Employees with autism spectrum disorders are usually unable to find even the simplest jobs, but recently they have been seen as a valuable resource that HR professionals are after. Autistic people remain highly concentrated when doing monotonous work, are not distracted, have an attention to detail, and may have extensive knowledge in an area of interest to them. 

Major corporations, such as Microsoft and SAP, and small businesses like modernization and renovation companies are increasingly hiring employees with autism. For their sake, it is necessary to change corporate rules, abandon standard job interviews and assign special assistants, but the result fully pays for itself. A million-dollar job market on the margins of progressive society.

A valuable resource

Most people with Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD) cannot get a job – they have trouble communicating, don’t fit into corporate boundaries and rarely make a good impression in job interviews. According to National Autism Indicators, only 14 percent of citizens with ASD had a job in the U.S. in 2017 and 15 percent in the U.K.. 

But recently, employers have seen the strengths of autistic people and are now specifically looking for such candidates. They benefit from high concentration and attention to detail, they do not get bored with monotonous, repetitive work, they are good at finding patterns, so it is not surprising that they are becoming in demand in a wide variety of fields.

Autism spectrum disorders are a continuum of neurodevelopmental disorders manifested by a significant deficit in social communication and social interaction, and a limited (narrow) and repetitive repertoire of behaviors, interests and activities. 

Major features of ASD include, but are not limited to, 

• problems with understanding and appreciating the emotions of others; 
• difficulties with understanding body language and other non-verbal expressions of others; 
• difficulties with making eye contact and using gestures. 

Also present are stereotypies (or stymies) – constant repetition of the same gestures and movements, often with vocalizations. Echolalia, when a person completely repeats words he or she has heard somewhere, retaining intonation. Strict adherence to certain rituals, such as strict adherence to certain routes, attachment to certain clothes. 

Hyper- and hyporeactivity to certain sensory stimuli, such as intolerance of loud sounds or avoidance of any touch. Disorder of functional language or refusal to use speech skills for communication (the same echolalia), and cases where speech is not used at all are also possible.

Experts With with Autism Spectrum Disorder

Such employees are also more loyal. According to SourceAbled, the turnover rate for employees with autism is 8 percent, compared to 47 percent for neurotypical employees. That said, people with ASD can be more productive. Participating Work for autism consulting firm Rangam Consultants Inc., for example, was able to reduce costs for one of its clients by 7 percent by hiring people with autism spectrum disorders. “Such people are loyal, diligent and don’t like to change jobs,” said Tim Weiler, director of the consulting firm Towers Watson. 

His company hired 18 people with ASD to participate in a pilot program several years ago and has since increased the number of such employees on its staff because it has proven commercially viable. Emma Jones, a member of the National Autistic Society’s UK employment team, also says that over the past few years they have been approached by more and more organizations who have learned that people with autism have strengths that can be leveraged in business. 

Melanie Lughi, vice president of research at consulting firm Gartner, believes that over the next ten years, the introduction of new work organization algorithms will allow 350 million people with mental disabilities to find jobs. “CEOs who ignore change are doing so at their own peril and hurting their organizations,” she said. Artem Novikov, a child psychiatrist with the Center for Curative Pedagogy, told Lenta.ru that the balance of power in the labor market could change significantly in the near future. 

“In general, the mental state of both children and adults is changing; there are more and more neurotypical people. Because of the abundance of information flows, half of the people are developing attention deficits. It is difficult for them to concentrate for a long time, attention constantly jumps, in such a situation a person with autism can have an advantage, because if he is interested in activity, he will work steadily, without distraction, without reading books about multitasking and articles on how to avoid procrastination. He’ll just get things done and the rest will wait,” he explained.

Hope IT

Specialisterne was one of the first in the IT business to hire people with ASD. This software testing and consulting company was founded in 2004 as a platform for people with ASD (75 percent of employees there are ASD). “Employers don’t hire people with autism because they’re locked into a social paradigm where everyone is looking for happy, normal employees, good team players who promote themselves,” says Thorkil Sonn, the company’s founder.

In 2012, SAP India hired five employees with ASD. The company admits that this decision was inspired by the success of Specialisterne. Pilot projects showed that the model helped grow the business, so a new goal was announced – autistic people should make up one percent of all employees at the company, that’s about 600 people. “Testing software requires a lot of accuracy and thoroughness, and on top of that it’s mind-bogglingly boring. It’s important to do it right, but it’s very difficult to hold your attention long enough,” explains Robert Austin, professor of IT management at Copenhagen Business School, explaining the autism in the IT sector. As the professor points out, this is by no means charity.

They will work in other areas as well.