Dyslexia Sparks met with politician and entrepreneur Victoria Aitken to talk about her dyslexia, her hugely successful career and the barriers she has overcome along the way.
Oozing positivity, Victoria Aitken firmly believes the skills she developed because of her dyslexia have helped shape the person and professional she is today. Her career has been varied, courageous and, importantly, built around the things she is good at.
Today, Victoria is the Cabinet Portfolio Holder for Children’s Services at East Riding of Yorkshire Council, with responsibility for 150 schools, families and children from pre-birth to 25, including children with special educational needs.
Overcoming barriers at work
A self-confessed expert in masking her dyslexia, and over the years has developed her own coping strategies to help navigate work. Text-to-speech tools are now part of her daily routine, creating consistency between her thoughts, speech and written text. She has always been confident expressing herself in conversation and now uses that strength to speak into her phone, turning her ideas into written copy and emails. Her advice is:
”“Be loud, be positive, and believe that you can achieve great things.”
Building a career around her strengths
Diagnosed with dyslexia at university aged 19, Victoria has gone on to build a varied and successful career, using her natural strengths in communication, people skills and lateral thinking along the way. “I have no regrets that I didn’t take an academic route, but it wasn’t really open to me.”
Victoria’s career has been anything but conventional. From residential social worker to Hull’s first female car saleswoman, she quickly turned her people skills and confidence into career strengths.
Her entrepreneurial side soon kicked in. She launched a screen-printing business with grants from Hull City Council, then went on to become an exhibition organiser, business owner and the country’s first leather furniture specialist.
A move from commercial business into politics came after she “saw other people needed a bit of support”. More than 20 years on, Victoria is still making her mark in politics and feels more empowered than ever to show what she can do.
How Victoria Aitken thinks differently about dyslexia?
For Victoria, dyslexia should never be a barrier. Instead, it has helped develop skills that have been invaluable throughout her career.
”Dyslexia has a way of becoming a superpower because I passionately believe that because I struggled with my academic work, I had to hone other skills and the other skills that I honed have been an absolute godsend to me.
Those experiences have made her brave and taught her to find a way around problems. “I will not be stopped.”
Creating positive futures for children and young people
Passionate about creating positive futures for children and young people, she also understands how difficult a dyslexia diagnosis can initially feel. For some families, receiving a diagnosis can feel like a heavy weight. You can begin to focus on what you can’t do, rather than all the things you can.
Victoria wants people to look beyond and “use your other superpowers.” “Use your emotion, use your ambition and use your positive attitude.”
Victoria is incredibly successful, but she is also refreshingly honest about the fact that dyslexia hasn’t simply disappeared. She admits she is still scared of filling in forms, but no longer avoids reading tasks, thanks to the right tools and support.
She continues to push herself, advocate for others and support her local community – showing that dyslexia doesn’t have to stand in the way of a successful and fulfilling career.