About Ross
My struggles weren't disqualifications. They were my credentials.
I'm Ross Loofbourrow — The ADHD High Performance Coach. I live in Santa Cruz, California with my wife and daughter. This is how I got here.
I'm Ross Loofbourrow — The ADHD High Performance Coach. I live in Santa Cruz, California with my wife and daughter. This is how I got here.
I was diagnosed with ADHD and an Auditory Processing Deficit in second grade. I was the slow test taker, the class clown, the kid who talked too much. I came home and told my mom I was the stupidest kid in my class. When she spoke with my teacher about my ADHD brain and how hard I was working, the teacher said: "Well, maybe your son should shoot for Bs or Cs. Not all students can get As, you know." That same teacher later told me: "Not all kids are meant to go to college."
My mom refused to accept that. She found a Montessori school. She fought for me. But the wound was installed: something is wrong with you, and it's permanent.
I grew up on the coast of California. I spent five summers as a Day Camp counselor for first through sixth graders at Mount Hermon Conference Center. My camp name was Bro.
Bro · Mount Hermon Conference Center
On the outside, I was the energizer, the loud one, the fun one. On the inside, I was carrying a diagnosis I was ashamed of and a belief that I was fundamentally different from everyone around me in a way that wasn't good.
Summer camp, junior high. The girl next to me became my wife.
I went to Westmont College in Santa Barbara. Failed my first college exam. Believed I was a fraud, not smart enough, not cut out for it. Then something kicked in, the same hyperfocus that would define my life. I placed in the top three at the speech tournament three years in a row. The "stupidest kid in class" was now outperforming his peers on stage.
I just didn't know what that meant yet.
My mom suggested I apply to Apple. I thought it was beneath me. I had a college degree. But I walked in, and for the first time in my life, I felt genuinely seen. The energy, the people, the pace. It was built for how my brain works.
Apple Retail · In my element at the flagship store.
I was hired as a part-time Specialist in 2009. Over the next 15 years, I would work at five different Apple stores. Three promotions in two years. The first internally promoted Manager in the South Bay Market in years. Colleagues called me "the golden boy." Leaders told me I had the "IT factor," the thing you can't teach. I was selected as People Leader at Apple Infinite Loop, the flagship headquarters store in Cupertino. I was invited to Tim Cook's internal communications meetings. Steve Jobs personally recognized me after a customer named Karyn Sinunu-Towery lost her iPhone in Las Vegas. I used Find My iPhone to track it live on the Las Vegas Strip, coordinated its return to San Jose, and helped her get it back. I could have just sold her a new one. She never would have known. I didn't. She wrote directly to the CEO of Apple to make sure he knew. Steve Jobs received the letter and emailed the store personally to express his thanks. I was a Specialist. Not a manager. Not a director. A part-time Specialist.
Original letter to Steve Jobs, CEO of Apple · March 17, 2010 · Subject: Ross Loofbourrow
For seven years, I performed. I excelled in every room that required energy, connection, and reading people. And I struggled in every room that required sustained organization, time management, and follow-through. The gap was visible in every performance review, with the same opportunities flagged year after year. But nobody knew why. Because I wouldn't let them.
I was embarrassed and humiliated by my ADHD brain. Scared of anyone discovering this secret part of me. Afraid of being branded with all the awful stigmas. Worried people would forever judge me in a negative way.
What Apple taught me (the thing I couldn't see until years later) was how to make people feel capable when they feel incompetent. How to translate complex technology into human language. How to read a room, read a person, and adapt in real time. Those skills didn't come from a training manual. They came from doing it thousands of times, with thousands of people, over 15 years. That is still, today, what I teach.
"I watched Ross grow as a leader during his time at Apple and what stood out was never just his performance; it was his energy and his genuine love for people. He has this infectious passion for life that is rare in any environment, let alone a high-pressure retail leadership role. On my last day with the company, I called him personally to say thank you. That should tell you everything about the kind of human being he is."— Diane Sanny
Former Apple Store Leader & Sr. Global Program Manager, People and Resources · Apple Inc.
In 2016, my boss called me and spent an hour and a half explaining, in vivid detail, why I no longer had what it takes to be a successful leader at Apple. She wanted me fired. She had me on a performance improvement plan. My peers were working against me.
I sat in my car for three hours, crying, furious, feeling like the walls of my life were closing in on top of me. The golden boy. The guy they called "the face of Apple." And in that moment, every ounce of confidence, everything that made me who I am, felt shattered.
The badge I wore every day while hiding my diagnosis.
I did what my ADHD brain does when the pain gets bad enough: I hyperfocused. I spent countless hours researching the best ADHD adult experts I could find across the entire country. I interviewed coach after coach. I found Phil Boissiere, an ADHD specialist in the Bay Area. I started cognitive behavioral therapy. I optimized my medication. I read 35 books in a year. I ran toward God, immersing myself in prayer, scripture, and worship. I began to trust that my ADHD wasn't a mistake. It was part of a divine design.
Six months later, the same boss who wanted me gone sat me down and apologized. She told me she was now proud to have me on her team. She said she couldn't have imagined the most recent months without me. A complete 180.
I pulled off the miracle nobody saw coming. I surprised myself, too.
After the turnaround, I was transferred to a different store to perform outside the shadow of the boss who had doubted me. The response was immediate: glowing praise and consistent gratitude from my peers and team for what I was bringing each day to every life I touched.
Then I got recruited. My new store leader Brian texted me before my first day: "Ross! I feel like a kid on Christmas Eve! I feel so fortunate to have you joining our team. Tomorrow will be a significant day for our store, and it's all because of you!" I walked in on day one to a standing applause.
What I walked into was a mess. A toxic team culture. Open defiance from the lead technician. Cliques. Bullying between team members. Zero culture of feedback or accountability. I was specifically brought in to help turn it around.
Over two years, we did. I helped establish a culture of fearless feedback. I introduced WeConnect cards, a tool designed to help team members connect and get to know each other quickly in a fun, meaningful way. They spread to multiple stores across two markets and were adopted by an Australian business leader who took them back to his home country. I turned the Genius Bar I inherited into the highest-rated in the market. The store earned Most Improved recognition. And I was selected as Most Valuable Leader, one of only two managers selected across Apple's South Bay Market in Silicon Valley, two consecutive years.
Before I was ever a coach, I was already coaching. At Apple, I would sit with people in hallways and parking lots and break rooms, not because anyone asked me to, but because I couldn't help it. My ADHD brain reads people the way other people read spreadsheets. I see what's underneath. And once I see it, I can't unsee it.
An employee named Angela was described as "one of the most difficult people" at the store. My second day, I took her into the hallway. An hour later, she walked away feeling cared for by a leader for the first time. Three days later she gave me a hug and thanked me. My wife told me that night: "That is a clear gifting you have — to talk with people impromptu, on the spot, and really motivate, inspire, and encourage them. Most people can't do that."
An operations employee named Mikey and I had one unscheduled conversation on a Friday. One. A month later, he emailed me: he'd gone to therapy, stopped drinking, started going to the gym, and entered financial coaching. One Friday conversation sent a man's entire life in a different direction. I wasn't a coach yet. I didn't have a certification. I just had the conversation I couldn't stop myself from having.
Chalene Johnson · Marketing Impact Academy LIVE · Los Angeles
In 2017, I traveled to Jordan and spent time with refugees. A man named Youseff, a nine-year refugee, wounded, bitter, angry, told our group he wouldn't share his story because it would make us cry. I sat with him for four hours. By the end of the day, his demeanor had radically transformed, noticeable to everyone around us. That night I asked him: "What if I want to hear your story?" I broke down crying in front of my group sharing what that experience meant to me. My teammates hugged me and said it helped them be vulnerable and authentic themselves.
With refugee children · Jordan, 2017
With Youseff · Jordan, 2017
I delivered my first workshop, "ADHD is a Superpower: Believe It and Change Our World," at the Ed Rev Expo in San Francisco. Sixty minutes. Seventy-five people. Built from scratch. Parents, teachers, students, adults of all ages approached me afterward saying my message had changed their lives, reignited hope, illuminated their path forward.
'ADHD is a Superpower: Believe It and Change Our World' · Ed Rev Expo · AT&T Park, San Francisco · 2018
I felt like I was floating on a cloud. I had absolute clarity that I was doing the work I was called to do and was uniquely created to excel in this way of serving. People were starving for a different narrative about ADHD. Not coping. Not accommodating. A fundamentally different belief about what life can be when you have an ADHD brain.
I've been on that mission ever since.
The through-line of my entire life is translating complex things into human language so people don't feel left behind. At Apple, it was hardware and software. In coaching, it's the ADHD brain itself. In AI, it's the most powerful and most misunderstood technology most people have ever encountered.
I've spent hundreds of hours inside AI tools, not to become a tech educator, but because my ADHD brain demanded systems that actually work for how I think. The systems I built are unusually human because I'm unusually human. My relationship memory system doesn't replace connection; it deepens it. My project architecture doesn't think for me; it clears the cognitive clutter so my actual thinking can happen at a higher level. Every system I build starts with a human problem, not a technical one.
I've invested over $80,000 in my own personal development over the last eleven years. Coaches, therapists, certifications, programs, books, conferences. I did that because the journey of growth doesn't have a finish line; it just has levels. And every level reveals something you couldn't see from the one before.
I hold certifications as a High Performance Coach through Brendon Burchard's methodology (one of roughly 1,000 coaches worldwide with the complete curriculum) and in strengths-based ADHD coaching through the iACTcenter, which taught me that the goal is not symptom management but whole-person development. I am a founding member of Brendon Burchard's ULTRA mastermind, where I built and lead a 260+ member global community.
With Brendon Burchard · Founder, GrowthDay & Ultra
Brendon Burchard · ULTRA Miami · From the main stage
The community that said "bring more."
I live in Santa Cruz, California with my wife and our daughter, who is starting to remind me of myself in ways that fill me with both terror and wonder. She's the reason I do this work with the urgency I do. Because the world she grows up in will either tell her she's too much or celebrate every ounce of what she brings. I'm building toward the second one.
Apple Retail Leadership across five stores, including the flagship Infinite Loop headquarters
Certified High Performance Coach — Brendon Burchard methodology
Certified in strengths-based ADHD coaching — 400+ hours specialized training
Most Valuable Leader — one of only two managers selected in the South Bay Market, consecutive years
Invested in personal development over 11+ years — coaches, certifications, therapy, programs
Members in a global WhatsApp community Ross helped build within Brendon Burchard's ULTRA mastermind
If any part of this story sounds like yours, the hiding, the performing, the gap between what people see and what you feel, I built this entire practice for you. Let's talk.
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