Why Guilt Is a Terrible GPS for Women in Leadership

I was on adoption leave—adoption leave—when my manager called. He needed a report written for his new leader. He'd attempted it three times, and it wasn't what the executive wanted. He needed it by 5 PM Friday. It was Thursday night.

I reminded him I was on leave.

"You're the only one who can do this. No one else is available."

So I wrote it. From home. On leave. With a new child.

And when I brought it up in my performance review? I was immediately dismissed. Like it was nothing.

Here's what guilt-based decision-making actually looks like: you get guilted into doing the thing, and then you get punished for doing the thing. Either way, you don't win.

The Uncomfortable Truth Nobody's Saying

Here's what the leadership books won't tell you: guilt isn't your conscience. It's conditioning wearing the voice of authority.

We've been sold this myth that guilt is a moral compass, that when we feel it, we're being "called back" to what's right. That if we didn't feel guilty, we'd become people who say no without explanation and set boundaries without apologizing.

Which, by the way, is exactly what we should be doing.

Neuroscience research shows that the amygdala, the brain's emotional processing center, is part of what researchers call an "impulsive, habit-type system" that triggers immediate responses to emotional stimuli. Meanwhile, the prefrontal cortex handles long-term strategic thinking and complex decision-making.

When guilt dominates your decision-making, you're letting the reactive, habit-based part of your brain override your strategic capacity. You choose what stops the uncomfortable feeling fastest, not what actually serves your goals or honors your boundaries.

"Guilt doesn't make you a better leader. It makes you a more exploitable one."

Where This Operating System Came From

The guilt-based decision-making system you're running wasn't installed by your employer. It was installed much earlier.

For many of us, it started in childhood. Be agreeable. Be helpful. Don't disappoint. Don't question. Don't take up too much space. And especially—don't say no.

If you were praised for being "easy," "reliable," or "the one who holds it all together," that conditioning didn't magically disappear when you became a senior leader. It just got rewarded. Until it started burning you out.

The data tells a story your body already knows: according to the 2025 McKinsey and LeanIn.org Women in the Workplace, 60% of senior-level women report frequently feeling burned out—the highest level in five years. And if you've been with your company five years or less? That number jumps to 70% . That's not because they're working harder than everyone else. It's because they're making thousands of decisions per day through a filter that prioritizes everyone else's comfort over their own strategic clarity.

That filter has a name: guilt. And it's running in the background of every 'yes' that should have been a 'no', especially for high-performing women burnout survivors who’ve been taught that self-abandonment is professionalism.

Three Signs Guilt Is Making Your Decisions

Guilt-driven decisions share three characteristics. Once you see them, you can't unsee them:

1. They prioritize immediate relief over long-term alignment. When guilt is steering, your brain wants the uncomfortable feeling to stop. Now. It doesn't care that saying yes to this project means you'll be running weekend releases for the next five years because "you do it so well." It just knows that saying no triggers the guilt alarm, and saying yes silences it. Temporarily.

2. They're based on "you're the only one," not actual necessity. Listen for this phrase. It's the calling card of guilt manipulation. "You're the only one who can do this. No one else is available. No one else knows how." The moment someone tells you that you're indispensable, they're not complimenting you. They're telling you they've already decided you don't get to say no.

3. You get punished whether you comply or refuse. This is the trap that keeps guilt-based systems running. Say no, and you're "not a team player." Say yes, and your extra effort gets dismissed or, worse, becomes the new baseline expectation. The guilt doesn't resolve because resolution was never the point. Compliance was.

"The problem isn't that you're making bad decisions. The problem is you're using bad data."

The Shift That Changes Everything

Here's the paradigm shift that took me years to understand: Guilt isn't information about the quality of your choice. It's information about the quality of your conditioning.

When you feel guilty about setting a boundary, that's not your soul telling you the boundary was wrong. It's your nervous system, shaped by decades of programming, recognizing that you've done something unfamiliar. Unfamiliar doesn't mean wrong. It means new.

The women I work with don't need to feel less guilt. They need to stop treating guilt like it's their CEO. They need a different question to ask themselves before every decision.

Not: "Will I feel guilty if I say no?"

But: "Is this a hell yes or a guilt yes?"

A hell yes feels like expansion. Clean energy. Maybe some nerves, but the alive kind.

A guilt yes feels like that deep sigh before you even answer. Tight shoulders. Immediate regret. The sense that you just traded yourself for approval that will never actually come.

Your body knows the difference long before your brain explains it away. This is the foundation of aligned leadership, making decisions from who you are now, not from the conditioning that was placed on you before you had any say in the matter.

If you've been exploring why you feel stuck despite your success, you might recognize this pattern from what I wrote about in "How to Stop Feeling Empty When You Have Everything"—that persistent sense that something's off even when everything looks right on paper. Guilt is often the mechanism that keeps us trapped in that emptiness.

What Aligned Leadership Actually Requires

Here's what I learned after 30+ years in finance and tech, most of them spent running on guilt:

Every guilt-based yes drains decision quality. It erodes trust with yourself. It teaches others to expect access to you at the expense of your energy. And over time, leaders who lead from guilt become resentful, lose clarity, and feel disconnected from their own authority.

That's not sustainable leadership. That's survival.

Aligned leadership requires discernment, not self-sacrifice masquerading as professionalism. It requires understanding that choosing alignment doesn't make you selfish. It makes you sustainable.

This is the kind of deeper work I walk women through in my coaching, because it’s rarely just the workload that burns us out. It’s the constant internal battle between what we want and what guilt tells us we should want.

If decision-making feels harder than it used to, even for someone as capable as you, it’s not a flaw in your mindset. It’s a nervous system flag. Guilt-based leadership decisions aren’t just exhausting because of what they require. They’re exhausting because of what they override. Your instincts. Your boundaries. Your clarity. That fog you feel around your next move? That’s not confusion. That’s your body asking you to stop deciding from depletion and start choosing from alignment.

A Question Worth Sitting With

Think of one thing you've been saying yes to out of guilt. Just one.

Now imagine saying no.

Notice what your body does.

And then notice this: The world doesn't end. No lightning strike. No scarlet letter. You're still capable. Still respected. Still whole.

What decision have you been postponing because you're afraid of what the guilt will feel like?

Ready to Upgrade Your Decision-Making System?

Recognizing this pattern is the first step untangling decades of guilt-based programming? That's deeper work. It requires understanding not just what you're doing, but who you've become — but learning to make decisions from that woman instead of the one you were conditioned to be.

If you’re done letting guilt run your leadership, let’s look at what’s really going on. In this Strategic Reset, we’ll map the patterns keeping you stuck—and if it’s aligned, explore what support could look like.

Book Your Strategic Reset, and let's see what decisions you'd make if guilt weren't driving.

Because here's the thing, Brave One:

Aligned leadership starts the moment you stop abandoning yourself to be liked.

And choosing fewer guilt-based yeses?

That's not selfish. That's sustainable.