Desire to Serve

Sonya Peele lives her life according to the Biblical principle, “To whom much is given, much is required.”

This adage guides Peele’s life philosophy as a visionary entrepreneur, consultant, mentor, and community leader. “All of us who have the time, resources, and energy should be involved in opportunities to uplift someone else,” she says.

A graduate of the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill, Peele is originally from Greenville, N.C. She and her husband moved to the Wilmington area from Cleveland, Ohio, in December 2020 to be closer to family, including her mother, who lives in Greenville.

Shortly after moving to Wilmington, Peele brought her business Work It Girl Consulting & Coaching to the area. Through Work It Girl, where she serves as chief executive consultant, Peele provides sales training, executive coaching, and strategic planning, mostly for nonprofit organizations and small businesses.

Peele started Work It Girl as an opportunity to use her skills and background in pharmaceutical sales, marketing, and business development to help organizations and entrepreneurs to thrive. She says her consulting work was born from the encouragement of a friend, who noted that Peele was good at coaching people. Peele often works with small businesses that recognize a need for training but don’t have the resources to purchase an extensive training program. 

For example, she worked with the Cape Fear Small Business Center to present sales training that helped the Center’s clients grow as entrepreneurs. “I support organizations that support others,” Peele says. “My customers have evolved into organizations that support the final customers.”

Peele’s approach to training is pragmatic and empowering. “I don’t just train to teach, I train to do. You walk out of my training able to stand up and do it confidently,” she says.

When Peele works one-on-one with clients, she helps them identify and draw out their natural abilities. “I help them discover who they are, their gifts, their talents, their strengths,” she explains. “My passion is leadership development for young women transitioning to adulthood.”

In May, Peele also began working part-time for the UNC Wilmington Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship. In this role, she works directly with new businesses to help them grow their sales portfolio and generally supports the Cape Fear region’s entrepreneurial ecosystem.

In the spring of 2025, Peele became Chair of the Board of Directors for MedNorth Health Center. MedNorth offers a range of services, including pediatric, adult and family medicine, OB-GYN, family planning, behavioral health, podiatry, and dentistry, along with an on-site pharmacy.

In her new role, Peele will steer the board through an exciting time at MedNorth. In December 2024, MedNorth broke ground on a $28 million expansion to add 35,000 square feet to the existing healthcare facility. The expanded space, scheduled to be completed in April 2026, means the facility can continue to build upon its offerings and better serve the community.

Peele’s future vision for MedNorth is to serve as many people as possible and build awareness of MedNorth’s services throughout the community. “Everyone deserves good health care. If your body and mind are not healthy, nothing else will function well for you,” Peele says. “My hope is we will make the community know we are here and bring more awareness of the services we provide so the community can be a better partner with MedNorth. MedNorth is a diamond in the rough in our community that the community doesn’t realize we have.”

Additionally, Peele is a 2025 graduate of Leadership Wilmington, which opened networking doors for her within the greater Cape Fear community. 

Outside of her career, Peele’s heart for service led her to participate in medical mission work in Haiti and South Africa. Peele describes her medical mission work as seminal experiences that inspired her.

In South Africa, Peele observed how local residents walked overnight to seek medical attention at a pop-up healthcare clinic. They stood in line to receive help for hours without complaining, she says. “It humbles you. It changes your perspective, makes you grateful for everything that we have in the U.S.,” she says. “Our lowest is still higher than their highest. I never felt so alive as when I was in South Africa.”

At the heart of Peele’s work is a strong desire to help others, to consistently grow, and to be of service to her community. “What I enjoy the most about my work is interacting with different people, meeting new people, learning from others, collaborating,” she says. “I learn from them and they learn from me. Together we can bring solutions and solve problems.”

To view more of photographer Aris Harding’s work, go to arisharding.com.

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