Elimination of Bias: Lawyers with ADHD – Potential, Powers, and Pains in a Profession that (Desperately) Needs our Brains

In this presentation, Marshall Lichty and Joan Bibelhausen discuss the unique brains powering lawyers with ADHD and the attitudes and actions that can limit them. Learn about ADHD fundamentals, the research, and ADHD’s impact on systems, organizations, and people. Presenters will discuss what ADHD looks like in adults in general—and lawyers in particular—and why we can be excited about the future for these JDHDs and the profession that claims them.

Topics include:

Potential. The legal profession has much to learn about ADHD in lawyers. There are lots of lawyers who don’t know they have this common and well-known brain condition or that they can do something to manage it. Bias and misunderstanding hurt people who might ask for help (and those close to them). Learning about ADHD—and understanding and advancing the well-documented strengths lawyers with ADHD bring to our profession—lets us use what we once labeled as “problems” to move the profession forward.

Powers. Lawyers with ADHD are creative, innovative, and entrepreneurial. They are gritty, persistent, and empathetic, with powerful skills in seeing gaps, creative problem solving, and connecting with people from every background.

Pains. Lawyers with ADHD have many powers, but they are not realizing their potential. This comes at crippling emotional cost to the lawyer and astronomical cost to their organizations and the profession as a whole. Available resources are expanding, but we need more.

– Marshall Lichty; Host, JDHD, A Podcast for Lawyers; ADHD Coach and Speaker, Law Firm Consultant and Marketing Strategist; Author, The Small Firm Roadmap
– Joan Bibelhausen; Executive Director, MN Lawyers Concerned for Lawyers