How Masking Shapes the Calling of the Neurodivergent Workforce
By Jen Spencer.
This is the first in a two-part series on neurodivergent professionals and the hidden cost of appearing fine at work, every day, in workplaces that consider them dependable.
Masking, sometimes called camouflaging, is the conscious or unconscious suppression of natural neurodivergent traits to meet neurotypical workplace norms. It is a learned strategy, not a fixed trait, shaped by which parts of a person are met with acceptance and which are not.
For many neurodivergent professionals, years of learning which parts of themselves are met with acceptance produce a private, self-imposed unsafety that persists even in objectively supportive workplaces.
In practice, it can look like an autistic teacher scripting her greeting word for word before Back to School Night, forcing eye contact that feels physically uncomfortable, and suppressing the urge to stim through a staff meeting, all so nothing about her reads as anything other than composed.
Potential Long-Term Effects of Masking
A 2023 study published in PLOS ONE compared workplace masking experiences among 285 autistic, 88 non-autistic neurodivergent, and 99 neurotypical UK adults, and found that while all three groups described masking as an adaptive response, autistic and neurodivergent participants reported uniquely heightened pressure to mask, driven by limited understanding of neurodiversity across workplaces (Pryke-Hobbes et al., 2023).
Sustained masking requires repeatedly overriding authentic responses, needs, and communication style to keep functioning the way a workplace expects. Over time, that can produce something closer to a quiet erosion of identity than typical workplace strain, a widening gap between who a person is and who they have learned it is safe to appear to be. That erosion is also where a workplace starts to feel unsafe from the inside, not because of anything a team is doing, but because years of learned risk assessment do not simply switch off.
Masking and Calling
For many neurodivergent professionals, their work is not just a job.
Teaching, nursing, counselling, and other helping professions are frequently described as a calling, a sense of purpose that goes beyond a paycheck and shapes how a person understands who they are. That sense of calling is often what makes the effort of masking feel worth it in the first place, a trade a person is willing to make to keep doing work that matters to them.
But a calling only sustains a person for as long as they can still access it, and masking, sustained long enough, is exactly what starts to close that access off. In part two of this series, I'll explore what happens when that gap collides fully with that calling.
Masking, Unmasking, and What Can Help
Masking is a real and valid strategy when a workplace does not feel safe, and none of this should be read as saying it is wrong. Still, because sustained masking can lead to the identity erosion and stress described above, it is worth having more than one way to respond – ways that protect not just your wellbeing but your ability to keep doing the work you were called to do in the first place.
- If the workplace still feels unsafe, make room for masking. For example, rehearsing a demanding interaction beforehand, in your head or in notes only you see, can reduce how much override is required in the moment itself, and keep the cost contained rather than compounding.
- If you want to test the waters, try unmasking in one small, contained way. Try to unmask one low-stakes trait, in one low-stakes setting. Don’t assume the whole room will react badly. Finding out how people will actually respond is often the only reliable way to learn whether a specific workplace is safer than years of caution have taught you to expect.
If you are neurotypical and reading this, notice when it happens. A colleague stimming, asking for something to be repeated, or stepping out during a loud meeting is a small act of unmasking. Visible acceptance in that moment, not silence or a raised eyebrow, is what determines whether it gets tried again, and whether that colleague keeps enough of themselves intact to stay in the work they came here to do.
Conclusion
Masking protects people in workplaces that have not yet earned their trust, and that protection is worth respecting, not correcting. But when masking is the only option a person has, the cost can compound quietly over time, and what it ultimately puts at risk is not just wellbeing but a person's ability to keep helping others in the way they set out to.
Part two of this series will look at what happens when that cost collides with a genuine sense of calling, and what organisations, not just individuals, can do about it.
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About the Author
Jen Spencer, PhD, is a researcher, keynote speaker, and workshop facilitator working with educators and helping professionals across the US. Her career spans ten years in healthcare, seven in K-12 teaching, three as a vocational rehabilitation counsellor, and several in state education leadership at the Indiana Department of Education. She has presented at conferences including ResearchED and the Indiana Association of School Principals. Drawing on that path and her doctoral research in educational leadership, she developed the Calling Collapse™ Recovery Framework, distinguishing burnout from the deeper identity-level erosion helping professionals experience when systemic barriers keep them from living out their calling.
References
Pryke-Hobbes, A., Davies, J., Heasman, B., Livesey, A., Walker, A., Pellicano, E., & Remington, A. (2023). The workplace masking experiences of autistic, non-autistic neurodivergent and neurotypical adults in the UK. PLOS ONE, 18(9), e0290001. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0290001