Most organizations don’t fail from a lack of talent. They stall because leaders default to what’s comfortable instead of deciding what’s necessary. In Dare to Decide™, former global executive Charlene Wheeless gives leaders a system to choose courage over default, and turn intention into culture and performance by design. Read More >

Default is the enemy of performance.

• People default to what’s familiar.
• Teams default to comfort.
• Cultures default to whatever goes unchecked.
• Default is a decision; you just didn’t make it consciously.

The Core Idea: From Default to Design
In high-stakes environments, indecision has a cost: lost time, stalled initiatives, eroded trust. Charlene shows leaders how to move from culture-by-chance to culture-by-choice using her Decision Effect™ and Seven Seconds of Courage frameworks. This keynote gives leaders a practical way to pause in the moment, choose aligned action, and create a ripple effect from individual courage to organizational clarity, alignment, and measurable results.

The Story Behind the System
Charlene spent three decades as the “first and only” Black woman in executive roles at multibillion-dollar companies. She led global communications through mergers, crises, and transformations where one decision could move markets. Then cancer stripped away her title and her armor. Standing in a hospital gown instead of a power suit, she had to decide who she was without the performance. The courage it took to choose herself in that moment became the same system she now teaches leaders: how to use just seven seconds of courage to stop defaulting and start deciding on purpose.

What Leaders Will Learn:

• Name and confront default behavior that quietly shapes culture, like silence in the room; workarounds; and “that’s just how we do it here.”
• Use Seven Seconds of Courage to move from automatic reaction to intentional response in the moments that send powerful culture signals.
• Apply the Decision Effect™—courage → clarity → alignment → performance—to make decisions that match the culture they say they want.
• Model visible, values-aligned decisions that build trust, psychological safety, and accountability across teams

Ideal Audiences & Formats best for: Read Less ^

• Executive and senior leadership teams
• Company-wide meetings and all-hands
• Sales kickoffs and revenue organization events
• Culture, change, and transformation initiatives
• M&A, integration, or restructuring environments

Most women donʼt burn out because theyʼre weak. They burn out because theyʼve been performing strength for too long. Read More >

In Dare to Decide™: Women Who Lead, former global executive and cancer survivor Charlene Wheeless helps women leaders stop shape-shifting to fit expectations and start designing their leadership by choice, not chance. Using her Seven Seconds of Courage™ methodology and Decision Effect™ framework, she shows women how to make bolder decisions in rooms that weren’t built for them, without sacrificing their health, voice, or humanity.

The Story Behind the Talk (Why Women Lean In)
Charlene spent three decades as the first, only, and underestimated Black woman in executive roles at multibillion-dollar companies. On the outside, she was the model leader: polished, unflappable, always “on.” On the inside, she was carrying the invisible tax of being “the one who has to get it right”—for herself, for her family, and for everyone who would come after her. Then two cancer diagnoses within six months shattered the persona she calls the Perfect Black Female Executive. Stripped of title and armor, she was forced into the most important decision of her life:

• Would she keep performing the role everyone expected,
• Or finally choose the life and leadership she actually wanted?

The system she built in that crucible: courage as a daily practice, not a personality trait, is the system she now teaches women leaders around the world.

In this keynote, women learn how to:

• Name the performance script they’ve been running (perfect, pleasing, proving) and decide what still serves them, and what doesn’t.
• Use Seven Seconds of Courage to speak up, set boundaries, and ask for what they really want in high stakes moments.
• Shift from culture-fitting to culture-shaping, moving from “Do I belong here?” to “This room is different because I am in it.”
• Claim their story as a strategic asset, not a liability, and lead without shrinking.

This isn’t another “feel-good women’s talk.” It’s a strategic culture play. Organizations hosting Dare to Decide™ Women Who Lead see: Read Less ^

• Women leaders who are more decisive, vocal, and aligned with the organization’s real priorities.
• Clearer conversations about career pathing, sponsorship, and power, not just confidence.
• A shared language for talking about choice, courage, and culture across the business.
• Stronger pipelines of women ready to step into stretch roles, P&L responsibility, and executive positions—without burning out along the way.

Charlene illuminates the hidden cost of high achievement and perfectionism. This keynote helps leaders recognize the signs of burnout, reclaim their energy, and shift from performing to truly showing up—with presence, purpose, and power. intention. Live with purpose. Read More >

Success isn’t a guarantee of fulfillment—especially when you’re stuck chasing approval, perfection, or someone else’s definition of success. In this transformative keynote, Charlene delivers her signature frameworks and activations.      

Best for: Corporate leadership, conferences, industry agnostic, ERG programs, Women’s leadership programs. Read Less ^

Own your voice. Take up space. Lead on your terms. Read More >

This empowering keynote speaks directly to women leaders who are ready to stop holding back. Charlene delivers an inspiring call to action for women—especially those navigating bias, burnout, and invisibility—to lead with courage, clarity, and unapologetic purpose. Equal parts inspiration and activation, this talk reignites agency and equips women to define leadership for themselves, not through someone else’s lens.

Best for: Women’s summits, ERGs, high-potential women’s programs. Read Less ^

As leaders grapple with the dynamics of an ever-shifting corporate culture, Charlene Wheeless shows them how a focus on Choice Not Chance is a powerful framework for creating vibrant and sustainable workplace cultures of breakthrough performance and fulfillment. Read More >

With more than three decades of experience in leadership, corporate affairs, communications, and operations, including her role as Principal Vice President of Corporate Affairs for a $40B global company, Charlene proves to be a revolutionary guide for leaders and teams who want to transform.

This keynote provides a pivotal and future-forward look at what companies can do to strengthen their culture and capabilities in many areas, while at the same time taking a giant step ahead of their competitors when they fully embrace a Choice not Chance attitude in all that they set out to accomplish.

Key Takeaways Read Less ^

• Six essentials of intentional leadership, compassion and the powerful results that occur when you have an open mind when solving challenges.
• The importance of understanding humanity and how there is courage and bravery in showing weakness both personally and professionally.
• Choosing choice over chance matters and how quiet quitting needs to be viewed differently.
• Your superpower can be seeing people for their value in a sometimes challenging and unforgiving world, rather than believing in the misleading perceptions that are sometimes automatically thrust onto them.