The Chartered Insurance Institute (CII) has warned that conventional recruitment practices are screening out neurodivergent candidates at a time when demand for data, technology and risk skills is intensifying across the sector. The professional body published a guide this week setting out how firms can adapt their hiring and management practices to access what it describes as an underused talent pool.
The CII represents around 122,000 insurance and personal finance professionals. It argues that neurodivergent candidates, whose brains process, learn and communicate differently from what is considered typical, disproportionately carry strengths in pattern recognition, data analysis, attention to detail and systems thinking. These are not peripheral skills. Yet the guide points to a Zurich Insurance survey from November 2024 in which half of neurodivergent adults reported experiencing discrimination when applying for jobs, with 28% saying they had been turned down for subjective reasons such as communication style or perceived team fit.
Automated CV screening tools, timed personality assessments and multi-stage interview processes are configured around neurotypical norms and tend to disadvantage candidates who process information or communicate differently. A 2024 report by the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD) found that only 37% of neurodivergent employees felt their organisation provided meaningful support, and one in five had experienced harassment or discrimination at work because of their neurodivergence.
The guide, produced with GAIN (Group for Autism, Insurance, Investment and Neurodiversity), identifies a consistent pattern in how recruitment goes wrong. Job descriptions that use vague behavioural language - "fast-paced environment," "strong team fit" - offer little clarity for candidates who interpret language literally. Assessments built on neurotypical data penalise cognitive difference rather than testing the skills the role requires. And 12% of line managers in GAIN's 2024 survey required a doctor's note for even minor workplace adjustments, creating barriers that deter disclosure and push neurodivergent employees toward masking their traits. That sustained mental effort erodes performance over time.
CII chief executive Matthew Hill said the sector's best employers were already doing things differently. "They actively seek out people who communicate, process information or solve problems differently," he said. "In short, they value neurodiversity."
The guide's recommendations are deliberately low-threshold. Sharing interview questions in advance, offering task-based assessments instead of personality tests, allowing additional processing time, and asking candidates about communication preferences require no significant resource commitment. Clearer job descriptions, ones that distinguish essential from desirable skills and describe the actual day-to-day reality of a role, also reduce the risk of recruiting the wrong candidate regardless of neurodivergent status.
The guide notes that a medical diagnosis is not required under the Equality Act 2010 for an employee to access workplace adjustments or claim legal protection, provided they can demonstrate a substantial and long-term adverse effect on day-to-day activities. Employment tribunals related to neurodiversity are rising. Under amendments to the Equality Act 2010 that came into force in January 2024, the definition of disability was extended to include limitations on an individual's ability to participate in working life on an equal basis with others.
Only 30.2% of autistic people were in employment in 2024, according to figures from the Department for Work and Pensions, compared with 82% of non-disabled people. The guide argues that gap represents an accessible and largely untapped talent pool at a time when competition for specialist skills is intensifying.
