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Hi AOM friends,

We're excited to invite papers and 1,000-word proposals for a Special Issue on Neurodiversity in the Workplace: A Relational Perspective. We're looking for work that illuminates how neurodivergent employees build, navigate, and sustain relationships-with leaders, coworkers, teams, and organizations-and what this means for belonging, performance, and well-being.

What we welcome

• Empirical (quant, qual, mixed), meta-analyses, research notes, GOMusings, and GOM Now pieces

• Designs spanning experiments, ESM/diaries, longitudinal field studies, and well-justified cross-sectional work

• Transdiagnostic and multi-condition approaches (beyond ASD/ADHD)

How to submit

• By Nov 1: send a 1,000-word proposal outlining aims, key questions/hypotheses, methods, and status

• Selected proposals will be invited to submit full manuscripts for blind review

Guest Editors: Joshua Marineau (NDSU), Kevin S. Cruz (Georgia Southern), Dana L. Haggard (Missouri State), and Yannick Griep (Samergo / North-West University)

Questions or early ideas? Reach out to any of us. We look forward to your contributions-and to advancing rigorous, practice-relevant scholarship on neurodiversity's relational dynamics at work.

Call for Papers

Guest Editors: Joshua Marineau¹, Kevin S. Cruz², Dana L. Haggard³, & Yannick Griep^4,5 1College of Business, North Dakota State University, USA; ²Parker College of Business, Georgia Southern University, USA; ³Department of Management, Missouri State University, USA; 4Samergo, Rotterdam, The Netherlands; ⁵North-West University, Potchefstroom, South Africa

Focus and Purpose of this Special Issue

Neurodiversity encompasses a range of neurological variations, including autism, ADHD, dyslexia, and others, representing an estimated 10–20% of the global population (LeFevre-Levy et al., 2023). Despite the significant presence of neurodivergent individuals in the workforce, they often face substantial challenges in securing and maintaining employment. For instance, unemployment rates among neurodivergent adults can be as high as 30–40%, which is three times the rate for people with disabilities and eight times the rate for those without disabilities (The Center for Neurodiversity & Employment Innovation).

Recognizing the unique strengths that neurodivergent employees bring-such as enhanced creativity, innovative problem-solving, and heightened concentration-organizations are increasingly focusing on neurodiversity as a critical aspect of diversity and inclusion initiatives (Khan et al., 2023). However, much of the existing discourse centers on organizational policies and support mechanisms, with limited attention to the interpersonal dynamics that neurodivergent individuals navigate in professional settings.

Understanding how neurodivergent employees engage in relationships with coworkers, team members, supervisors, and the organization at large is crucial. These interactions significantly influence job satisfaction, performance, and overall well-being. For example, communication styles may vary, leading to potential misunderstandings or conflicts if not appropriately managed. Individual differences in social cognition and behavior impact the building and maintaining of critical workplace social relationships. Moreover, the degree of social support and inclusion experienced by neurodivergent individuals can impact their sense of belonging and engagement at work.

This special issue aims to fill this gap by exploring the relational aspects of neurodiversity in the workplace. By examining how neurodivergent individuals interact within various organizational contexts and societal structures, we seek to develop a comprehensive understanding of the factors that facilitate or hinder effective workplace relationships. Such insights are essential for informing the development of targeted interventions and support mechanisms that promote not only inclusion, but also the thriving of neurodivergent individuals within organizational settings.

Employer – Employee Relationships. The relationship between neurodivergent employees and their organization is central to fostering inclusion, engagement, and long-term retention. Understanding how neurodivergent individuals connect with their organization involves exploring their sense of belonging, communication patterns, and recognition within workplace structures. Investigating why these relationships matter highlights their impact on job satisfaction, productivity, and mental well-being. Examining when challenges arise-such as during onboarding, performance evaluations, or workplace transitions-can inform proactive interventions. Additionally, recognizing what may go wrong, such as miscommunication, lack of accommodations, or exclusion from professional networks, is crucial in designing effective management strategies. Without addressing these dynamics, organizations risk perpetuating workplace inequalities and missing out on the unique strengths of neurodivergent talent.

Leadership Relationships. A person's relationship with their immediate supervisor is arguably the most important interpersonal relationship in the workplace due to the wide variety of personal, interpersonal, and organizational outcomes it impacts. For neurodivergent individuals, these high-stakes relationships can be particularly challenging to navigate due to social and communication difficulties, sensory and information processing differences, demand avoidance tendencies, and/or executive functioning issues they face. While we know that leading with empathy and understanding can contribute to improved relationships (Szluc, 2024) for neurodivergent individuals, we know less about the darker side of their managerial relationship (e.g., abusive supervision). It is also important to consider how leadership and related motivation theories might operate differently for neurodivergent individuals considering their interest-based versus importance-based motivation systems.

Team Member Relationships. Teams are a foundation of modern organizations (Mathieu et al., 2019). However, Rijswijk et al. (2024) found only three studies in their review of cognitive and neurodiversity in groups that examined how neurodiversity is related to group processes and outcomes and these three studies only examined neurodiversity within student workgroups. Our lack of knowledge about how neurodiversity is related to the inputs, mediators, and outcomes of organizational groups and teams (Ilgen et al., 2005) is extremely problematic both theoretically and practically. We need to build and test theory as to how neurodivergence serves as both an input as well as a moderator of other inputs, and how neurodivergence positively or negatively impacts the many processes and outcomes of organizational groups and teams in order to have a more accurate understanding of those processes and outcomes. Given interdependence is a defining characteristic of teams (e.g., Cohen & Bailey, 1997), understanding the relationships that exist between neurodivergent team members and their teams is critical to this more accurate understanding.

Co-Worker Relationships. Building and maintaining social relationships is a critical part of success in organizations (Fang et al., 2015). This is largely because resources critical to individual, group and organizational outcomes are accessed through social relationships-such as information and political support. This means that success at work relies on social and relational acumen to develop and maintain positive relationships while avoiding social pitfalls. Neurodivergent differences in social functioning are well documented (Harpin et al., 2016), but the effect these differences on the real-world social networks of employees is not well understood. Thus, the study of how neurological differences, as well as key mitigating factors, impact social relationships for neurodivergent employees can shed light on the challenges as well as the potential benefits of neurodiversity on social relationships at work.

Example Research Questions

Below you can find a non-exhaustive list of example research questions we would be interested in:

1. How do neurodivergent employees develop a sense of organizational belonging?
2. What organizational structures and policies best facilitate neurodivergent employees' engagement?
3. When are neurodivergent employees most vulnerable to workplace exclusion?
4. How do mismatched expectations between neurodivergent employees and management affect workplace relationships?
5. What proactive strategies can organizations implement to prevent relationship breakdowns with neurodivergent employees?
6. How does neurodivergence impact group and team outcomes, such as attitudes and performance?
7. How does neurodivergence impact the use of technology and how that technology is used within groups and teams?
8. How does neurodivergence impact shared cognition within groups and teams?
9. How does neurodivergence impact information sharing within teams?
10. How does neurodivergence impact team adaptability?
11. How might neurodivergent individuals experience abusive supervision differently?
12. How do neurodivergent managers differ from neurotypical managers when it comes to motivating employees?
13. How might the development of mentoring relationships differ for neurodivergent individuals?
14. How might aspects of neurodivergent social functioning enhance and/or inhibit positive social relationships for individuals, teams and organizations?

We emphasize that 'neurodivergence' includes many different neurological differences and that this is not a special issue limited to ASD or ADHD. Papers that address multiple categories of neurodivergence, comorbidity issues, or take a transdiagnostic approach are encouraged. We welcome not only empirical papers (both quantitative, as well as qualitative), but also meta- analyses, research notes, GOMusings (when the authors believe their idea suits one or more of the objectives as outlined in Cruz et al., 2022), and GOM Now papers (when the authors believe their study lends itself for a short paper focused on solving organizational issues, as outlined in Kessler, 2021). For quantitative empirical papers, we welcome a broad range of methods, such as experimental and quasi-experimental designs, experience sampling methods, diary studies, and other longitudinal designs, with a preference for samples of real employees in real organizations. We further do not dismiss the use of cross-sectional quantitative designs, as long as the design is suitable for answering the research question (Spector, 2019). Otherwise, authors need to further corroborate findings from cross-sectional studies with follow-up studies. For qualitative empirical papers, we also welcome a broad range of methods, as long as the method fits the research questions.

Deadlines, Submissions, and Review Process

Please note that this call is open, so everyone is welcome to submit. The submission process consists of two stages. First, you will submit a 1000-word proposal in which you explain the objectives of the work, the main research questions/hypotheses, the intended methodology, and whether or not you have already carried out the work. Proposals will first be judged by the special issue editors for their appropriateness for the special issue at hand. If not deemed as a good fit, we may encourage you to submit your paper for other issues of the journal. Submitted proposals that fit the scope of the issue well will receive an invitation to submit their full manuscript for a rigorous blind review process. Please note that whether empirical results are significant or not will not be a determining criterion at any stage of the submission process. By submitting to this Special Issue, you commit yourself to reviewing another submission by peers to this Special Issue. The deadline for submission of the proposal is November 1^st, 2026, whereas the deadline for submission of the full manuscript is July 1^st, 2027. The special issue is intended for publication by September 2028.

Authors must adhere to a stringent timeline. Relevant dates are as follows:

• November 1, 2026: Initial proposal submission due date
• December 15, 2026: Decisions and feedback on proposal
• July 1, 2027: Full paper submission due date
• October 1, 2027: Decisions and reviews provided on submissions
• January 1, 2028: Revise and resubmit manuscript due date
• March 1, 2028: Second round decision and reviews provided
• June 1, 2028: Second round revise and resubmit manuscript due date
• September 1, 2028: Completed manuscripts due to publisher

Contact Information for Special Issue Editors

The special issue editors would be happy to discuss initial ideas or to answer questions regarding the special issue. The contact information for each of the special issue editors is listed below.

1. Joshua Marineau (joshua.marineau@ndsu.edu)
2. Kevin Cruz (kevinscruz@yahoo.com)
3. Dana Haggard (DHaggard@MissouriState.edu)
4. Yannick Griep (ygriep@gmail.com)

References

Cruz, K. S., Zagenczyk, T. J., & Griep, Y. (2022). (Re)introducing a new section generally and a special section in this issue specifically: GOMusings. Group & Organization Management, 47(5), 891-898. https://doi.org/10.1177/10596011221117436

Cohen, S. G., & Bailey, D. E. (1997). What makes teams work: Group effectiveness research from the shop floor to the executive suite. Journal of Management, 23(3), 239-290. https://doi.org/10.1177/014920639702300303

Fang, R., Landis, B., Zhang, Z., Anderson, M. H., Shaw, J. D., & Kilduff, M. (2015). Integrating personality and social networks: A meta-analysis of personality, network position, and work outcomes in organizations. Organization Science, 26(4), 1243-1260. https://doi.org/10.1287/orsc.2015.0972

Harpin, V., Mazzone, L., Raynaud, J., Kahle, J., & Hodgkins, P. (2016). Long-term outcomes of ADHD: a systematic review of self-esteem and social function. Journal of Attention Disorders, 20(4), 295-305. https://doi.org/10.1177/1087054713486516

Ilgen, D. R., Hollenbeck, J. R., Johnson, M., & Jundt, D. (2005). Teams in organizations: From input- process-output models to IMOI models. Annual Review of Psychology, 56, 517-543. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev.psych.56.091103.070250

Khan, M. H., Grabarski, M. K., Ali, M., & Buckmaster1, S. (2023). Insights into creating and managing an inclusive neurodiverse workplace for positive outcomes: A multistaged theoretical framework. Group & Organization Management, 48(5), 1339-1386. https://doi.org/10.1177/10596011221133583

LeFevre-Levy, R., Melson-Silimon, A., Harmata, R., Hulett, A. L., & Carter, N. T. (2023). Neurodiversity in the workplace: Considering neuroatypicality as a form of diversity. Industrial and Organizational Psychology, 16(1), 1-19. https://doi.org/10.1017/iop.2022.86

Mathieu, J. E., Gallagher, P. T., Domingo, M. A., & Klock, E. A. (2019). Embracing complexity: Reviewing the past decade of team effectiveness research. Annual Review of Organizational Psychology and Organizational Behavior, 6, 17-46. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-orgpsych- 012218-015106

Rijswijk, J. v., Curșeu, P. L., & Oortmerssen, L. A. v. (2024). Cognitive and neurodiversity in groups: A systematic and integrative review. Small Group Research, 55(1), 44-88. https://doi.org/10.1177/10464964231213564

Spector, P. E. (2019). Do not cross me: Optimizing the use of cross-sectional designs. Journal of Business and Psychology, 34(2), 125-137. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10869-018-09613-8

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Yannick Griep
Northwest University
Potchefstroom
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