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Businesses should examine whether their fleet policies work for all their drivers amid a risk of overconfidence on neurodiversity
That’s which cited research by Neurodiversity in Business and Birkbeck, University of London which found that UK employers rated their neurodivergent readiness at 70-75%, while only 32-38% of neurodivergent employees felt psychologically safe disclosing their diagnosis or believed their employer understood its impact
Venson argued that fleets should adopt the approach advocated by neurodiversity specialist Genius Within, whereby fleets take a universal approach rather than wait for drivers to reveal a diagnosis. This is said to effectively bypass the need to make one-off, paid-for assessments and adaptations
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It is argued that meaningful changes to layouts and labelling which can be made to vehicle cargo areas would benefit any driver, as would considered communication and management styles, while simplifying and standardising vehicles can save significant sums and make for a more practical and adaptable fleet
Serious potential implications from fleet policy failures
Simon Staton, client management director at Venson Automotive Solutions, said that a gap in perceived neurodivergent readiness could have serious implications for employees who drive for work, affecting training, vehicle handovers, incident management and driver safety as well as wellbeing and retention and an employer’s duty of care
He continued: “Whilst fleet managers do not need to become neurodiversity specialists, they should understand what needs to be considered for fleet policies, communications and training and consider that not every driver processes information in the same way
“When businesses communicate with employees in ways they can understand and create an environment in which they feel comfortable, drivers are more likely to perform well, remain with the organisation and avoid preventable mistakes
“Keeping fleet policies flexible and accessible is not simply about inclusion, it can strengthen safety, wellbeing and operational performance for every driver.”
Dr Nancy Doyle, founder and chief science officer at Genius Within, said: “The most useful start point for supporting drivers is to assume that around a fifth of any workforce is neurodivergent and to calibrate the fleet accordingly
“That would involve neither a complete overhaul nor even mentioning the word neurodiversity, rather a series of tweaks, adaptations and considerations to make the vehicles and the operation as accessible as possible to all employees.”
