Episode 36: Super-vision: why autistic minds are a natural match for intelligence work
Published on 10 June 2025 • Hosted by Dr Lisa Colledge
In national security, high performance is non-negotiable. So what is it that makes military intelligence and cybersecurity agencies turn to autistic and dyslexic individuals to fill some of their most critical roles?
From Israel’s Unit 9900 to the UK’s GCHQ and Australia's cyber training programs, defense organizations are actively recruiting neurodivergent individuals not out of charity, or purely from a desire to be socially responsible, but because of their extraordinary pattern recognition, attention to detail, and visual-spatial reasoning. These aren’t feel-good inclusion stories. They’re talent strategies with real-world results.
In this episode of Culture by Neurodesign, I explore the science behind this trend. Drawing on Dr Temple Grandin’s first-person accounts of her visual thinking style and Professor Laurent Mottron’s Enhanced Perceptual Functioning theory, I paint a picture of how autistic perception is not just different—it’s uniquely suited to certain high-demand tasks.
Temple describes her thoughts as “videos,” not words, and she can mentally rotate and simulate entire systems as though standing both outside and inside them. Mottron’s lab has developed the Theory of Enhanced Perceptual Functioning, describing how autists are better able to mentally manipulate 3-dimentional images, and are more resistant to the bias of having what they see impacted by prior knowledge.
We need to stop designing roles for one neurostyle and start recognizing the power of cognitive complementarity. Autistic minds often excel at precision, anomaly detection and spatial reasoning. Dyslexic minds tend to thrive in pattern recognition and holistic thinking. Neurotypical minds bring vital strengths in verbal fluency, narrative shaping, and social attunement. When you consciously design team norms and environments to help people with these differences interact—not compete—you amplify not only your team’s mental health, but their performance outcomes.
Just as importantly, this shouldn’t rely on starting with diagnosis. It starts with curiosity and openness to difference. You don’t need someone to disclose they’re autistic or dyslexic to begin making your environment more neuro-inclusive. Instead, ask: who does well with visual tasks? Who prefers structure or deep focus? Who solves problems in unconventional but effective ways? And act on what you observe. Work on helping your team to connect and value these differences too. How to do this is not something which is obvious to most of us, but we can learn it.
If defense intelligence teams are already making these shifts—because performance demands it—then it’s worth a look for everyone else too.
Other episodes referred to in this podcast are:
Episode 15 – Autism, allism, and innovation: a case study with Professor Laurent Mottron.
In this episode, Dr Lisa Colledge introduced Professor Mottron and discussed his collaborative approach with autistic researchers, showcasing how combining different thinking styles lead his research lab to innovative outcomes.Episode 16 – From constraints to creativity: dyslexia and innovation.
Relating to GCHQ’s recruitment of dyslexic individuals for signal intelligence and anomaly detection, this episode discusses the enhanced holistic perception and big-picture thinking associated with dyslexics.Episode 33 – Autism and Silicon Valley: a case study in neuro-inclusive design.
This episode is another example of how a particular function – in this case the technological functions of Silicon Valley – are a natural fit with the skills associated with autistic individuals.Episode 34 – Anti-bias brains that excel in logic and rational decision-making.
Dr Lisa Colledge shared several examples of how autistic brains resust the cogfnitive biases associated with heuristics (cognitive shortcuts), and the importance of this enhanced rationality in decision-making.
Temple Grandin’s chapter describing her visual thinking style is: My Mind is a Web Browser: How People with Autism Think. (1995) Published in Learning and Cognition in Autism, Eric Schopler and Gary B. Mesibov (eds), Plenum Press, New York. Chapter 8, pp.137-156.
I’m Dr Lisa Colledge, and I help ambitious leaders build future-ready teams they trust to deliver now and adapt to whatever’s next — driving engagement, performance, and enduring resilience.
Learn more about building Neuro-Inspired Teams that outpace, outperform, and outlast your competition.
