The Real Impact of ADHD on Planning, Memory, and Time Management (Mike Legett)

The ADHD Skills Lab

If planning your week, remembering the small stuff, or keeping up with admin feels harder than the actual work, you're not imagining it.

This week, Skye sits down with Mike Legett, an ADHD coach and executive functioning specialist who was diagnosed with ADHD as a child. Mike studied molecular genetics at Emory before leaving graduate school when its vague, paperwork-heavy demands became unworkable. She went on to build a career as an internationally recognized swing and blues dance instructor and now helps adults with ADHD build systems that work with their brains instead of against them through the Center for Living Well with ADHD.

Together, Skye and Mike unpack why ADHD isn't a lack of effort. It is often a mismatch between the person and the systems they are expected to work within. They explore why planning, memory, time management, and admin can become the biggest sources of stress, and what actually changes when you stop relying on willpower alone.

If you've ever wondered why the "boring parts" of running a business seem to drain you more than the work you love, this conversation will leave you with a clearer understanding of what's really happening and what you can do to make life easier.

What We Cover

  • Why planning and admin create so much friction for ADHD brains
  • How paperwork and unclear expectations led Mike to leave academia
  • Why "just push through it" usually makes things worse
  • What changed when Mike stopped trying to manage everything alone
  • How better systems reduce mental load without requiring perfect discipline
  • Why working with your brain beats fighting against it

Connect With Mike Legett

https://www.mikelegett.com/

About ADHD founders for ADHD founders.

Interesting in working together? You can click here to receive a free bottleneck audio session and learn more about what we do. https://www.unconventionalorganisation.com/unstuckaudiosession

Diagnosed with ADHD at the start of her PhD, Skye Waterson spent years researching what actually works and writing about it for thousands of founders. The pattern she kept finding: ADHD business owners don't have a focus problem, they have an operations problem, because the whole business runs through their own head. Now she and her husband, former programmer Robert Waterson, work as fractional COOs for those founders. They find the bottleneck, hire the fix, and build the system that holds.

Subscribe to our Newsletter - https://unconventionalorganization.substack.com/

Follow us on Instagram - @unconventionalorganisation

Visit our website - https://www.unconventionalorganisation.com/

More description

If planning your week, remembering the small stuff, or keeping up with admin feels harder than the actual work, you're not imagining it.

This week, Skye sits down with Mike Legett, an ADHD coach and executive functioning specialist who was diagnosed with ADHD as a child. Mike studied molecular genetics at Emory before leaving graduate school when its vague, paperwork-heavy demands became unworkable. She went on to build a career as an internationally recognized swing and blues dance instructor and now helps adults with ADHD build systems that work with their brains instead of against them through the Center for Living Well with ADHD.

Together, Skye and Mike unpack why ADHD isn't a lack of effort. It is often a mismatch between the person and the systems they are expected to work within. They explore why planning, memory, time management, and admin can become the biggest sources of stress, and what actually changes when you stop relying on willpower alone.

If you've ever wondered why the "boring parts" of running a business seem to drain you more than the work you love, this conversation will leave you with a clearer understanding of what's really happening and what you can do to make life easier.

What We Cover

  • Why planning and admin create so much friction for ADHD brains
  • How paperwork and unclear expectations led Mike to leave academia
  • Why "just push through it" usually makes things worse
  • What changed when Mike stopped trying to manage everything alone
  • How better systems reduce mental load without requiring perfect discipline
  • Why working with your brain beats fighting against it

Connect With Mike Legett

https://www.mikelegett.com/

About ADHD founders for ADHD founders.

Interesting in working together? You can click here to receive a free bottleneck audio session and learn more about what we do. https://www.unconventionalorganisation.com/unstuckaudiosession

Diagnosed with ADHD at the start of her PhD, Skye Waterson spent years researching what actually works and writing about it for thousands of founders. The pattern she kept finding: ADHD business owners don't have a focus problem, they have an operations problem, because the whole business runs through their own head. Now she and her husband, former programmer Robert Waterson, work as fractional COOs for those founders. They find the bottleneck, hire the fix, and build the system that holds.

Subscribe to our Newsletter - https://unconventionalorganization.substack.com/

Follow us on Instagram - @unconventionalorganisation

Visit our website - https://www.unconventionalorganisation.com/

2026-07-13 33 min Transcript
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