenges a lot of people with ADHD face. Disorder is the clinical term and a diagnosis can open the door to support and treatment. For many people, recognising ADHD as a disability is exactly what protects them at work.

But when I found out about my own ADHD, after more than 20 years in corporate marketing, those words didn’t describe the brain I’d been living with. They only described what it got wrong.

So I started calling it something else to myself. DART: Dynamic Attention, Rapid Thinking.

I like it because the words are neutral. They don’t decide for you whether it’s a good day or a bad one.

Dynamic can mean scattered. It can also mean the person in the room who connects three ideas nobody else had put together.

Rapid can mean racing thoughts as you’re trying to fall asleep. It can also mean seeing the answer before the problem has been fully explained.

Same brain. Different day, different setting.

And a dart needs a target, momentum and a flight path to land anywhere useful, which is what gets me motivated and is pretty much what coaching offers.

I know not everyone will see themselves in this. Some people with ADHD spend a lot of their time frozen by overwhelm. Some find their challenges with executive function disabling every single day, and a new name doesn’t change that. Strengths don’t cancel out challenges and I’d never pretend they do.

What I want to change is where we start. Since finishing my first ADHD coaching course, I’ve been thinking about the kind of coach I want to be. I want to begin with who someone is on a good day: what they’re brilliant at, what gives them energy, when they lose track of time in a good way. Then look honestly at what’s actually disabling them.

Very often a big part of that is the environment around them. Back-to-back meetings, open-plan noise, endless admin, a 9 to 5 built for a different kind of brain. That part can change.

This is strengths-based coaching, which is how I’ve approached mentoring and developing teams for over a decade. Now I’m applying it to ADHD in the corporate workplace, the world I know best.

So far it’s become two things. The DARTmind Method, a coaching approach I’ve developed, grounded in research on solution-focused coaching, strengths, motivation and neurodiversity at work. And The DART Journal, a daily planner for ADHD brains.

Both are works in progress. I’m now doing ICF-accredited coach training, reading the latest research and learning from other coaches. I fully expect my thinking to keep moving, but I wanted to sound you out. If DART resonates with you, or doesn’t, I’d love to hear why.

Because what I care about most is helping people unlock what they’re capable of and thrive at work, not just get through it.

Available on Etsy - RRP £12.99 or free with a coaching programme.