Why I Built These Tools
For most of my career in corporate leadership I was figuring out neurodivergence in real time.
My own and everyone else’s.
I was managing people with ADHD, autism, and AuDHD before I had language for any of it. What I knew was that standard management approaches were not working. Not because my team was not capable. Because the tools assumed a neurotypical baseline that most of us did not share.
So I built different ones.
This is what eventually became Drains & Sparks — an AuDHD workplace workbook for neurodivergent professionals navigating corporate environments.
Over more than a decade I developed frameworks for the conversations that kept coming up. How do you figure out what you actually need at work when you have spent years masking so effectively that you do not know the answer yourself? How do you name what is draining you? How do you start the hard conversation with your manager without it feeling like a confession?
I used these tools in one-on-ones. I shared them with other managers. They worked well enough that they became part of how I led.
The employees who went through those conversations got something most neurodivergent professionals never get — a structured way to name what they needed and the language to ask for it. What they did not get was direct access to the tools themselves.
That is what this is.
What’s Inside Drains & Sparks
Drains & Sparks is a self-reflection workbook for AuDHD, autistic, and ADHD professionals. Built from frameworks developed and refined over years of real corporate leadership. Used with real teams. Shared with other managers. Available publicly for the first time.
It walks you through your role, your strengths, what costs you energy, what gives it back, how you work with others, what you need from your manager, and how to say it. The last two sections — Naming What I Need and Starting the Conversation — are the ones I hear about most from the people I have worked through this with. That is where things tend to click into place.
Here is what each section covers:
- Your Role — what your job says versus what you actually spend your time doing, and where the gaps are creating friction.
- Your Workplace Superpowers — the skills you bring that others do not, including the ones no one has formally recognized.
- What Drains You — the tasks, environments, and dynamics that cost your nervous system more than they should.
- Your Sparks — what genuinely energizes you and the conditions where your brain does its best work.
- Time and Attention — where your focus goes versus where you want it to go.
- You and Your Manager — what you need more of, what you need less of, and how to start that conversation.
- Starting the Conversation — sentence starters for asking for support, naming a barrier, preparing for a review, or saying the thing you have been sitting with for months.
- Naming What I Need — a direct written record of what you need in your current role and what you would need in a future one.
Common Questions
What is the Drains & Sparks workbook?
Drains & Sparks is a self-reflection workbook for autistic, ADHD, and AuDHD professionals. It helps neurodivergent people figure out what they actually need at work and find the language to ask for it. It covers role clarity, workplace strengths, energy drains, sparks, manager relationships, communication needs, and how to prepare for hard conversations.
Who is it for?
Neurodivergent professionals in corporate environments — particularly late-diagnosed adults, high-masking individuals, and people preparing for a performance review, a manager conversation, or a career transition. It is also used by managers looking for better tools to support their neurodivergent teams.
Is this a clinical tool?
No. It was written by a late-diagnosed AuDHD professional with 12 years in corporate leadership. It is a practical self-reflection tool built from real workplace experience, not a clinical assessment or a substitute for professional mental health support.
How long does it take to complete?
There is no set time. Some people work through it in one sitting. Others return to specific sections as their situation changes. It is designed to be used once or returned to every time something shifts at work.
Is there a video version?
Yes. The companion video is a 45-minute on-demand session where Brett works through every section of the workbook himself, live, at his own career inflection point. Real answers, no performance. It is available separately or as a bundle with the workbook.
Three Ways to Get It
The complete bundle — the workbook and the 45-minute companion video coaching session — is $35. That is $17 less than buying them separately and the version I recommend starting with.
If you want just the workbook it is $27.
If you want just the video session it is $37.
If you are a neurodivergent professional trying to figure out what needs to change at work — or a manager looking for a better way to have these conversations with your team — this was built for both of you.