Tickets Here

EEON would like to warmly invite you to our last virtual forum for the year with International guests!

This will be a highly interactive session to explore how having a neurodiverse workforce can positively impact creativity and innovation in the workplace.

Neurodiverse individuals represent at least 20% of the adult population and we know that neurodiversity cuts across race, gender, age and sexual orientation.

Neurodiversity is an aspect of diversity which is often not discussed and misunderstood.

Neurodiversity describes a range of conditions that involve a different way of interacting with the world, including autism, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, and learning difficulties such as dyslexia, etc.

Together, we will explore

• What Neurodiversity and Neuroconvergence means
• demystify neurodiversity/neurodivergence and explore ways in which they interact with each other.
• How workplaces can benefit from a neurodiverse workforce
• How workplaces can create safe and welcoming environments
• Practical ways organisations can boost their hiring processes to recruit and then nurture neurodiverse employees and set people up for success
• Case studies and how to leverage neurodiversity to gain competitive advantage and build our workforces of the future
• The future of work & skills required.

There will also be opportunities to challenge ourselves around how we view neurodiversity/neurodivergence and help creating positive transformational change in our workplaces.

As always with EEON we will encourage you to Learn, Think and Do!

Confirmed Speakers

Belinda Sheehan

Belinda is the Neurodiversity Program Manager for IBM in A/NZ and has managed the successful hiring of 2 groups of neurodivergents into IBM. Belinda works with the Global Neurodiversity team to increase awareness, acceptance and advancement of neurodiversity within IBM and externally. Belinda is passionate about Neurodiversity and her goal is to make the changes required to make the workplace more inclusive, having personal connections with many family members, friends and colleagues who are neurodivergent.

Belinda has been with IBM for 20+ years and is a Senior Managing Consultant having spent the majority of her career managing teams who develop and support applications across many industries including Government, Communications and Utilities.

Callum McKirdy

Callum is a speaker, author, mentor and facilitator specialising in workplace dynamics and behaviour. With a successful 20-year career assisting leaders and teams to develop radically authentic workplaces by leveraging their uniqueness across Australasia.

Proudly dyslexic and ADHD-positive, Callum champions organisations to think differently about different thinking, and views neurodivergent people as the innovative super-workforce of the future.

Callum speaks at industry conferences, facilitates high-impact workshops, trains teams, and mentors professionals who are looking to reconnect people with purpose in their workplaces.

The author of The HR Catalyst: A Guide to the New Practice of Leading HR, published in 2019 and a contributing author to the 2020 Amazon Bestseller What The Hell Do We Do Now? – An Enterprise Guide to COVID-19 and Beyond, Callum is due to publish his second book TILT: Thinking Differently About Different Thinking in late- 2021.

Dr Harriet Smith – NHS UK,
Clinical lead of Personal Disorders

Dr Harriet Smith is a Clinical Lead in a large NHS mental health trust in the southwest of England. Her doctoral research was on the change process in systemic therapy, and she has lectured at Bath University and University of the West of England.

In her clinical work she specialises in working with people with complex needs who may meet the diagnosis of personality disorder. She is trained in a number of evidence-based therapies including Dialectical Behaviour Therapy and Mentalisation based family therapy. She combines this with working strategically to improve clinical care and pathways across the health and social care system in her field.

Prior to retraining as a psychologist, she worked as a producer and director of documentary films. She is also a proud mum to two lovely children and likes to play hockey and get out for the occasional paddle board.

Thomas (Tom) Quine – Department of Health

Tom has a Bachelor of Sport and Exercise Science from Victoria University. He struggled for several years to get a job and, after being diagnosed with autism, eventually got his break via the Rise program – an initiative designed to help people on the autism spectrum find work – at the Department of Health.

Tom has since progressed from his initial position in the Records Management Unit to a role in Communicable Disease. He is very active in both autism and disability advocacy and has recently been appointed as a co-chair for the Autism Success Network; an employee-led association for people with lived experience of autism and their allies in the Victorian public sector. In his spare time, Tom enjoys learning about astronomy.