Perseverance and the Pivot By Dr. Sherwanna Flanagan Clarke
How unexpected disruption becomes the catalyst for purpose-driven leadership, reinvention, and lasting impact.
There are moments in life when everything you have carefully built seems to shift beneath your feet. Titles change. Doors close. Plans unravel. And in those moments, you are forced to confront a question many leaders quietly avoid:
Who am I when the position is gone?
For years, my career followed what many would describe as a successful path. I spent more than two decades in the pharmaceutical industry, leading complex global initiatives, managing multimillion-dollar portfolios, and helping organizations move strategy into execution. I understood systems. I understood leadership. I understood results.
What I did not anticipate was the pivot.
Like many professionals, I experienced a corporate layoff after years of commitment and performance. On paper, it looked like an ending. Internally, it felt like uncertainty. But what I would later learn is that disruption often arrives as an invitation — not a punishment.
In the stillness that followed, I began to ask different questions.
Not, “How do I get back to where I was?”
But instead, “What am I being prepared for?”
Perseverance is often misunderstood. Many believe perseverance means pushing harder in the same direction regardless of circumstances. But true perseverance requires discernment. Sometimes strength looks like endurance. Other times, it looks like courageously choosing a new path.
The pivot required humility.
I had to acknowledge that identity cannot be rooted solely in achievement or organizational titles. Leadership is not confined to a role; it is expressed through influence, service, and the ability to help others move forward even when your own path is unclear.
Out of that season emerged Katalýtis For Change, a consulting and leadership development firm grounded in a simple belief: organizations do not fail because of strategy alone — they struggle when people are not equipped to navigate change.
The same skills I had used inside large corporations — facilitation, operational strategy, cross-functional alignment, and change management — became tools to help leaders across industries find clarity in complexity.
The pivot also revealed something deeply personal.
Resilience grows when purpose expands beyond self.
My work began extending into community partnerships, workforce development initiatives, youth leadership programs, and authorship projects designed to encourage the next generation. What once felt like a detour became alignment.
I learned that perseverance is not about resisting change.
It is about becoming transformed by it.
Today, when I speak with executives, entrepreneurs, or emerging leaders facing uncertainty, I often remind them that disruption does not erase your value. It refines it.
The pivot is not the opposite of perseverance.
It is often the proof of it.
Because sometimes the greatest leadership moment is not holding on to what was — but having the courage to step into what is becoming.
