Claim OwnershipThe ADHD Skills Lab
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© 2026 The ADHD Skills Lab
Description
Things are starting to fall through the cracks.
Not because you're not trying, but because the systems everyone recommends weren't built for a brain like yours.
The ADHD Skills Lab is for business owners with ADHD whose responsibilities have grown past simple solutions. Each week, Skye Waterson and guests share research-backed strategies and real-world systems to help you reduce the chaos, make consistent progress, and stop reinventing the wheel every time life gets complex.
No "just use a planner." No productivity hacks that last a week. Just honest, practical support from someone who has spent years researching, testing, and refining what actually works for adult ADHD.
Skye is the founder of Unconventional Organisation, a former academic diagnosed with ADHD during her PhD, and the author of over 50 articles read by more than 250,000 people worldwide. She has worked with senior leaders, business owners, academics, and professionals navigating ADHD in high-responsibility roles, and was invited to share her research with both the Australian and New Zealand Government.
🤝 In partnership with Understood.org: https://u.org/4boG8QW
🌐 https://www.unconventionalorganisation.com/
📲 https://www.instagram.com/theadhdskillslabpodcast/
137 Episodes
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Presented by Understood.org You start a business for freedom. Then one day you realize the business no longer fits the way your brain works. Taki Moore is often called the business coach’s favorite business coach. Through his Million Dollar Coach community he has helped thousands of coaches grow their businesses and create more than $1 billion in client results. Along with that success was something he didn’t fully understand until recently: ADHD. In this episode of the ADHD Skills Lab, T...
Many adults with ADHD struggle with tools that seem simple at first but quickly become overwhelming. Dashboards full of icons, systems that require too many clicks, and constantly changing interfaces can quietly drain focus. In this episode of ADHD Skills Lab, Skye and Robbie explore practical ADHD work systems that reduce visual overload and make digital tools easier to navigate. Earlier this week, they explored research on object recognition memory in ADHD and why visual systems like softwa...
Why does a simple software update suddenly make everything feel impossible to use? In this Research Recap, Skye and Robbie break down a meta-analysis examining object recognition memory in ADHD. Object recognition memory helps your brain recognize visual information like icons, folders, faces, and layouts. It’s what allows you to quickly identify the right button in a menu or remember where something lives inside a complex interface. Researchers reviewed 28 studies involving children and adol...
When creative work gets hard, most people with ADHD assume something’s wrong. Wrong idea. Wrong project. Wrong career. In this conversation, Andy J. Pizza (author, illustrator, and host of Creative Pep Talk) breaks down the moment his work completely dried up — and why that crisis forced him to stop winging it and start creating strategically. We talk about perfectionism, rejection sensitivity, creative droughts, collaboration fights, and the uncomfortable shift from “I hope this works” to “I...
Business owner with ADHD wanting operational clarity and focus? Click here to book a session with Skye. https://www.unconventionalorganisation.com for a operational clarity session! More adults with ADHD start businesses than the general population. But here’s the part nobody talks about: Research shows ADHD is positively linked to entrepreneurial attitudes and startup behavior… and negatively linked to post-launch outcomes, performance, and wellbeing. In this Research Recap, Skye an...
Description Business owner with ADHD wanting operational clarity and focus? Click here to book a session with Skye. https://www.unconventionalorganisation.com for a operational clarity session! Why does focus feel like forcing a rusty machine to start… instead of flipping a switch? In this Research Recap, Skye and Will unpack a randomized placebo-controlled study examining how brain networks behave differently in adults with ADHD. This episode isn’t about recommending medication. It’s...
You can be successful on paper and still feel stuck. In this episode, Skye talks with entrepreneur and investor Kassidy Warren about leaving the corporate “safe path,” taking real risks, and the identity shift required to stop playing small. They unpack rejection, procrastination, reinvesting before results, and what it actually means to turn pro — especially with an ADHD brain. If you’ve built something stable but know you’re capable of more, this one will hit. What we cover: The hidden cost...
“I wasn’t failing. I just wasn’t growing.” Adam Tasker had the career. The family. Three kids. Responsibility handled. But privately, he knew he was drifting. After being diagnosed with ADHD as an adult, following his sons’ diagnoses, he began to look at how he was operating. Not just as a father, but as a leader. At home. In business. With himself. In this conversation, Skye and Adam unpack: What actually changes after a late ADHD diagnosisHow overwhelm escalates and why some days collapse f...
Looking for The Business Visibility Workshop? Click here for details: https://unconventionalorganisation.circle.so/checkout/the-business-visibility-workshop-wednesday-feb-18th You don’t need a formal ADHD diagnosis for ADHD traits to affect your health, finances, or well-being. In this Research Recap, Skye and Will break down a study on subclinical ADHD - ADHD traits that fall below the diagnostic threshold - and how they impact entrepreneurs and employees. The findings are confronting. Acros...
If sales feels heavy, awkward, or mentally exhausting, it’s probably not because you’re bad at it. It’s more likely because you’ve been trying to sell using advice that relies on pressure, performance, or rigid systems - the exact things that make ADHD brains freeze, overthink, or avoid the conversation altogether. In this episode, Skye sits down with Wes Schaeffer (The Sales Whisperer) to talk about how to sell in a way that actually feels calm, grounded, and sustainable — without hype, mani...
A lot of people with ADHD deal with physical symptoms they’ve never talked about - or never thought were connected. This episode looks at what the research actually shows about ADHD and gut issues, and where the line is between association, speculation, and overreach. ADHD usually gets framed around focus, motivation, and productivity. But growing research suggests it may also be linked to very real physical symptoms, including gut issues that many people quietly live with. In this episode, S...
If the word accounting makes your attention disappear, this episode is for you. Skye sits down with Joe Dunaway - founder of Vici Financial, accountant, business owner, and ADHDer - to talk about why so many ADHD entrepreneurs avoid their numbers, and how to understand them without overcomplicating things or forcing yourself into systems you won’t maintain. This isn’t about becoming good at accounting. It’s about knowing enough to make decisions, reduce background stress, and stop guessing ab...
Looking for the Bottleneck Reset Workshop? Click here for details: https://unconventionalorganisation.circle.so/checkout/bottleneck-reset-workshop-wednesday-jan-21st Kids with ADHD are not just more likely to struggle academically. They are more visible, more misunderstood, and often less liked by peers and teachers. In this Research Recap, Skye and Will unpack a study on ADHD, social status, and bullying, and talk honestly about what it felt like to stand out in school for reasons you did no...
Looking for the Bottleneck Reset Workshop? Click here for details: https://unconventionalorganisation.circle.so/checkout/bottleneck-reset-workshop-wednesday-jan-21st Growing a business is hard. Doing it with ADHD - while raising five kids - can make you feel like your brain is actively working against you. In this episode, Skye talks with Tiana Sutton, a fitness instructor, community builder, and mother of five, about realizing she had ADHD later in life - not through childhood struggles, but...
Looking for the Bottleneck Reset Workshop? Click here for details: https://unconventionalorganisation.circle.so/checkout/bottleneck-reset-workshop-wednesday-jan-21st If you have ADHD, you probably know this pattern. You’re foggy, scattered, or stuck… until a deadline hits. Then suddenly, you’re laser-focused, productive, unstoppable. And afterwards, you’re wrecked. In this episode, Skye and William Curb from Hacking Your ADHD unpack why hyperfocus feels like the only way to get things done...
Ads are overwhelming for a lot of ADHD business owners, not because they are bad at marketing, but because the information is scattered, noisy, and contradictory. In this episode, Skye talks with ads expert Jeremy Pogue, founder of Summit Acquisition, about how ads actually work at a high level, what they are and are not responsible for, and how to think about them without spiraling into complexity. This is a grounding conversation designed to help you understand the landscape before you deci...
Video is everywhere, but very little of it is designed with ADHD in mind. In this Research Recap, Skye and William Curb from Hacking Your ADHD unpack a qualitative study exploring how people with ADHD actually experience video content. From captions to pacing to visual overload, they look at what helps, what hurts, and why one size never fits all. They also talk about why many ADHD viewers adapt by speeding up videos, multitasking, or using video as background stimulation, and how those habit...
Skye sits down with Carly Braker, founder of Avialan Blue, to talk about building a high tech areospace engineering consultancy while navigating ADHD. Carly shares how she masked symptoms growing up, why the “real world” hit harder, and the adjustments she had to make when deep focus, sensory overwhelm, and impostor feelings collided with entrepreneurship. What we cover: Why gifted kids often miss their own ADHD signsThe crash that happens when school structure disappearsThe identity shift fr...
People love to say ADHD comes with superpowers. The research is more nuanced. In this Research Recap with William Curb from Hacking Your ADHD, Skye and Will examine two papers that look at ADHD strengths in careers. They discuss the themes that appear across 79 studies, the stories from qualitative interviews, and the complicated truth about strengths that can help and hurt depending on context. What we cover: Why creativity and idea linking appear across ADHD career researchHyperfocus: stren...
Most people with ADHD have one moment that stops them in their tracks. For Laura, it was finding her childhood journals filled with the word “focus” scribbled in every possible way. In this conversation, Skye talks with Laura Key, host of the ADHD Aha! podcast, and VP of content at Understood.org. After interviewing more than 120 people about their ADHD stories, Laura shares her own. From finding her childhood journals to understanding how ADHD shaped her leadership, parenting, and emotional ...
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