Workplace Multiplier by Tola Akinsulire

March 17, 2025

Welcome to the Workplace Multiplier newsletter. Published Monday to Friday, equipping you to achieve your professional goals faster and without burnout or overwhelm by leveraging The Triple Win Method.

How Your Workplace Can Be Your Life Coach🧠

We spend at least eight hours at work every day—the space that claims most of our waking hours.⏰

This makes the workplace a wonderful playground to practice becoming your best self. There's ample time to try, fail, learn, and improve before your next opportunity.

(Unless you're working for psychopaths. That's a conversation for another day.)😅

Let's assume you work with normal people who come with the usual challenges and occasional headaches—the kind you vent about to family and friends. These interactions provide the perfect opportunity to develop skills that transform every area of your life.

A Real-World Lesson📚

Let me share a story from my book, "Winning Beyond Borders: Achieving Success at Work in a New Country":

While flying to a West African country from Europe during the COVID-19 pandemic, I encountered a boarding gate agent who refused to let me board. He claimed I needed special embassy authorization, despite this not being a requirement for an ECOWAS passport holder like myself.🛂

I went on to the super useful website - Traveldoc.aero which provided up-to-date information on travel documents given the various COVID-19 country-based restrictions to see if anything had changed from when I took my connecting flight to now.

Nothing had changed. As long as I had a valid negative COVID-19 test result, I could fly into that country.

I tried to show the official. He was so not in a mood to listen to me.

Next, I called the airline's help desk, who confirmed I could board with just my passport and a negative COVID test. When I offered my phone to him so they could explain this to him, he refused to speak with "anyone on a passenger's phone."📱

Even the airline helpline couldn't move this man-mountain. The only thing they could do was rebook me for the next day.

And me? I was now stuck in a country where I didn’t know anyone in it.

Or so I thought.

Fortunately, I didn’t need to do a one-night reenactment of Tom Hank's movie “The Terminal.” I was living in Europe at that time so I had an EU residence card which allowed me to leave the airport.🏨

A work colleague had a friend locally who arranged a hotel reservation close to the airport and helped secure the "authorization" document through embassy connections.

The next day, I arrived at the airport with the document in hand—but kept it hidden. I wanted to see if it was truly necessary. Sure enough, the officials on duty that day knew the rules and cleared me for boarding with just my passport and COVID test.✈️

Why This Story Matters💡

Throughout this frustrating experience, I remained calm and reasonable with the immovable agent.

❌ I could have escalated into "angry customer" mode (a la Karen) or gone “Is it because I am black?”

But years of workplace practice have taught me not to play the victim or label people based on their actions. I've learned that when people treat me poorly without justification, it's typically due to their lack of skills, knowledge, or personal insecurities playing a chord in their minds—not because of me.

✅ Whatever the reason behind what this guy did, I was not going to label him. Rather, I would see him as incompetent for that day.

But that was not going to be a cop-out excuse to do nothing about it.

After reaching my destination, I filed a formal complaint with the airline. They refunded my overnight expenses and provided additional compensation for the inconvenience.💰

That's how I advocate for myself—by speaking up professionally rather than mumbling complaints in some back corner.

This approach, cultivated through years of workplace practice, now extends to other areas of my life.

The workplace truly can be a wonderful training ground for becoming your best self.🏆

Fellow Workplace Multiplier,

As always, keep winning at work and in life.

Tola Akinsulire

Your Strategic Workplace Mentor

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Want to get in on some of the lessons I have picked up in my career? Get my eBook "21 Lessons I Learned in My Career - A Primer to Help You Become Better at Work". Get it here

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