Leading with purpose, insight and authority

Professional spaces often reward speed, visibility, productivity and performance.

For many Black women, this can mean learning to lead through excellence, resilience and over-preparation. We learn to read the room. We learn to anticipate what is needed. We learn to prepare twice as hard. We learn to keep going, even when we need rest.

But what if our deepest leadership advantage is not how well we perform, but how deeply we are aligned with ourselves?

Special guest, Peju Adeyemo, a healthcare professional, mental health advocate and speaker on spiritual intelligence, purpose and resilience led us in a discussion at a recent Network for Black Women Leaders Elevate Session exploring spiritual intelligence.

The session looked at spiritual intelligence as a powerful leadership asset: the capacity to remain connected to purpose, values and inner authority, particularly when external pressure is trying to disconnect us from ourselves.

This was not a conversation about religion, mysticism or prediction. It was about the deeper sources of wisdom, clarity and alignment that can guide how we lead.

For some people, that may connect to faith. For others, it may be purpose, conscience, embodiment or the quiet knowing that something within us recognises when we are aligned and when we are not.

When performance becomes survival

Peju invited participants to think about the difference between performance, emotional intelligence and spiritual intelligence.

Performance tells us: 'I am what I produce'.

Emotional intelligence helps us understand and manage some of what we feel.

Spiritual intelligence asks something deeper: 'Who am I, and what am I leading from?'

This distinction resonated because many Black women know what it means to become exceptional in order to be considered competent. Excellence can become a survival strategy. Over-preparation can become a form of protection. Being useful, reliable and impressive can start to feel like the safest way to be valued.

But when performance becomes the main way we feel safe, it can also disconnect us from ourselves.

Healing and leadership have something in common. They both begin from the inside.

Peju spoke honestly about her own journey through severe postnatal depression, anxiety and hopelessness. From the outside, many people could not see what she was carrying.

That experience shaped how she now understands leadership, healing and purpose. Both, she reminded us, begin inside.

Alignment is not a luxury

One of the strongest messages from the session was that success without alignment eventually becomes exhaustion.

This is especially important in workplaces that constantly measure output. When our value is reduced to what we produce, how quickly we respond or how much we can carry, it becomes easy to mistake pressure for purpose.

Peju challenged this idea and spoke about moving from a performance-led way of working to a purpose-led one. In her clinical role, that shift means not only asking, 'How many patients have I seen?' but 'Has this person felt heard? Have I understood what is really going on? Have I responded with compassion and discernment?'

This is a powerful leadership distinction too.

Because leadership is not only about completing tasks, hitting targets or appearing capable. It is also about how people experience us. Do we create calm? Do we create trust? Do we see what is beneath the surface? Do we respond from wisdom, or from fear?

Spiritual intelligence is not about predicting the future. It is more about living from your deepest values instead of fear.

Peju shared a story of working with a patient whose physical pain was connected to unspoken grief. The presenting issue was back pain, but the deeper need was to be seen in their loss.

Inner authority over external validation

For Black women, external validation can be inconsistent.

One person may recognise your value; another may underestimate you. One space may celebrate your leadership; another may question your competence. One room may invite your voice; another may only tolerate it when it is packaged in a particular way.

If our authority depends entirely on other people’s recognition, it becomes unstable.

Spiritual intelligence offers another foundation. It asks us to develop inner authority: a grounded sense of who we are, what we value and what we know to be true, even when recognition is delayed, partial or absent.

This is not arrogance. It is not ego. It is the ability to stop waiting for proof of what we already know.

Peju described how she no longer feels the same need to prove herself in every space. Sometimes she speaks less. Sometimes she listens more. Sometimes she allows others to underestimate her without rushing to correct the story. Her authority is not built on being the loudest person in the room, but on knowing who she is.

Things are not meant to be so hard. When we understand self, we are aligned with purpose and anchored in the right space.

For Black women who have been taught to defend ourselves, explain ourselves or prove ourselves repeatedly, this is a meaningful shift.

Peju introduced her ABCDE framework for spiritual intelligence: Awareness, Belief, Connection, Discernment and Enlightened Action. Rather than treating this as a checklist, she described it as a set of leadership “muscles” we can strengthen over time: becoming more aware of who we are, trusting inner authority over external validation, staying connected to our source (where we draw strength), discerning what truly matters, and turning insight into grounded action or behaviour.

Discernment is a leadership skill

Another important theme was discernment.

Not every opportunity deserves a yes. Not every criticism deserves a response. Not every battle deserves your energy.

For many Black women, this can be difficult. We are often trained by experience to be ready: ready to respond, ready to correct, ready to protect ourselves, ready to prove that we belong.

But discernment asks a different question:What actually matters here?

It helps us pause before reacting. It helps us decide whether a comment requires our energy, whether an opportunity aligns with our values, whether a conflict is ours to engage with, and whether urgency is being confused with clarity.

This does not mean staying silent in the face of harm. It means choosing our response from a place of wisdom rather than reflex.

Peju offered a simple practical tool: Pause, Reflect, Weigh, Decide and Review. 

• Pause before reacting.
• Reflect on the story you are telling yourself.
• Weigh the situation against your values.
• Decide from conviction.
• Review what you have learned.

It sounds simple, but in fast-moving professional environments, pausing can be transformative.

Bringing the whole self, without being consumed

During the discussion, participants reflected on the tension between leading from purpose and working in environments that reward speed, pressure and high performance.

How do we lead with spiritual intelligence when our usefulness at work is still measured by output?

Spiritual intelligence does not mean rejecting skill, knowledge or performance. It means adding humility, compassion and self-understanding to them.

It means remembering that people are not only problems to solve, targets to meet or roles to manage. They are whole human beings.  It also means remembering that we are whole human beings too.

We have to see ourselves in the way we want to be seen. 

Spiritual intelligence invites us to reconnect with the parts of ourselves that get neglected in the process of exhibiting resilience.

It asks:

• What is one area where I am performing instead of living?
• What is one decision I already know the answer to?
• What part of myself have I been neglecting?

These are not easy questions. But they are necessary ones when we are expected to carry pressure, absorb discomfort, manage emotion and still produce at a high level.

Our human capacity to understand self and to lead from our place of self and purpose is what will make a huge difference.

Leading from within

We do not have to disconnect from ourselves in order to lead well. We do not have to build leadership only on resilience, output and constant proving. We can lead from clarity, purpose, self-awareness and inner authority.

Spiritual intelligence is not separate from work. It shapes how we make decisions, hold boundaries, listen deeply, respond wisely and stay connected to who we are.

Leadership is not only about what we produce, how quickly we respond or how much we carry.

It is also about how connected we are to ourselves.

And sometimes, the strongest voice in the room is not the loudest. It is the one that knows who she is.

Connect with Peju on LinkedIn | Instagram | Facebook

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