How AI tools are helping professionals with dyslexia, ADHD
This article is part of a series that will spotlight the biggest challenges and opportunities for desk-based professionals who are neurodiverse. More from the series →
Lois Castillo says the same thing to all her potential employers: she needs access to AI tools to do her job well.
“I say ‘hey, I will be one of the best leaders you have, but I need Grammarly to do my job,’” said Castillo, who is dyslexic. “At other organizations, I was paying for it myself because the organization didn’t really understand it.”
Castillo is the head of diversity, equity and inclusion at digital advertising platform company Basis Technologies where she excels at her job thanks to assistance from AI.
As we’ve reported throughout our neurodiversity series this month, dyslexia can be a huge benefit to thinking about things differently, but there can also be a heightened cognitive load to make sense of certain information. However, with AI tools like Grammarly, that cognitive load quickly lessens and the person with dyslexia can really maximize their greatest skills. That is the case for Castillo.
She uses AI tools for word and spell check. Often, she’ll have AI tools read back to her something she wrote to catch any mistakes. Besides Grammarly, she tinkers with ChatGPT to help organize her thoughts and provide outlines of things that she is working on. Canva’s AI tools have also helped her prepare decks. OtterAI is another tool she uses to transcribe her thoughts and it will help her with the correct spelling of some words and construct sentences.
“It has really enhanced productivity,” said Castillo. “I also manage talent who have ADHD and they said these tools help them too. You can’t solely rely on AI, but I think it gives people who are neurodivergent, who need that mental organization, the ability to produce. It blocks the barrier of you struggling whether it’s organization of thoughts or attention. That’s what gives you a guiding post.”
Her one ask though is that employers understand this need and encourage people to use AI for assistance and even cover it financially where possible.
“It was important for us to bring up this topic around all departments because we’ve had quite a few of our talent express ‘hey, I need this, this is what is going on, this is how I work,” said Castillo. “For us, and any organization committed to transparency and support, with this increase of diagnoses, it’s important that organizations are ready to support their working style.”
And most are. In fact, some businesses are using AI to help their employees digest information better. For example, Axios HQ, the first AI-powered internal communications platform, is being used by over 600 companies, including Walmart, Delta and Tyson, to provide information in a new way. Inspired by his own struggles with dyslexia, Axios HQ CEO Roy Schwartz created Smart Brevity, an accessible way for employers to communicate using simple language, brief sentences and smart formatting.
“For me, someone with dyslexia, I either have to simplify stuff myself, or I need it provided to me in a simple way so my brain can ingest it properly,” said Schwartz. “So the bullet points, the white space, the scannability, helps me absorb that information.”
It’s all made possible with AI. Over the years, Axios HQ has kept its edits to turn big news into easily digestible information, and now that is being used to train its own model for Smart Brevity. An employer can put in any text at all and it will convert it into this style while remaining accurate in what it is saying. Employers pay an annual subscription fee for usage. Schwartz said their average customer value is $20,000, but it varies by the size of the organization and use case.
“When I grew up, people were just like ‘get a dictionary, fix your spelling,’” said Schwartz. “But I think AI is going to do a lot, especially in the reading and writing space. I see it in my kids. They speak the text they want to send, they don’t type it. When you add that to generative AI, you’re going to have an assistant help you write everything you might want to write.”
While an employer uses AI to streamline their messaging, which in turn helps neurodiverse workers, there is more they can do. While Castillo calls for employer-covered access to paid AI tools like Grammarly and ChatGPT, there are newer tools made specifically for neurodiverse individuals too.
Dr. Coral Hoh created Dysolve, the first AI computer program for dyslexia and language-related disorders. It uses AI-generated interactive games to target the unique case of dyslexia. It’s helped hundreds of users already, even in its early stages. However, it costs $200 a month. Where an employer can cover the costs is a helpful way to support different parts of the workforce. While other tools help to cope with dyslexia, Dysolve is meant to correct it. For 20-year-olds, that correction took just a couple of months, said Hoh.
“It’s permanent,” said Hoh. “You’re practicing daily. When it’s language, you keep using it all the time, so regression doesn’t happen. A lot of pathways clear, and it doesn’t go back to the initial state, which is what we found.”
Its early users also backed what Schwartz was saying – employers have to provide messaging in smaller chunks. “Even smaller than what they think would be the case,” said Hoh. “If someone has a language issue, it has to be small. That’s what our users tell us. People try to simplify the message, but it’s still not small enough of a chunk.”
Between employers not just encouraging using AI tools, but actually covering the costs, and changing their own messaging with the help of AI tools, it could go a long way.
“When language is not processed efficiently, all other things are affected,” said Hoh. “Their emotion, management of time, ability to solve problems, regulation of self – everything gets affected. Why? Language isn’t supposed to be processed with so much effort. The typical brain does it with very little mental resource. For these people it’s taking away too much and it’s hard for them to function in their jobs. It’s all about reducing the processing load.”