Author, Researcher & Coach
I am fascinated by the intersection of Earth, business, and coaching through an autistic-first lens. As the founding director and director of education at Earthself Community Interest Company, this inquiry is taken into applied contexts of leadership and organisation — exploring what it means to coach, lead, and do business on behalf of Earth.
The origins of this work are both personal and systemic.
Why This Work Exists — And Why It Matters
I am a late-diagnosed autistic woman whose working life has unfolded inside leadership, coaching, and organisational systems that were never designed to recognise how my brain, body, and nervous system work — or how Earth itself works. Long before I had language for being autistic, I could feel the strain: the quiet exclusions, the neurobiological mismatches, and the way certain forms of intelligence were praised while others were rendered invisible or “too much.”
Alongside this lived experience sits my professional one. I have worked within fast-growing organisations and professional coaching contexts, witnessing leaders and teams struggle not because they lacked commitment or capability, but because the ways they communicated and made decisions could not hold complexity, neurodivergence, and ecological reality at the same time.
My Scottish roots matter here. Growing up in a place shaped by industry, extraction, and survival — where we were both colonised and colonisers — has deeply influenced how I understand responsibility, stewardship, and power. Scotland is a place where histories of erasure and resilience sit close to the surface, and where questions of who gets to decide, who bears the cost, and what is sustained over time cannot be fully abstracted away, even when we try.
This work emerges at the intersection of these experiences. Drawing on an academic background in consciousness, spirituality, and transpersonal psychology, my doctoral research undertaken at the University of Strathclyde examines how autistic intelligence is marginalised and excluded in leadership and coaching through their foundations in adult development theory. I am exploring what it takes to create an autistic-first neuro-inclusive, Earth-systemic approach to leadership development — one that enables those of us who function differently to live, lead, and contribute as part of an Earth where all life thrives.
For academic, research, publications, speaking, coaching or facilitation enquiries you can contact me via tabitha@tabithajayne.com