Just why are there so many dyslexic entrepreneurs? And what we can all learn from their way of thinking in Dyslexia Awareness Week (1-7 October)
What do Cath
Kidston, Jo Malone and Anita Roddick all have in common? They’re all hugely successful business women
I hear you say. Well yes, that’s true. But they have something else that binds
them - they’re all dyslexic.
Yet despite
this they’ve managed to single handedly build multi-million-pound businesses. Struggling
to read and write has not held these women back. Nor Steve Jobs or Alan Sugar.
So just why
are so many entrepreneurs dyslexic? What gives them the edge in business over
the rest of us? Statistics show that around 20% of UK business
self-starters are dyslexic, compared to 10% of the general public. And astonishingly 40 % of self-made
millionaires identify themselves as dyslexic, which is massively
disproportionate. Maybe working for yourself is preferable to trying to fit
into someone else’s business?
What they possess that
non-dyslexics don’t is what UK charity Made by Dyslexia terms Dyslexic Thinking
– dyslexic minds tend to think multi-dimensionally, so, using all their senses.
If nurtured they can have higher than normal intelligence and extraordinary
creative abilities. They’re naturally curious problem solvers who think creatively
outside the box. This makes dyslexic entrepreneurs
exceptional at identifying solutions to problems, and in creating new ways to
tackle challenges. Great skills in business, eh?
Jo Malone made a fortune from
honing one skill in particular to compensate for inability to read and write. “I’m a woman who’s dyslexic, can’t tell
my left from my right. I can’t fill out a form on my own, and when I go into a
bank, I have to ask someone to help me. But I
use my sense of smell like my eyes and hands. It's something that happens
naturally to me, so I would look at what you're wearing, and who you are, and I
would be translating it back into smell’.
So Jo took her “million dollar nose” and made
a fortune creating a multi-million dollar fragrance empire. Creative,
resourceful, resilient, dyslexic.
Similarly Agatha Christie
(yes, the best-selling
novelist of all time, surpassed only by Shakespeare and the Bible was dyslexic)
developed her imagination due to the isolation she felt living with her disability.
She was described as the “slow” one by her family, but it was this rich imagination
that set her apart and ultimately sealed her place in literary history.
 |
| Jo Malone |
Kate Griggs, from
Made by Dyslexia, firmly believes the onset of the merging of robotics and virtual
reality, dubbed the Fourth Industrial Revolution, will call for precisely the
type of intelligence dyslexic people have in abundance: creativity, imagining,
exploring, connecting and reasoning.
The British intelligence service now recognises their
ability to analyse complex information in a "dispassionate, logical and
analytical” way. That’s why GCHQ
recruits a higher than average number of dyslexic employees to decipher facts
from patterns to combat terrorism.
There is talk of
lessons in entrepreneurship for dyslexic school children in the US. “They’re
hard wired for it”, says the wonderfully named dyslexic business woman Tiffany
Sunday.
So far from being a
“disability”, being dyslexic is actually a gift. Dyslexics have the skills for the
future and the cards, it seems, are stacked in their favour. Or are they?
The success that
Jo, Cath and Anita achieved is all the more remarkable when you consider that
when they were at school there was much less support for dyslexia (if it was
even diagnosed in the first place!) and much more stigma. They were pigeon
holed for their disability as well as their sex. But I guess that’s where the
resilience comes back in! Challenging those stereotypes and succeeding against
the odds in a predominantly male arena.
Surely today it’s
different though? Well, education funding has been slashed and SEN departments
are cutting down. So, if a child’s condition is picked up at all, teachers are
faced with limited funds with which to support them.
Not surprisingly UK
dyslexic charities are calling for a change in the education system. Made by Dyslexia believes that rather than
taking brilliant dyslexic minds and squashing them into an education system
that doesn't fit, all children would benefit from being taught the skills of creativity,
visualisation, problem solving and innovation.
Toddlers have these
qualities in abundance but by the time they start secondary school much of it
has gone by the wayside. Rote learning, excessive testing and league tables
have removed much creativity from the curriculum. And the Government’s
commitment to making GCSE exams tougher must be a concern to every parent of a dyslexic
child. Who then will lead the Fourth
Industrial Revolution?
We’re going to need
thinking outside the box more than ever in the 21st Century. The world is crying out for people to look at
it in a new way. We should be harnessing
the potential of dyslexic abilities, tapping into their brilliant minds, not
focusing on their disabilities and erecting barriers.
In Dyslexia Awareness Week (1st
to 7th October) we’d do well to remember the words of another
notable dyslexic, Albert Einstein: “Imagination is more important than knowledge. For knowledge
is limited, whereas imagination embraces
the entire world, stimulating progress, giving birth to evolution.”
This blog was written by Guest Blogger, Jasmine Comer. Find her Linked In here: www.linkedin.com/in/jasmine-comer-copywritingliverpool
And be sure to follow Jasmine on Twitter!
This blog was written by Guest Blogger, Jasmine Comer. Find her Linked In here: www.linkedin.com/in/jasmine-comer-copywritingliverpool
And be sure to follow Jasmine on Twitter!
