Leading At The Intersections: Why My Whole Life Is My Credential

Five years ago, a single term shifted everything for me.

I came across Kimberlé Crenshaw's framework of Intersectionality – and something clicked. Not just intellectually, but deeply and personally. I wasn’t simply reading a theory. I was reading myself.

I am a Caribbean woman navigating American spaces. I am a mother who gave birth to a first-generation Caribbean-American daughter. I am a wife and partner whose husband works a 6-weeks on, 6-weeks off rotation in Saudi Arabia. I live in a multigenerational home. I am a scholar. I am a professor. I am Shari.

All of these intersections – together – make me who I am. And they make me the leader I am.

What Leadership at the Intersections Actually Looks Like

When I think about intersectional leadership, I’m not talking about a buzzword or a diversity checkbox. I’m talking about something far more structural – and far more human.

I’m looking at the crossroads where identity, power, and communication meet, and asking:

·      How do we build stability across different?

·      Where are the gaps in how we communicate – verbally and non-verbally?

·      How do people consume information and perceive the world shaped by their own intersections?

These aren’t abstract questions for me. They are the questions I live inside every single day.

Why I Do This Work – And Why I’m Qualified to Do It

I am a Caribbean-American Ph.D., a professor, a mother, and a cultural scholar. I help leaders understand the power structures, stories, and systems that determine:

Who gets to lead

Who gets heard

And who gets left out

I do this work because I’ve studied it. I’ve lived it. And I am actively raining the next generation to move through it differently.

Here’s what I want you to understand: my degree is not the only thing that gives me authority in this space.

The way I live my daily life gives me that authority too.

The negotiation of cultural identity at the dinner table; The navigation of American professional spaces as a Caribbean woman; The management of a household that spans generations, time zones and continents…These are not personal footnotes to my professional credentials – they are my credentials.

An Invitation

If you are a leader who has ever felt like you had to leave parts of yourself at the door to be taken seriously – this work is for you.

If you lead teams, organizations, or communities where people are constantly navigating multiple worlds at once – this work is for you.

Leadership at the intersections isn’t about managing difference. It’s about leveraging the full depth of who your people are – and building systems worthy of that depth.

I’ve spent my career, and my life, learning how to do exactly that.

Let’s talk about what that could look like for you.

Crenshaw, K. (2016). The Urgency of Intersectionality. In TED TALK.