The Invisible Barrier

The invisible barrier is often the hardest accessibility barrier to address because nobody is quite sure who is responsible for identifying it.

By Gareth Slinn

A neurodivergent person may experience confusing processes, unclear instructions, constant change, excessive cognitive load or environments that make it difficult to concentrate. But should it really be their responsibility to identify the problem, disclose their needs and explain what the organisation should change?

At the same time, it is unreasonable to expect a non-neurodivergent colleague or manager to automatically recognise a cognitive accessibility barrier they may never experience themselves.

This creates a chicken-and-egg problem. Neurodivergent people are encouraged to speak up, while organisations say they cannot address needs they do not know about. Managers are expected to understand neurodivergence, while employees are expected to explain it. Responsibility moves around the organisation, but the invisible barrier remains.

When responsibility continually falls between people, we should look at the system.

Instead of asking who should have raised the problem, we should ask why the system depended on somebody raising it in the first place.

That means helping people understand cognitive accessibility while giving neurodivergent people safer and easier ways to describe the barriers they experience. It also means examining processes, technology and working practices before somebody reaches the point where they have to ask for help.

Because eventually an invisible barrier can become very visible. Performance drops. Someone withdraws. A candidate abandons an application. An employee goes off sick. A customer gives up. Someone leaves.

By then, we are dealing with the consequence rather than the barrier that caused it.

A better approach is to start earlier.

Prevent barriers where we can. Identify what we miss. Remedy what remains.

The invisible barrier should not need to become a visible problem before an organisation decides to act.