Episode 184: Autism, community and the #DataFam – with Adam Mico

The episode transcript is below.

Carolyn Kiel: Hi, this is Carolyn Kiel, host of the Beyond 6 Seconds podcast. Thanks for tuning in to this episode today! Before we get to the interview, I wanted to let you know about another project I’m working on. You know, in addition to hosting this podcast, I also have a day job working in the corporate world. Recently I realized that I don’t know many other autistic people who work in corporate. I’m sure we’re out there – maybe we don’t talk about it as much online, but we’re still doing awesome work. I’ve decided I’d like to meet more autistic corporate professionals! That’s why I set up a new group on LinkedIn, as a place for autistic corporate professionals to meet and share our advice and experiences with navigating corporate jobs, careers and workplaces. If you’re an autistic person working in the corporate world, please join this private group and share it with others who might be interested too. I’ll put the link to the group in the show notes. I hope to meet you there soon!

Welcome to Beyond 6 Seconds, the podcast that goes beyond the six second first impression to share the extraordinary stories of neurodivergent people. I’m your host, Carolyn Kiel.

On today’s episode I’m speaking with Adam Mico. Adam is the Principal of Data Visualization and Enablement at Moderna. He’s a Tableau Visionary, three time Tableau Ambassador, an Advisory Board member of the Data Leadership Collaborative and a member of the Tableau Speaker Bureau.

In his spare time, he blogs, produces data visualizations, travels, and networks with the larger data community. He’s autistic and supports diversity and inclusion efforts, which includes neurodiversity. Adam, welcome to the podcast.

Adam Mico: Thank you so much, Carolyn. It’s great to be here.

Carolyn Kiel: Yeah! So happy to have you here. So to start off, how did you find out that you’re autistic?

Adam Mico: Well, that’s a long story. Everybody has a different story as far as finding out that they’re autistic. I knew I was a little bit different. Casting autistic when I was a kid was a lot different than what, what it was today. When I was a kid, the only way I had an opportunity to see what an autistic person was just really horrible films from the fifties and sixties that actually, it scared me, it scared me a lot. I knew I was a little bit different, but I didn’t know how I was different because it wasn’t very well understood back in the eighties when I was dealing, especially in Wisconsin. So it was a very different environment out there.

So I knew things were different growing up. I knew my process was a lot different than other people. In fact, when I was a little kid, I used to do a lot of fun activities by myself to keep myself entertained. It was like creating new box scores out of sports sections or creating stats out of something. I would flip coins many times to see if it, it’s actually 50% or if it’s 52%. Did this for an extended period of time. And then during my teen years, I was focused more on masking and trying to fit in. So again, pushing it down as much as possible. And then I started to understand it a little bit more and get a little bit more educated in Asperger’s and autism. And it was probably the early 2000s, if not late 1990s. And I tested, I did one of those online tests. I’m like, well, it’s pretty clear that I am, but whatever. I’m just not gonna deal with it now.

So I just kind of pushed it down. So it took me a long time before I realized and validated with myself that it’s a possibility, but it was more along the lines of me being stressed out by everything that was happening. It was more about the anxiety associated with autism and not knowing how to deal with it.

And as the older you get, and if you get stuck in a career, the more unhappy you get. So it’s like I have to deal with something. I know something’s going on and I just need to get diagnosed for something, not just autism, it could be anything. I didn’t know exactly what I had and I wasn’t trying to figure, you know, think for myself. People were looking at me and like, you know, maybe, maybe you are on the spectrum. I’m like, I don’t wanna box myself in there, because if I do that, that’s gonna be worse for me if it’s not really that.

So my first diagnosis was in DSM-IV when Asperger’s was still a thing, and then right after that, probably within a year of DSM-5 coming out, and Asperger’s was not something you could diagnose any longer, it was just autism spectrum disorder. And that’s what I ended up having, with associated anxiety.

Carolyn Kiel: Okay. Yeah. When you get identified or diagnosed as an adult, I feel like a lot of the times it’s kind of like, where do you go from there? Like there’s not any obvious like supports or, you know, it’s different when you’re a child, these days there’s more support, but as an adult it’s kind of like, okay, you know, there you go! And knowing what to do with that, I feel like after making that discovery can be difficult.

Adam Mico: Well, that was the best thing for me is knowing what I actually had to deal with, cuz I had tools in my arsenal to combat that and understand what I’m dealing with. Not knowing what you’re dealing with, especially with somebody on the spectrum, it’s something that’s so devastating for you because you don’t have, you don’t know what you’re dealing with.

Like when I went in for my initial diagnosis, I didn’t know if it was just anxiety. I don’t wanna say just, but a different classification, but anxiety or depression or schizoid or anything, it could have been a lot of different things. I had no idea, I wasn’t qualified to make that diagnosis and I couldn’t be the most objective person. So it was really helpful to get verification of what it actually was and understand what to work with going forward and getting some of the tools. So I never got medicated for anxiety or anything like that, but it was just understanding what I had to deal with and understanding what I had to work with in order to excel and find happiness.

Carolyn Kiel: Yeah! And what kind of tools did you find helpful once you had the diagnosis?

Adam Mico: So more along the lines of understanding my boundaries and helping people that were important to me, that were really impactful in my day-to-day, like my immediate supervisor or a manager that I worked with quite a bit. It was not the easiest thing to share that with other people. But it helped me when I provided that information to them so they had an understanding and that we could work together because it, it’s good if you have the right work environment where you could do that. Some work environments, it would be even more difficult, especially if you go back a few years. But modern days it seems to be a little bit better than what it was. And if you have the, if you feel comfortable to share that with somebody that you’re working with a lot, I think that helps out a lot because it opens communication. You’re not blocking against something they don’t know about and vice versa. You can have really open conversations and talk about things a little bit better and help them make it a successful environment for you.

Carolyn Kiel: Yeah, I think that is a big decision for a lot of autistic and other

Adam Mico: Oh, yes.

Carolyn Kiel: neurodivergent or disabled people about, you know, how to talk about it at work, or if to ever bring it up at work. And as you said, it really depends on the environment and the relationships with the people that you have and I guess their understanding of what autism is. So when you made the decision to talk about it at work, how did you know that you were in a good environment that would be supportive? Or did you know, and just kind of took the leap?

Adam Mico: I knew my manager I was working with for quite some time. However, it was to a point where I had to say something because I, I like to consider myself an honest and open person, and if they couldn’t accept me for what I am and accept that, it would be a very difficult environment for me to continue to work in.

That’s when I was working in the public sector. And in the public sector I worked for 22 years for the same employer, so I was pretty comfortable there. I had tenure, whatever you would refer to it as at that point. And it wasn’t something, you know, I thought there would be any retaliation, and I knew my career was kind of a dead end at, at that particular place. So I wasn’t really worried about promotions at the time or anything like that. I figured I would just take the leap just for my mental health, because if I didn’t, that would’ve hurt my anxiety much more.

Carolyn Kiel: Yeah. Yeah. Definitely can see that situation there. That’s interesting because you have had a really incredible career, it seems, I only know parts of it a couple years going back from seeing all of the work that you do with Tableau and as an ambassador and active on social media about really spreading the, the word and the love for Tableau.

So since really coming out at work about being autistic, it seems that you’ve had this amazing career in the past couple years. I would love to learn more about your career journey because it, you know, it sounds like you were in a place that for a long time that really wasn’t where you wanted to be or just wasn’t having the career growth or opportunities that you were looking for. How did you change your career? Like, what did that look like from there?

Adam Mico: So that’s a great question. So when I was working in the public sector for maybe the first 15 years, I wasn’t diagnosed as autistic. I may have burnt some bridges because I didn’t know how to handle what was going on in my, in my head at the time. I didn’t get involved with stuff. I wasn’t passionate about stuff. I was just kind of like doing a nine to five thing. So it was, there was a certain point where I had a heart to heart with some people that were leaving the, the public sector for private sector work even after many, many years. And those heart to hearts kind of told me that there’s nowhere for me to go. It was either counting down until retirement or finding something else and kind of betting on myself. So it took a lot for me to start betting on myself. But that’s when I became more open to opportunities.

At the time I was more open to opportunities, I did have a lot of great things happening with Tableau, meaning that I was, I was a big part of the community. I was an Ambassador at that point. I was a Tableau featured author and had a lot work that was shared with the larger community, had made a lot of great connections.

And it was funny, before I became part of the social media, I wasn’t really, I wasn’t out about being autistic. People could probably figure it out, but it was only really like a handful of people in my family that knew about it. There was a person in our community, in the data fam community that indicated that, hey, I’m autistic and — not me personally, but he mentioned that he was, and he blogged about it and so forth. And it just felt that I wanted to give a community, and in this particular case the Tableau community, one last shot of me being socially active anywhere. Otherwise, I was just feeling like I was just gonna kind of build myself into this cave, kind of be a hermit and count down the things and live a life in solitude more or less with my family, but without any real friendships or something I was happy about career-wise.

But fortunately due to that and being, probably a big part of it was, I was very authentic about who I was and tried to be as honest and open with as many people as possible. Anybody that wants to listen or talk to me about certain things, I was very open and I continue to be as much as possible. But as far as finding new work, it was in April. I did get a lot of lot notifications, like recruiters would contact me about work that was kind of similar to what I was doing at that point. At that last point, I was a senior data analyst and business automation specialist. And I had security because again, with the public sector, you have pretty good benefits, you have early retirement, so I wanted to make sure it’s worth my time. So I don’t want to jump to, you know, just be a consultant somewhere, have a temporary job or, or contract somewhere. I wanted something that was real and that could have lasted, you know, quite a long time.

So I was contacted about a potential role as a Tableau Evangelist. And that was with Keyrus. And that was a new opportunity for me to do something completely different and take a big risk. So, they took a risk on me because they never had a Tableau Evangelist before. But I also took the risk on them because who knows how long it would last. But at a certain point they had to bet on what their, you know, what they thought was of value. And I had to bet on myself and had to do something different than what I was doing. Because I know when I was working my prior job, even though I did have some growth, there was a very tight ceiling, and that wall was banging my head.

Carolyn Kiel: Mm-hmm.

Adam Mico: So it was just, that ceiling rather was banging my head. So as a result of that I needed to find something, you know, explore something different. And an opportunity that sounded exciting to me was working as a Tableau Evangelist, because it would be a combination of utilizing consulting skills, kind of working with sales and doing a lot of stuff that I could do publicly, like test myself with public speaking, test myself with writing, doing a lot of data visualizations on behalf of the company to showcase for others. So that was such a fun experience, and it was very difficult for me to leave.

Carolyn Kiel: Oh wow. Yeah. I mean, and that’s a big change, but it’s really great that you, essentially you took that bet on yourself and, and they took that bet on you. And it’s a big, you know, after being at the same place for 22 years.

Adam Mico: 22 plus years, yes.

Carolyn Kiel: Wow. Yeah. It’s a, it’s a big change, but that’s, you know, sometimes that’s what you need and it seems like it’s really leading to really great things for you.

So how did you actually become involved, or how did you discover Tableau within your career? And probably should explain a little bit about Tableau is.

Adam Mico: Sure.

Carolyn Kiel: I know a tiny bit about it, about data visualization, but yeah, if you could talk about kind of how you found Tableau and started with it.

Adam Mico: So Tableau is basically an enterprise data visualization solution. So some people use Excel, but it has limitations on what data you could bring in and what you could do with the data as far as building charts and having flexibility and so forth. Tableau is a tool that utilizes so many different data sources. Instead of working with thousands of rows of data, you could work with millions of rows of data. You could use very different types of data where you couldn’t use in Excel and other related tools. And it was really an enterprise solution because you either had a server environment or a cloud environment where a lot of people can join and it gives an opportunity for teams and cross-functional teams to work together and really get insights and not only see data visualizations, but actually have access to data they probably wouldn’t have access to before.

So when I started, it was a demonstration. So at that point I was an unemployment insurance trainer but was good with Excel. So they’re like, “oh, we have this new tool.” And there was a demonstration. I was the only one that seemed interested in it, so, cuz I was the one that was asking all the questions during the demonstration. It was during like a leadership type conference thing and I just couldn’t stop asking questions. It was like, “okay, you have the tool.”

Carolyn Kiel: Mm-hmm.

Adam Mico: So, initially I was working with a team as a subject matter expert, and then I started becoming a product owner of the tool, re-engineering our metrics and so forth to share business insights with people internally. It developed from there and I spent probably about 20 to 25% of my time on Tableau for like the last four or five years I was working with the public sector.

Flash forward, I didn’t do anything in public, so all my stuff was like Batman in a cave. I was doing it at work. And as soon as I did my work in public, I realized my design sucked. So it was great to see, and it really, it really impassioned me to the community because I could see what they’re doing and I was like, I felt like I was living in a hole all these years. My head was in the ground because I didn’t see all the great things everybody was doing. So I was able to get really inspired by what everybody else was doing and then create something of my own and build up my network because of my commitment to the community.

And my intent when I joined that community back in 2019 was to give back. At that time I joined the community, I reclassed at the highest level I could possibly reclass to at my current job. So I was at a plateau and I was kind of bored. So I’m like, I, I thought I knew everything about Tableau. I’m like, okay, I’m just gonna join a community so I could be part of something as well as try to give back. But I realized I had so much to learn myself. I, it wasn’t something I could really give back to. So I really needed to put more effort into building up the skills that I didn’t know I had because I felt I really had a safety net. Things that would’ve mortified me in the past as far as public speaking or writing publicly, or being not anonymous, I was able to do with the community.

So, and it was kind of funny because with the community, it was like people that are neurotypical are, like, “oh, Adam, you’re an extrovert!” I am an extrovert with my tribe. But if you know what I am in a normal life with people I have nothing in common with, I’m in the back of the room and looking for a way out. That’s me. So it’s completely different when it’s covering topics that are really near and dear to me. And having the opportunity to share that and understanding other people can have similar impacts regardless of whether you’re autistic or, or whatnot.

Carolyn Kiel: Yeah. That’s really powerful. The Tableau community sounds like it’s just a very supportive community, a great place to learn and, and share and find people from probably like all different types of industries and companies who are using this tool and have that one big thing in common.

Adam Mico: And even with something like data where you have to analyze and be focused and have a strong attention to detail, there are a lot of neurodiverse people, even if they don’t know it. It’s a skillset that aligns well with neurodiversity, because of what we could bring to the table. What many other people have difficulty doing, it may come more naturally to some of us on the spectrum.

Carolyn Kiel: Yeah, absolutely.

From joining that community, I think you said in 2019 and going public with your Tableau work and such, you’ve won community awards in a relatively short amount of time. Tell me about that, that journey and what those community awards mean, and what that means to the community.

Adam Mico: So my first community award was the most shocking one to me because there was this Tableau conference award that was sponsored and voted on by the community. It’s called the Vizzie Awards.

Carolyn Kiel: Mm-hmm.

Adam Mico: So it’s hosted at the Tableau Conference or aligned with Tableau Conference somehow. In this particular time, it was 2019 Tableau Conference. I just joined the community in August. In November, they had these awards. So I’m like, “nobody knows who the heck I am.” So I didn’t, and I didn’t know anything about the words. I didn’t pay attention to it. And I wasn’t there. I was just at home like most people. So somebody tweeted out, “oh, Adam, you won Notable Newbie at the Vizzie Awards!” I’m like, “What the heck is a Vizzie Award, and what does that mean?” But then I really thought about it and it really choked me up a bit, because I didn’t really understand acceptance because I never tried to be myself and be accepted at the same point. I was always trying to mask to gain acceptance. So in some ways, it’s a lot harder to mask if you’re being genuine. Especially if you have people that support you during the whole time, you don’t want to as much anymore. It felt like people were accepting me for me, for once in my life, outside of my family and so forth.

And then later on, earlier in the following year I became a Tableau Ambassador, which is an official recognition by Tableau as far as being basically an evangelist and a person that highlights impactful social media messages. I was a social ambassador, still am, my third year of being that.

And then shortly after that, the following conference, I won a community leadership award voted on by the community. And it was funny cuz one of the early friends I had with the Tableau community was reading about me at the time, and I was watching it live on Zoom. At that point it was a virtual conference because it was in the midst of the pandemic. And he was reading about me. I’m like, “this guy sounds like me, but it’s not me. It can’t be me.” Because that’s like the biggest award that one could get in the community that’s not already a Visionary or what it was at that time, a Zen Master or a Tableau employee. So it was just a incredible experience for me. And I just didn’t know that was possible, you know, for somebody like me, especially cuz I’d never really thought of myself as that. I just thought of myself as a curmudgeon that happened to get things done! That’s kinda how I saw myself.

And then I won it the following year with a, a good friend of mine. And it was kind of funny because we were still not at the conference, it was still virtual the following year. But we were in a big cabin together, something that would’ve mortified me just maybe two years ago, but there was about 15 of us living in a cabin in Tennessee. And it was a really nice cabin.

Carolyn Kiel: Wow.

Adam Mico: But it was, it was still a cabin but I knew I can get away when I needed to. But I did win the following year and I was actually sick to my stomach cuz I’m like, “it’s too much. It’s too much.” But then my friend who was actually on the couch, maybe within three feet of me actually won herself. So that was just such a great experience.

And then the following year I became a Tableau Visionary, which is the biggest recognition that Tableau provides people. Basically, they’re indicating that you’re a master of the tool, you teach the tool as well as collaborate with people. And I pride myself on collaboration and so forth. I didn’t really think about the other stuff. Of course, you would love to have some of that recognition, but I didn’t think it was gonna come at that point. But it was just something that was just so inspiring to me. Because the year before I didn’t see anybody that I knew was neurodiverse and it bothered me.

Carolyn Kiel: Yeah.

Adam Mico: Because even though I’m sure there were a number of people that were neurodiverse, nobody was public about it at that point as a Tableau Zen Master or Visionary. So that bothered me. And that was a year, before and other people have come out since then as being neurodiverse, which is great to see. But I’m glad that I’m, I’m one of them as well.

Carolyn Kiel: That’s great. Yeah. It’s amazing when you find your community

Adam Mico: Mm-hmm.

Carolyn Kiel: and you find your people just so, so many incredible things are possible, even things that you never expected to happen. That’s awesome. Wow.

And now you have a new book about Tableau.

Adam Mico: Right.

Carolyn Kiel: So tell me about like, how did you get the opportunity to, to write a book and what was that process like?

Adam Mico: So yeah, it was published at the end of last month. It’s called Tableau Desktop Certification Guide and it’s with Packt Publishing. So this is funny, like a year and a half before that, Packt Publishing went to me and had an idea for a book for me to write primarily because I was an ambassador at that point, and I was pretty well known in the community. So they had an idea. I made my own version of the idea, they didn’t care for it. And I created the one that they wanted, I didn’t care for that. So I’m like, “okay, it’s been real, so I’m not gonna do this right now.”

So a little over a year later, they contacted me again, but for something that was really interesting to me. When I was working as a Tableau Evangelist, I accidentally took the test that I started to write the book on. And I took the test because they just flipped over from an old site to a new site. And instead of being able to use the tool, it’s all knowledge based. And I, I was so nervous at the time, cuz I haven’t taken a proctored exam for 20 plus years.

Carolyn Kiel: Oh wow.

Adam Mico: I assumed it was the exam I was supposed to take because the week before when I looked at the website, it wasn’t there. So I’m like, oh, okay. Must be the test I’m supposed to take. So I started taking the test. I did really well on the test. And then I took the right test the following day, passed that one.

But it was kind of funny because it was a happy accident that helped me write this book. Because they were able to see, because you have an accreditation from Tableau, it’s a Credly badge that you could verify that you passed this certification and so forth. So obviously that along with having a network and being an ambassador at the point I was asked, I think it was February when they asked me about the Tableau desktop certification book. Everything kind of fell into place.

So I knew exactly what was needed. I knew the book that I wanted to write because I trained for seven years when I was working in the public sector, I know many people have very different learning styles, and if you’re tackling a knowledge based test, you really have to know a tool back and forth because you can’t use the internet. You can’t use the tool when you’re used to using the tool. So you have to have a combination of hands on experience as well as terminology based slash academia experience. So I try to incorporate that as much as I possibly could based on Tableau’s own domains which they’ve published. But there’s not a lot of information. They have a study guide. It’s super helpful in some ways, but if you don’t know what you’re looking for, it could be very difficult to work with. So I created a lot of hands-on exercises, cover the learning in a way that makes sense, at least to me and to the publisher. And it’s actually doing pretty well right now. So I’m very proud of the feedback that’s been received, and I really hope it helps a lot of people.

The exam is, the reason for it too, is that a lot of people have a big gap in being able to access something, because to some people, especially looking for a job, a hundred dollar exam is expensive. And also your time is the most valuable commodity. So I try to shrink six months of learning into two weeks with the hands-on examples as well as the writing part. So somebody could reasonably take it within two to four weeks, pass the exam and get noticed by recruiters. Because if you don’t have a big network, nobody’s gonna notice you. But if you have something that’s certifiable that somebody could search for, somebody if you’re in their area or if, if it makes sense for them to reach out to you, you’ll have more of an opportunity rather than no opportunity for having that type of contact.

Carolyn Kiel: Yeah. And since it sounds like it’s a relatively new type of certification or new exam,

Adam Mico: Mm-hmm.

Carolyn Kiel: it seems like there would be a demand for it, cuz not, maybe not a lot of people have taken it yet, so that’s really interesting.

Adam Mico: There was an old version of the exam, but it was all mostly hands on.

Carolyn Kiel: Oh!

Adam Mico: So it’s a completely different exam now. So if you took the old exam and you take the new exam, you would think it was a completely different company and different test and everything. So it’s so different.

Tableau is a tool that, it’s a hands-on tool. A lot of people that work with the tool don’t really think about the terminology. They’re just moving stuff around, grading calculations or whatever it gets done. But if you don’t know the terminology, you’re gonna have a really difficult time with the knowledge based exam.

But I also try to make sure that people have an opportunity to, to utilize hands-on skills too. So they kind of are able to access that part of their brain. Because if you’re just looking at terminology all day and reading a book on terminology, you’re probably not gonna read that book. But if you have an opportunity to work with something, that’s what’s really important for a lot of people to gain knowledge so that it’s a combination of things. So hopefully that’s what helps a lot of people. And I’m looking forward to seeing more feedback and looking at ways to help improve that for them.

Carolyn Kiel: Well, that’s great. Yeah. It sounds like that your book is really helping people succeed at that new certification, which will help them in their careers. That’s really cool. Wow.

Adam Mico: Thank you so much. It took a long time because many people are writing tech books, have full-time jobs and they’re writing tech books as well. So it was a lot of weekends and so forth. There were a number of times I was like, do I wanna continue with this? Because it’s just too long and I have too many things going on. I relocated from not only New York but Wisconsin to Boston in April.

Carolyn Kiel: Wow.

Adam Mico: So dealing with that relocation, new everything, especially with us being neurodiverse, it’s very difficult to settle down and find kind of a, like a nice hum as opposed to a roar.

I was battling that, but writing the book at the same time. But it was important for me to do that well, even though I wasn’t a hundred percent sure I was gonna complete it because of everything going on. So it, I’m glad that it’s out, that it’s done, and that it was done in I think about nine months from when I started it.

Carolyn Kiel: That’s great. Did you have a hard deadline to get it done from the publisher?

Adam Mico: In a sense they were patient with me. They’re a very aggressive publisher because you don’t want other publishers coming out with similar books.

Carolyn Kiel: Yeah. Mm-hmm.

Adam Mico: So obviously you wanna get that book out there as soon as possible. Others have a desktop certification book, but it’s based on the old test. Of course, you can’t really, they’re not gonna say that. So this is, from what I’ve seen, the first one based on the new version of that exam.

There was times I couldn’t do much because I was doing a lot of travel and preparing for other stuff. I had Covid after flying back from London last year. So there’s a lot of things going on. I have a granddaughter that was born actually February 22nd, 2022.

Carolyn Kiel: Oh great!

Adam Mico: So obviously we wanna spend some time with her as well. So it was a lot of juggling and a very demanding job that I have right now. But fortunately it got out and I’m happy it’s done, at least this version. And, you know, maybe I’ll do a new version later on. We’ll see.

Carolyn Kiel: That’s awesome. Yeah. It’s a great accomplishment and achievement to have that out in the world. It’s a culmination of so much hard work.

As part of your job and as part of your role as Tableau Ambassador and your role in the community, you’re also an advocate for diversity. So tell me about your advocacy.

Adam Mico: So basically since I joined the community, I was more about amplifying messages from people that are not as, they don’t have to be in, in crowd or anything like that, so they can come from various different backgrounds. And I find those stories more interesting than those that had a really nice, steady transition into the world that I’m in right now. So the backgrounds that are different, that come from different walks of life. And fortunately with people in Tableau, cuz data analytics and data visualization is relatively new, so a lot of people started elsewhere, completely different fields. From pharmacy, to law. To everything else. And they find something that really impassions them. And then they get involved with the community or they try to see what they have and try to upskill based on working together with the community.

So it’s fun to see new voices when I have an opportunity to do so, amplify those voices and give them opportunity as much as I possibly can. I’ve mentored a number of people and continue to mentor some people in our community, both neurotypical and neurodiverse as well. So I’m happy to see that there are more people coming out as neurodiverse in our community, cause it’s great to see that it’s more accepting. There’s a really nice landing space for them where they could realize they’re in a safe space. So I want to, I want to help them find that safe space and just be out with my own neurodiversity and what I’ve had to deal with as well, and be an open book for people and be able to give them an opportunity to understand that, hey, you don’t have to say that there’s a wall and that you can’t go through it. You can create your own stepping stone and climb over it. So you just need support. You need to know what you’re dealing with and understand what you’re capable of. And at a certain point you could say, you know, maybe I’ll bet on myself, or maybe somebody could help me as well. So if you can get a combination of that and know that you’re in a safe space, that’s gonna really help people excel. Especially those that come from diverse backgrounds or are neurodiverse.

Carolyn Kiel: Yeah, yeah, that’s important, having that, you know, supportive and safe community, betting on yourself and then having people to help you through mentoring you, sponsoring you, and just kind of helping to guide you along. That’s a really powerful combination.

Adam Mico: Exactly, and I’m looking for communities that are positive impacting too. Because I learned from communities I’ve joined in the past, even though I felt like I was okay in those communities, maybe those communities weren’t as, maybe they’re a little bit more toxic and not very helpful. Maybe not toxic outwardly, but not helpful for my mental health.

And you have to think about that, especially as a neurodiverse person because once you get in that community and you want to be part of something, it’s really difficult to back out. It’s hard to recognize how it’s impacting you until it’s almost too late.

Carolyn Kiel: Yes.

Adam Mico: And it’s like, oh man. I bottomed out and I don’t know how that happened. That’s happened to me a couple times before. But fortunately you learn from that and you have to, you learn from working with people that are more accepting. And I think our current environment is much more accepting of neurodiversity than it was in at the distant past. So right now it, it’s not perfect. There’s a long ways to go. It seems like most of the people in power are neurotypical, so engaging with those conversations and being in tune and maintaining your energy is very difficult thing to ask a neuro diverse person.

Carolyn Kiel: Yeah. Are there certain types of supports that you provide or that you find helpful for people who are autistic and working in the Tableau community or otherwise neurodivergent? Or does it really just depend on the individual people and what they need to succeed?

Adam Mico: It really depends on the individual person. And the good thing about the community is that one could kind of work and upskill and kind of do it silently, and just kind of like be behind the scenes if they’re not ready to be outspoken. I’m one of a few maybe that that would be as outspoken, but there’s plenty of quiet people that are looking for ways and things that interest them.

The great thing about data and the initiatives that the Tableau community has is that there are so many initiatives. If you have special interests, those special interests could be focused upon, so there’s there’s initiatives related to games. There’s initiatives related to sports. There’s initiatives related to general data visualization. So there’s a lot of things that somebody that’s neurodiverse that have their special interests could really dig into, or they can create their own initiative and build from there. So there are so many options. It’s like the funnest choose your own adventure for somebody like us because we have the opportunity to either be more outspoken or be a little bit quieter.

Carolyn Kiel: So you could basically take any kind of data set on any topic and create data visualizations on it, and then I guess share it with the community and be like, what do you think of this? Or like, is that a lot of what happens in the community?

Adam Mico: Some of that. It’s kind of funny. Like a lot of it’s on social media, so if you’re on LinkedIn, it’s like casual Friday at work. And then maybe Twitter’s a little bit more like happy hour. Where casual Friday you’re sharing data visualization that could be on anything, or you’re commenting or liking stuff that other people post that you admire, or you’re sharing posts or whatnot. And talking about topics related to stuff that interests you.

Where on Twitter, it’s kind of like a combination of that, but then you have friends that are just chatting and having general conversations, memes or GIFs or whatnot, and it, it was just kind of like a fun event that it feels like a more relaxed community. And there’s so many people where you could find your tribe pretty quickly, especially given the interest that people have as far as what they’re working on Tableau wise or data visualization wise.

Carolyn Kiel: That’s really cool to realize that those communities are on different social media platforms. What’s the best way for people, say, if you’re like, really new to using Tableau or new to doing data visualizations and you wanna become connected to the community, like what’s the best way to connect on social media with the community?

Adam Mico: There’s a couple ways. The easiest way is if you do a Google search of Tableau community, they have a huge resource and a number of resources related to community stuff, including they have a weekly newsletter, more or less, or, or a curated list of impactful visualizations, blogs and so forth that you could, you don’t even have to really be part of a community to gain knowledge from it, and have it pretty easily accessible to you.

However, if you wanna meet new people and be part of the community our hashtag, at least in the Tableau community is #DataFam. And it’s kind of like a bat signal for us that are in the data fam. A lot of us follow it and we try to help as many people as possible that are new to the community and help make sure that they have resources and they feel seen. If they want to feel seen!

There’s a lot of people that don’t want to be seen right away. They kind of lurk for a while or they may even participate a little bit, but participate as quietly as possible. But then at a certain point they feel more comfortable. And that’s both for neurodiverse and neurotypical people.

Carolyn Kiel: Oh, that’s great. Awesome.

Adam, thank you so much for sharing your story on the show and talking about the impact that Tableau has had on you and the impact of the community around Tableau, which is really, really incredible. How can people get in touch with you if they wanna learn more about your work or your book or the things you’re working on?

Adam Mico: Of course. So, yeah, feel free to look for me on LinkedIn or Twitter. I’m always as much as, as accessible as possible. Not during work hours probably, unless it’s lunch. But yeah, reach out to me on LinkedIn or Twitter. I’m happy to communicate. My DMs are open on Twitter and you could always reach out to me or even tag me on something on LinkedIn. I’ll be happy to contact you. And if you wanna know more about whatever is going in the community, let me know. I’ll be happy to share that, that information with you and even introduce you if you want to be introduced.

Carolyn Kiel: Very cool. Yeah, I’ll put links to your Twitter and LinkedIn in the show notes.

And as we close out, is there anything else that you’d like our listeners to know or anything that they can help or support you with?

Adam Mico: Well, I just think listening and being open-minded and giving yourself a chance to explore something new. The worst thing, at least in my experience about dealing with autism is feeling like it’s a dead end and that you’re in a rut and you can’t get out of that rut. It’s easy to feel that way, especially if you’re in an environment where it doesn’t feel like you’re supported. So looking for opportunities to look beyond that and work beyond that and getting your chance to flourish elsewhere, if you’re in a situation that’s not healthy for you. So you have to think about yourself and you have to think about always stepping forward any opportunity you have. For me, it’s always trying to learn something new and trying to engage as much as possible and push my weaknesses and work on them as much as possible to make them more strengths.

Carolyn Kiel: Yeah, that’s really important to keep in mind. Wonderful. Well, thanks again, Adam, for being on the show. I really enjoyed talking with you.

Adam Mico: Thank you so much, Carolyn. It was great to talk to you as well.

Carolyn Kiel: Thanks for listening to Beyond 6 Seconds. Please help me spread the word about this podcast. Share it with a friend. Give it a shout out on your social media, or write a review on Apple Podcasts or your favorite podcast player. You can find all of my episodes and sign up for my free newsletter at beyond6seconds.net. Until next time!