Julie Legg chats with Garrett Hammonds, the founder of a digital marketing agency and a self-described high-performing achiever who was diagnosed with inattentive ADHD in adulthood.
Garrett opens up about the emotional impact of a late diagnosis, and how it reframed his self-perception from “just a weird kid” to someone whose brain simply worked differently. Since his diagnosis, Garrett has restructured not only his personal systems, but also the way he leads his agency.
With his wife (also neurodivergent), Garrett has intentionally designed a workplace where diverse minds can thrive, replacing rigid time-tracking and unrealistic expectations with autonomy, flexibility, and trust.
KEY POINTS FROM THE EPISODE
- Garrett’s journey to an adult ADHD diagnosis during the pandemic
- How a reading struggle led to testing and a surprising revelation
- Reframing childhood struggles through the lens of neurodivergence
- The emotional relief and clarity that came with diagnosis
- How his leadership style shifted after understanding his own brain
- Building a neurodivergent-friendly agency with flexible systems and structure
- Replacing micromanagement with trust and project-based work
- Productivity hacks: themed workdays, time-blocking, and the Morgen app
- Using tools like Willow Voice AI to manage writing-based executive dysfunction
- Advice for newly diagnosed adults: “Be patient and be kind.”
LINKS
- HAMMOND MEDIA: https://www.hmm.agency/
- LINKEDIN: https://www.linkedin.com/in/garretthammonds-digital/
- MORGEN CALENDAR: https://www.morgen.so/
- WILLOW VOICE: https://willowvoice.com/
- Email ADHDifference Podcast
- The Missing Piece: A Woman’s Guide to Understanding, Diagnosing and Living with ADHD – by Julie Legg
TRANSCRIPT
JULIE: Welcome to Season 2 of ADHDifference. I’m your host, Julie Legg, ADHD advocate, author of The Missing Piece: A Woman’s Guide to Understanding, Diagnosing, and Living with ADHD, and an unapologetic doer of many things. This season, we’re turning up the volume with a global lineup of brilliant guests bringing their lived experiences, insights, research, strategies, and resources. And of course, along with a healthy dose of humour and humility. Whether you’re neurodivergent yourself or just curious, there’s something here for every curious brain. Let’s dive in. In today’s show, meet Garrett Hammonds, the owner of a successful digital marketing agency, diagnosed with inattentive ADHD in adulthood. A high-performing achiever for years, he struggled silently. Getting diagnosed changed not only how he works but how he leads and has intentionally designed his agency to support neurodivergent minds. Welcome to the show Garrett.
GARRETT: Hey, thank you so much. I’ve been so excited to be on the show and so this is a real treat for me.
JULIE: Yay. I’m glad you’ve joined us. Thank you. Look you’ve spoken about being high performing on the outside but feeling overwhelmed on the inside for many years. What was it that finally led you to seek an ADHD diagnosis and how did it shift your understanding of yourself?
GARRETT: Absolutely. I love that question because it opens up so many different things from my journey in life and it’s hard to even think back to a time where I wasn’t diagnosed with ADHD, but that’s the majority of my life. 2021 right in the middle of the pandemic, I got diagnosed and really it was a time period where we couldn’t go out and about and socialize as much. So, I was reading more often and I’ve always had a terrible time reading. It’s you know, been something where I thought I was dyslexic. So, I originally was getting tested for dyslexia to see if I had some sort of issues going on there and they told me, you know, you do have some reading issues, but what you should do is go and get tested for ADHD. And it turns out I’m in like the top 93rd percentile of inattentive ADHD folks. And it changed so much inside of my life because before I thought, oh you had a hard time making friends as a kid because you’re just weird. You’re just kind of different. You know, you had a hard time in school because, you know, you just didn’t learn the same way. Maybe… maybe you weren’t as smart as the other kids. You know, you needed more time on the tests, you know, because you know, you just weren’t quite at the same area as others. And so I got to reframe all of these things when I was diagnosed and think, well, goodness, maybe I wasn’t a weird kid. Maybe, maybe I am smarter than what I think I was. And of course, because of all of those things, I’ve always been very high performing in the workplace. And not because necessarily I’m you know, just better than any other marketer out there or something, but because I felt like I had to work that much harder because that was where I found my worth. I felt like in order for other people to like me, I had to perform. And so there was so much that happened after the diagnosis. I could really take a step and say, “Well, yes, now you can perform and do your job and do all these different things that you love, but you don’t have to be as hard on yourself. You can you can be kinder. You can be more empathetic. You know, you can go through these processes, but with a new perspective.”
JULIE: It’s an amazing shift change, isn’t it? Once you realize, as you said, you know, I’m not the dumb kid. You know, I’m actually awesome and there’s an explanation. Now, I’ve just got a couple of questions on what you’ve been talking about. And one was your struggle with reading. That’s actually quite common. And I also struggle paying attention long enough to really hold on to the grasp of some complicated things because I forget, and I have to go back and reread the paragraph multiple times. So I’m with you there on the reading. You’re overachieving… dopamine and drive. And aren’t they some ADHD traits put to amazing use? [Absolutely.] Can see overachieving, high achieving. Yeah. Oh, how exciting, it really is.
GARRETT: And being able to think through some of these different pieces now, understanding my ADHD more, I’m able to harness some of the ways that I can hyperfocus on tasks, but I have to set myself up for success with that. So often, you know, I do digital marketing and I’ve been with an agency for close to four years now, a few somebody else’s agency, now you know, with my own and you have to task switch a lot and you wear a lot of hats when you’re at an agency. And so I’ve had to work out how do I be high performing but also do it in a way that works for my brain. And it’s a fun little challenge even today, but I love it.
JULIE: And we’ll talk about some of those strategies shortly. Also too, I was going to ask you, you were already in a leadership role before you got your diagnosis. So, what did that feel like?
GARRETT: I would say my management style changed from when I first started my career. I went through this process of trying to figure out what I really enjoyed the most. And part of that process, I feel like I became more independent than what I should have been while working with teams at a company. But I got into a leadership role very early on in my career. My second job, I took on a director position at a company called the Oklahoma Society of CPAs. And so it was a bunch of finance individuals, even to the highest level in the country which was very neat. But from there I worked in several leadership roles across companies before I got the diagnosis and I found myself really stopping to be able to consider the way that everybody functions differently on a team and trying to be able to understand what sets people up for success. And instead, before it was very “Here’s our goal that we’re trying to get to. Let’s get it done,” you know, and very to the point. But it’s so much more about the relationships. And most of that was me not understanding myself, and by understanding myself, I could then step back and try and understand how other people functioned as well. And so it did a big shift in my management style for sure.
JULIE: Big a-ha moments no doubt when everything started making sense, unpacking all those years undiagnosed. So I’d love to hear about what you’re currently passionate about now and the projects and what’s currently energizing you. So whether it’s a project in the agency or a tool that you’re building or a new concept that you’ve been chewing on, can you tell me a bit about that?
GARRETT: Absolutely. So we, my wife and I, who both of us are neurodiverse, she’s actually ADHD and autistic and so she’s… out of the two of us I’ll just admit she’s much smarter than I am, which makes a perfect pair for me. I can lean on her for a lot of things. But both of us when we started this agency, we had a couple of different things in mind. One, we really wanted to be able to contribute something positive to the marketing agency space. And it’s not like what we’re doing right now is unheard of inside of the space. But really, the reason why marketing agencies can still come into a market fresh is because there’s so many poor marketing agencies out there. So, it’s almost a course correct for a lot of folks. They don’t really work on tracking very heavily. They don’t show how investment dollars are actually paying off in sales and where the return on investment comes from. So, we had some different things in how we structured the agency to try and fix on some of those course corrects. But the part that I get the most excited about is because we’re both neurodiverse. The other piece is that with the employees and contractors that we have as a part of Hammond’s Media and Marketing, we wanted to make it very accessible for people of all different brains, all different perspectives, all different backgrounds. So, we wanted to structure it to where neurodiverse folks could really thrive. And a couple of different things that we’ve been working on and continuing to structure is, you know, for one, we don’t have traditional work hours, just hard stuff. We make it to where you know, folks let us know when they’re available. We’re mostly all… because we’re a digital agency, we’re mostly all remote inside of the work that we do. And say that you know, somebody who has a neurodiverse brain has co-morbidities, things that cross over and you wake up one morning you have a migraine, you have you know anxiety and depression that’s coming you know, you name it. Well, all of a sudden at a traditional workplace, somebody’s telling you, “You have to be here and you have to show up and perform and no matter what, you know, this is the way we do things.” It just doesn’t set people up for success.
Unless you’re telling them, “Hey, every time that something inside of your day throws you off, you have to just spend all of your sick days.” Now, mind you, people can still take plenty of sick days when they work at Hammond’s Media, but we want people to be able to say, “Hey, I don’t have to get up and work right away. I can wait until some of these things pass or I’m able to do some self-care.” And it’s very project based. It’s not task based. So that’s one example, but we’re trying to
really structure the company with little systems all throughout to where people can thrive and be themselves and do the work that they want to do and that they’re passionate about.
JULIE: Still your systems and your flexible working arrangements, that’s suiting not just neurodiverse but also neurotypicals. Are they appreciating?
GARRETT: Yes. Yes. I think everybody kind of likes a little bit of flexibility and the reason you know, agencies are so notorious for time tracking and I’ve seen it done a million different ways. You know, there’s a hundred different softwares out there that people can put on their computer and they have to clock their hours, and clock in and clock out when they switch tasks, and that’s a nightmare. It’s like a second job having to do that. So part of what we do is again, it’s very project based. We want people to work through a project successfully and to communicate about what they’re doing in the project. And in some sense, we still have to do some time tracking, but I don’t make people hit a clock and clock in and clock out. We want to be very generous with the time and say generally, you know, “What time did you start? What time did you finish? If you don’t know exactly, give yourself a little leeway. Give yourself, you know, the benefit of the extra hours if you have to guess.” Because, you know, I prefer pay people a little bit more than to nickel and dime folks and say, “Oh, you were 2 minutes, you know, less than what you said you were.” So it’s been nice to be able to see and learn from others what is helpful to you, whether you’re neurotypical or neurodivergent.
JULIE: Brilliant. And these have been implemented since your diagnosis?
GARRETT: Absolutely. Absolutely. And I started doing some of these things at the previous agency I was at and it turned out I had six people on my team at that agency that were direct reports for me. And three of them had ADHD. You know, it’s a small, small world apparently. We had a team of fully diagnosed individuals which was a lot of fun. But we started being able to do some of that there and I carried that over and have evolved it even more, being able to have my own agency with Grace. So, and I’m hoping it gets even better and better. We’re early on inside of our agency life… had the agency for 5 years and really only been full-time with it for the past year. And we can get feedback from folks to be able to say, “Hey, I really like what we’re doing here” or “I’m struggling with this.” What can we do? And actually build the company with the employees and the clients and all the people we work with. And it’s an exciting time.
JULIE: That would be music to the ears of many workers, I bet. Many team members, that is. Oh, you mentioned the sort of the agency space and I think it may be no surprise to you that the marketing, creativity, is one of the happy spaces for ADHDers and in a list of careers of things that you might be drawn to. You’ve got the working on projects, again, that’s great because there’s a start and an end and you can celebrate that. Doesn’t drag on forever and ever and ever. Also those that like data and systems and structure, also like analysis of the data and the tracking and things like that. People can find that really interesting and yeah, just the straight up creativity. I’m glad to hear it’s all very alive and well in in your neck of the woods.
GARRETT: Absolutely. Yeah. And it’s… I’ve definitely seen that inside of the space. Even something like code developing being able to just focus in on this thing that stays true as long as you are able to structure it. It’s a nice structure, but then you’re able to also see some of the creative side. You don’t have to, you know, with developers, you could have UX designers who have visual elements and then you have the coders who, you know, want to dig into the scripts and do all that jazz. And so, yeah, it’s a great space for that. All different types of thinkers.
JULIE: Brilliant. And I guess these systems are evolving as well. I guess once you’ve ticked off a few, you’re on to the next one to see how you can better the workflow or the team or whatever. So, it’s a continual project for you to look at new systems?
GARRETT: Absolutely. And that’s kind of my end of the year project is I’m working on some of our operations and in particular, you know, there’s so much going on with AI right now. And as an agency, we’re trying to be able to think about how can we utilize all of these AI features while keeping things human at the same time. And it’s neat to be able to mesh that together with our overall systems planning. And everybody has different ideas that they’re throwing out there with things, but the future we have to be learning and we have to be growing. And so that has to be a mentality as an agency that we have is constantly growing. Whether it’s systems and how we work, or the tools that we use, or whatever we want to insert into the blank there.
JULIE: Well, your systems sound amazing and I hope you’re able to share all your wisdom and new-found enthusiasm with others.
GARRETT: Absolutely. You know, it’s funny you mentioned that sharing with others. One of my goals, especially in my local community, is to be able to get more on the speaking circuit and really try and work with other agencies that I come in contact with, or even corporations, and be able to talk about the ways in which they can really put in some of these systems and operations that are built for folks who have ADHD or who are neurodiverse or just in general. I think like we were talking about this is good for everybody. And it’s not going to be a one-size-fits-all, but it’s one that I definitely think we’re making some serious progress and I’d love to be able to share on that by getting out and speaking more.
JULIE: So, that’s very exciting. And also bearing in mind that not everyone with ADHD will disclose that to their employer. So if there are systems in place that suit everyone you’re going to be capturing those people that don’t speak up about it either. So well oh well done. That’s very exciting times ahead for you.
GARRETT: Absolutely. And that’s a great point. So many of these systems that are built for accessibility and inclusion. It’s just a neat thing to really make work spaces better for everybody. And that disclosure, that’s such a good point. Not everybody… and you know, I would even say that folks you know, not in every scenario do you want to disclose because it has its downfalls in some scenarios within our current systems. But you know, we’ll do our part, do everything that we can.
JULIE: Oh that’s fabulous. With regards to ADHD friendly strategies, what’s one system or a habit that you use that has helped you work with your brain instead of against it?
GARRETT: Absolutely. That’s a great question. I feel like I’m asking myself that pretty regularly actually you… because again always learning about new things. I’ll show you my… I have a handy dandy timer that I keep at my desk. I do a kind of altered Pomodoro structure. I just keep it very, very simple for timing. I do 45 minutes of focused work and then a 15-minute break and I cycle through that. But one piece of that is I have to actually manage my calendar to where I have production days where I can just focus on production and then I have my meeting days. So the meeting days, they’re packed. You know, I may have five, six meetings, you know, fairly close together that I have all at once. And but I can stay focused on, oh, here’s my social time. I go in, I’m in sales mode. I’m in, you know, coaching mode, whatever, whatever comes through. But it allows me on the days that I have blocked off to just be production days to hone in on things and really knock it out quickly. So, I use a tool called Morgen for my calendar scheduling. It really helps me out with a lot of things. In particular, helps me with those block-off dates. And if I’m ever traveling somewhere, it automates my travel time in the schedule. And I’m so time blind, you know, that another common ADHD thing. I can get so locked in on a task. This calendar will, with the automated travel times, it’ll alert me and I’ll be like, “Ah, okay. I need to stop and I need to leave because I’m going to have to drive 30 minutes somewhere to meet with a client.” So I’ve loved little things like that. I also have started to incorporate a whole handful of tools and you know, tools is one approach other than systems. It usually costs a little bit of money. So I like to try and mix in both when I recommend things to people. But I will throw out one tool that I’ve loved lately just called Willow Voice AI. I have no affiliation. I just really have liked the tool lately. It’s a dictation app and you know, if I have a really important email that’s going out to a client, maybe it’s a sensitive topic, you know, whatever you can think of, something that stresses you out when you’re writing an email. Sometimes I’ll just push those off and not do them as timely as what I should because I’m like, ah, it’s just going to stress me out to write this. Well, this dictation app, instead of me typing out and questioning whether it’s the right wording or trying to figure out if my tone of voice, it will… it’s learned based on all of the writing I’ve done with it. I hit a button, it listens to me talk, and it writes out what I’m saying, but it fixes my grammar. It structures things into bullet points for me. If I tell it to, it’ll even, you know, help me rewrite things in more clear manners or whatever I prompt it to do. But I think it’s a great tool for anybody with ADHD because it takes the pressure off of some of those more intimidating writing scenarios that you have. And it’s been really neat. But I love learning new systems for ADHD. So, I’m looking forward to listening to more episodes in the future of your podcast and seeing what everybody else has, too.
JULIE: I can relate to your email scenario. I was contracting in corporate and I would write the most amazing emails, but what people didn’t know is that it would take me ages. Every word, this is before AI came along to help. I would undercharge my time because I felt embarrassed that I spent too long, half an hour to write several lines of an email that someone could have sort of banged out in a few minutes. Very handy to know those tips. Thank you. I just wanted to ask you too, as I do with all my guests, for someone who’s received an adult ADHD diagnosis, especially someone already in a high responsibility role or a high achieving role such as yourself, what would you want them to hear?
GARRETT: When I was first diagnosed, I wish someone would have told me, “Be patient and be kind” because I wanted… I was like I’m diagnosed now. I know what’s going on. I have, you know, medication that I’m started on. It’s all going to be solved just right away. And it doesn’t work like that. There’s a process where we learn, we grow, and the things that we’re given when we’re diagnosed are tools, but we have to be able to develop those new found pieces of who we are. And that takes patience, that takes kindness. And so definitely that’s going to affect you in your personal life. It’s going to affect you in your professional life. And it’s so, so important just in general be kind, be patient, because it’s an amazing journey that we all go through and it’s a huge piece of who we are. The other thing that I would say is really try and experiment because you know, like I mentioned a minute ago, I had three people on a team that were all ADHD and one solution that worked for one of them didn’t always work for the other two or for me. It’s crazy to see how ADHD manifests so differently across individuals. But find out what works for you and ask others, get ideas, test it out. But if it’s not working, don’t necessarily just throw it out all at once, but test things and see what you find really fits in with how you work best, and how you process things. So, I hope… I hope anybody will be able to be encouraged. We’re all doing this, you know, this life thing and figuring it out as we go along. So, we’re learning as we go and we just do our best. And that’s a big thing to just keep in mind during, if you’re diagnosed as an adult, you know, you’re going to have a few new things to think about for sure.
JULIE: That is marvellous words of advice, Garrett. Thank you so much. I wanted to thank you so much for sharing your journey with me today and it sounds like you’ve got some amazing systems in place. And yay you for being the leader in terms of that and your agency and I wish you all the very very best, and thank you for your time today.
GARRETT: Thank you so much. I had a blast. Thanks for having me.