On screen, these qualities are portrayed as powerful, transformative – even essential.

In the boardroom, they are often dismissed.

We like to believe that business decisions are rational. That strategies are built on data, forecasts, and carefully constructed models. That the best leaders are the most analytical ones.

But that’s only half the story.

Behind many of the most decisive, high-impact business calls lies something far less tangible – and far less acknowledged: intuition.

Or, as it’s often labelled (and quickly undermined), “female intuition”.

The intuition we see – but don’t value

What makes Hamnet and Sinners compelling is not just their narrative, but their unapologetic portrayal of instinct as intelligence.

They centre a way of knowing that is felt rather than proven. A way of understanding that doesn’t rely on data – but is no less accurate.

And yet, in business, this same capability is treated with suspicion.

Women, in particular, are subtly conditioned to translate instinct into data before it can be taken seriously. To justify what they already know.

“I have always trusted my gut,” says Lien Potgieter, head of marketing and communication at Medihelp. “Much of my strategic thinking is informed by trends, but also by intuition – by sensing shifts before they fully materialise. The challenge is that you start to doubt yourself when others ask for data or proof, even when experience tells you you’re on the right track.”

That doubt is not a lack of confidence. It is a response to a system that prioritises proof over perception.

Intuition is informed, not irrational

There is a persistent misconception that intuition is the opposite of intelligence.

It isn’t.

It is the brain’s ability to process experience, context, and subtle cues at speed – often arriving at a conclusion before we can fully articulate why.

“Intuition is informed judgment,” says Varsha Vala, principal officer at Medihelp. “In leadership, you are often required to make decisions with incomplete information. Data is critical – but it is not always sufficient. That’s where experience, context, and instinct become invaluable.”

In other words, intuition is not guesswork. It is pattern recognition at its most sophisticated.

The problem with calling it “female intuition”

By attaching intuition to gender, we’ve inadvertently weakened its credibility.

We’ve framed it as emotional rather than intelligent. As subjective rather than strategic.

But intuition is not inherently female – it is human.

Men experience it too, but are often less encouraged to acknowledge it. In many corporate environments, instinct is something to be masked with numbers, not expressed with confidence.

The result? A universal capability that remains underutilised because it doesn’t fit neatly into corporate definitions of rigour.

The human advantage in a data-driven world

At the recent ASI wellness event, “Trust Your Gut – The Human Advantage,” which Medihelp co-created with ASI, this very tension came into focus.

In a world increasingly dominated by artificial intelligence and data saturation, human insight is not becoming less relevant it is becoming more valuable.

Because while machines can analyse what is known, they cannot anticipate what is emerging in the same way humans can. They cannot sense cultural undercurrents, emotional shifts, or moments of opportunity before they are visible in the data.

Those insights are intuitive.

And they are often what separate good decisions from great ones.

A different kind of leadership

Trusting your gut does not mean abandoning data.

It means recognising its limits.

It means understanding that the most effective leaders don’t choose between instinct and evidence – they know when to use both.

It also requires a shift in mindset: from needing to prove everything, to knowing when proof will come too late.

The real risk

The real risk is not that intuition will lead us astray.

It’s that we ignore it – because it doesn’t sound “rational enough”, or because we’ve been taught not to trust it.

Hamnet and Sinners remind us of something we may have forgotten: that intuition is not mystical or irrational. It is deeply human.

And in business today, that may be our greatest advantage.

Perhaps it’s time we stopped asking whether intuition belongs in the boardroom – and started asking why we ever left it out.