Issue 3: ADHD and Leadership

When people picture leadership, they often imagine someone calm, organized, measured, someone who always follows a neat checklist to success. By that definition, I used to believe I could never be a leader.

After all, my mind never stops racing. I forget things. I get bursts of excitement that lead me off the agenda. Sometimes, in meetings, while others are talking about today, I’m already ten steps into next year.

But here’s the truth ADHD taught me about leadership: Being a good leader isn't about perfect control. It’s about creating movement, connection, and hope.

And in those areas, ADHD has given me unexpected gifts.

Here’s what ADHD brought to my leadership toolbox:

• Energy: When I believe in something, I bring real, contagious energy. I can lift a room when people are tired. I can rally a team when morale is low. I can pour passion into a project so deeply that others feel it, too.
• Creativity: ADHD brains are wired for non-linear thinking. In leadership, this means seeing solutions no one else considered. Connecting ideas that seem unrelated. Pivoting quickly when plans fall apart.
• Empathy: Living with constant internal battles makes you notice others’ struggles. It softens you. It teaches you to listen beyond the words people say. It shows you how to lead not just with strategy, but with heart.
• Courage: Every day, an ADHD brain faces a hundred invisible challenges. We mess up. We forget. We get overwhelmed. And yet we get up and try again. That quiet resilience shapes how we show up when leadership gets hard, and it always gets hard.

Of course, ADHD also brings real leadership challenges:

• Forgetting key details despite truly caring.
• Struggling to sit through long, slow meetings without the mind wandering.
• Getting emotionally intense at times when steady calmness is needed.
• Overcommitting because the desire to help burns so brightly.

I have had to build structures around myself: Checklists, reminders, trusted colleagues who gently anchor me. I’ve learned that asking for support isn’t weakness, it’s wisdom.

More importantly, I’ve learned to stop trying to lead like everyone else.

Instead, I lead like me, fast mind, big heart, messy moments and all.

Living with ADHD doesn’t make leadership impossible. It just makes it different. Maybe even, when we embrace it fully, a little bit extraordinary.

Different is not broken. Different is brilliant.

If you live with ADHD and lead others, whether as a manager, a parent, a teacher, a coach, what leadership lesson has your journey taught you? I’d love to hear your reflections.