By Stephaie Diana Eubank
After working for eleven years in a remote modality (which means I have been remote before; remote was cool), I get a lot of questions from friends, colleagues, faculty members, students, and online followers asking how do I stay productive? These questions grow when people learn of my Dyslexia and ADHD diagnosis. To be fair, it has been a long journey to get a diagnosis of ADHD, like many women in our 30’s, as we do not present the same way as men or boys. (Women and girls must emotionally mask symptoms to fit in as a natural defense mechanism). There are also helpful tools that I have gained from my work within the disabled community, nonprofit sectors, and the college educational sector. One of those tricks to helping to increase my motivation and productivity remotely is body doubling.
Body doubling, in a nutshell, is being able to double where you choose to work with one or more people in the room. This is further explained as a motivation tool (Washington, 2023) and how it helps workers and students function more effectively. For many ADHD people, it is the feeling of accountability as there are others in the room to give that vibe of people counting on you or people watching you.
For me, I do what is called audio processing (Gomez & Condon, 1999); in essence, I talk it out even when there is only me listening. I find it funny when working from home, and my husband hears me talking and goes, “Huh?” thinking I am talking to him. Although he is used to my symptoms and my imaginative responses of, “staff meeting, sorry.” Thinking out loud is a normal part of ADHD and Dyslexic adaptations to address complex information I am working with, especially in data analysis and qualitative results.
However, when working from home and it’s just me and the fur babies, especially post-COVID, I use the same method we use for the fur babies when no humans are home. I turn on the TV or leave an Amazon music station on. I am a wicked B of the West. I own that I need background sounds, so I trick myself into not being alone so that I have a faux body doubling.
Although it is a warning to people wanting to implement this trick for themselves. Please be sure to be in meetings to mute yourself. Sometimes, your musical stylings are not welcome. One of my mentors who recently passed had forgotten to mute himself using this skill and was singing Snoop Dog’s “Gin and Juice” and only realized everyone heard him because they all sang together the song’s hook. I have been caught belting Lin Manuel Miranda’s masterpiece “Hamilton” songs. Or, when singing with my kids while working, we sing Eminem and Dr Dre’s song, “Forgot About Dre,” as it has been a good tool with my son’s speech delay to help with the E sounds they used to get stuck on. The moral of the story if body doubling in whatever method works for you. Be sure your audience is suitable to your plans of audio processing and your ability to carry a tune.
I have had participants in my dissertation research detail getting into joint Microsoft Teams Meetings to help give a remote feeling of being back in the office to help spark more creative problem-solving. When they feel like they need to body double, they all get into a Teams meeting and chat together while they work. I find it a creative method for addressing social isolation that often affects remote workers.
These ADHD tools can be helpful for business leadership managing a remote and hybrid workforce but require more understanding and an evolution in organizational culture that welcomes new ways of thinking, along with a culture of inclusivity. We can’t afford as business leaders to not grow and change, which means tossing to the side old methods that don’t serve us anymore and embracing new ways to enhance the work experience.
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Work Cited
Washington, N. (2023, August 24). Body doubling for ADHD: Definition, how it works, and more. Medical News Today. https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/body-doubling-adhd
Gomez, R., & Condon, M. (1999). Central auditory processing ability in children with ADHD with and without learning disabilities. Journal of Learning Disabilities, 32(2), 150–158. https://doi.org/10.1177/002221949903200205
Dr. Stephanie Diana Eubank DBA Remote Team Research (AKA Dr. Bear) 