October is ADHD Awareness Month. This year’s theme, ‘A Community of Support’, offers HR an opportunity to think beyond legal compliance and consider what a genuinely supportive workplace looks like for employees with ADHD.

The starting point, of course, is understanding the legal obligations. But building a community of support also requires something more: understanding that ADHD does not look the same in everyone. You should avoid assumptions about what an employee with ADHD needs, or why they may be struggling.

ADHD and the Equality Act 2010

ADHD may amount to a disability under the Equality Act 2010 where it has a substantial, adverse and long-term effect on an employee’s ability to carry out normal day-to-day activities. Whether it does so will depend on the individual.

Where the definition is satisfied, important discrimination protections apply and an employer is required to make reasonable adjustments to remove disadvantages experienced in the workplace.

But a supportive workplace cannot be built around the disability definition alone. To provide effective support, managers first need to understand the individual in front of them.

Understanding the many faces of ADHD

In 2025, the ADHD Awareness Month theme was ‘The Many Faces of ADHD’. ADHD is not simply an inability to concentrate or someone being ‘hyperactive’. It may affect organisation, working memory, time management, prioritisation, attention or impulsivity. Some employees may also have developed sophisticated strategies for masking or managing their difficulties.

And those difficulties are not necessarily static. An employee who has managed successfully for years may struggle when their role changes, responsibilities increase or familiar structures disappear.

Life stages can matter too. For some women, hormonal changes during perimenopause and menopause can exacerbate difficulties with concentration, working memory, emotional regulation and stress tolerance. Coping strategies which have worked for years may suddenly become less effective.

A community of support therefore starts with curiosity rather than assumption: asking what the individual is experiencing and what might help.

When assumptions get in the way

Cases in this area provide some striking examples of what can happen when employers fail to do that.

In Ghiotto v Hawkwell House Hotel, an HR employee with ADHD experienced difficulties with detailed payroll work and concentrating in a busy office. Rather than properly exploring what would help, she was required to focus intensively on payroll and moved to a former cupboard to do it. The tribunal found that she had effectively been ‘set up to fail’ and upheld disability discrimination claims.

Borg-Neal v Lloyds Banking Group provides a broader lesson about neurodivergence. A dyslexic employee was dismissed after using a racial slur in full while struggling to formulate a question during race awareness training. Expert evidence established that his dyslexia affected not only written communication but his ability to formulate and express himself verbally.

Neither case means employers cannot manage performance or conduct. The lesson is that understanding should come before response. Before concluding that someone is careless, difficult or simply underperforming, managers should consider whether there may be another explanation.

Creating a community of support

This is also a message which has received some timely government backing. Earlier this month, the Government published the findings of its Expert Academic Panel on Neurodiversity, which emphasised the importance of supporting neurodivergent people according to their individual strengths and challenges, based on need rather than diagnosis. The report also calls for practical, evidence-based workplace strategies and greater use of Universal Design principles so that workplaces are inclusive from the outset, rather than relying solely on adjustments being made reactively.

Working towards creating a community of support involves an inevitable focus on management training. The Government’s recent report found evidence that managers lacked confidence when dealing with neurodivergence generally. Managers do not need to become ADHD experts. But they do need enough understanding to recognise that apparent ‘carelessness’, disorganisation, poor listening or inconsistent performance may have another explanation.

Training should encourage managers to ask rather than assume; listen to the employee’s experience; recognise that support may need to change over time; involve employees in identifying workable adjustments; and know when to seek HR or occupational health input.

HR can reinforce that culture by providing access to reliable information and creating an environment in which employees feel able to ask for support.

HR Inner Circle members can access a wealth of resources in our Neuroinclusion Toolkit, which is available in the Vault: https://members.hrinnercircle.co.uk/toolkits/.  For non-members, our toolkits will be available to purchase very soon.