The Most Undervalued Asset At Work

The Benefits of Using Humor in the Workplace

Jan 28, 2024

It is 6.30 pm. You have spent the whole day in intense meetings, but you still have a final one. This time with the accounting department. Your energy levels are low, but you still tell yourself to pay as much as attention as possible.

Luckily, the presenter makes this task feel effortless to you. His secret? Telling two subtle jokes in different moments of the presentation. By improving people’s mood, making himself more relatable, and reducing the stress in the room, he managed to captivate people’s attention while delivering a rather dull topic.

I bet that a witty speaker is not someone you come across very often at work. Despite the several benefits that smiling has, it is sparsely used in the workplace. Yet, studies show that using humor at work has several positive benefits, ranging from sales, to leadership and creativity.

The Science Behind Humor

We all enjoy the company of funny people. They raise the energy levels in the room and make those around them feel better. But why is this so? What chemical mechanisms do they trigger when they make us laugh?

Here are some of the hormones released by laughter and their effects:

Oxytocin: increases trust, facilitates social bonding, and speeds up self-disclosure.
Endorphines: this helps relieve pain, reduce stress and improve our sense of well-being.
Dopamine: makes us feel more bonded. It can also improve our memory and information processing abilities.
Cortisol (the “stress” hormone) decreases. This helps makes us feel calmer and less tense overall.

Additionally, these factors influence our respiratory function. This makes us take deeper and more regular breaths, which promotes a sense of well-being. In the long run, frequent laughter can also boost the immune system and relieve pain.

I see… but how does that apply to business?

Firstly, let’s see some stats:

Leaders with a sense of humor are seen as 27% more motivating and admired
Their employees are 15% more engaged, and teams that work with them tend to be twice more creative
98 percent of top executives prefer employees with a sense of humor, and 84 percent believe these employees do better work

“Humor is the most under-appreciated asset at work” Jennifer Aaker, professor at Stanford Business School

And there is more.

Humor in Pitching (Public Speaking and Sales)

By using humor strategically in a presentation, you will achieve a few things. Given that you have increased trust with the audience, they will be more willing to listen. Given that the audience is in a better mood, more relaxed, and thus breathes more regularly, they will better retain what you say. And because of the increased bonding you have generated, they might be more willing to buy.

This increased willingness-to-buy has been observed in studies. In one of them, participants negotiated on the purchase price of a piece of art. When the sellers added a punchline to the final offer they made to the buyer, participants in the study granted 18% more concessions than in the control condition. By increasing your rapport and likability, you make the other less adversarial and thus more willing to concede.

Finally, sales is a lot (sometimes more) about listening than about talking. The better you understand the client, the better you can fulfil their needs. This is where self-disclosure comes into play. In a 2015 study, had participants watch either a funny or neutral video clip before engaging in a self-disclosure exercise with a stranger. People who watched the funny clip revealed 30% more personal information relative to those who watched the neutral clip.

Leadership

An effective way leaders can use to be funnier is self-depreciating humor. If done properly, you will be perceived as having more self-confidence. If you can mock yourself, you must be pretty confident in your abilities.

However, this is contrary to what many managers might do. And there is a reason for that: if the self-depreciation is not done properly, then it might end up lowering your status.

But if done appropriately, it will render you more authentic and approachable. As Adam Grant says: “self-deprecating humor disrupts defensiveness and builds humility. It reminds you that you're only human”.

"A sense of humor is part of the art of leadership, of getting along with people, of getting things done." Dwight D. Eisenhower

Creativity

Humor also helps in creative endeavours. This can be used in many instances in the company sphere, especially in brainstorming sessions. One of the reasons why humor works well in this situation is that it helps relax the environment and lower the stakes. If tension is diffused, then people can take greater risks, and thus share more creative ideas.

Additionally, the reduction in cortisol that a joke generates reduces our state of flight-or-fight, a mindset forces us to have a very narrow focus of the task at hand. This does not help when you are trying to find novel connections of the seemingly unrelated. Humor, thus, makes it easier to think broadly and associatively.

Finally, encouraging people to have fun during creative tasks makes them more playful, a key element for creativity. As one of the most creative people ever said, “In order to stimulate creativity, one must develop a childish inclination for play”.

“In order to stimulate creativity, one must develop a childish inclination for play” Albert Einstein

If it is so great, then why are we not doing that already?!

One of the reasons seems to be that many of us believe that adding humor automatically renders something not-serious. We associate having fun with activities done outside of work. If someone has fun at work, we might label him as unprofessional. However, as Adam Grant says, “Humor isn't unprofessional. It's a strategy to signal smart and warmth at the same time”.

“Humor isn't unprofessional. It's a strategy to signal smart and warmth at the same time” Adam Grant

Another explanation might have its roots in our first working experience. When we get our first job, we are starting from the very bottom of the organizational ladder. We have no credibility, no reputation; it is yet to be built. Thus, we need to prove ourselves. For that, we must be committed, disciplined and work hard. That is, we need to take things seriously. There is, thus, little space for humor left. More importantly: when people rise through the ranks, they don’t usually rethink this approach.

But I am not very funny… can I change?

In mindset1, Carol Dweck argues that we can learn any ability to a high degree of proficiency, as long as we adopt the right mindset and work hard towards it. Humor is not an exception to that.

An example would be David Nihill. The Irish-born author went from being deathly afraid of standing in front of an audience to regularly performing stand-up and winning storytelling competitions.

We find another example in Adam Grant. When this rather shy organizational psychologist started teaching at Wharton, his students were not very pleased with his classes. After asking for feedback, he noticed that he was perceived as rather dull. After spicing up his lectures by using humor strategically, he managed to improve his teaching style substantially. He has now been the best-rated Wharton professor for 7 straight years.

That’s good news! How can I do the same?

Some experts say that the key to being funnier is to change your mindset about it, to try to see the word though different lenses. Most of us are probably not primed to look for humor. If we see a funny situation, we might just ignore it or forget it slightly afterwards; we are just not used to paying attention to these moments. Thus, being more aware of the funny things that happen to us might help. Writing down those moments at the end of each week could help with this mindset change.

“If you want to have more humor in your life don’t look for what’s funny, look for what’s true” Naomi Bagdonas, professor at Stanford Business School

Something else that might make us wittier is to look for the things that are true (albeit unpleasant) and point at them. This can be done in a self-deprecating way. A conspicuous example can be found in Lincoln, a person that was broadly regarded as rather ugly. When his rival Douglas called him a “two-faced” during a debate, he replied “If I had another face, do you think I’d wear this one?”.

But I would say that the main problem is not that we are not funny, but that we are generally not aware of the benefits that humor brings to the workplace. I would argue that by just recognizing this and acting accordingly, we can make a change in the working atmosphere.

This should not require a big effort; some small jokes every now and then would suffice. For example, the next time that you write an email to a colleague, you might add a small pun in the middle of it. If you have to present in front of others, you might include a meme in the second slide to break the ice. Or when you are talking to a client, you might briefly tell them an amusing anecdote that just happened to you.

You have a lot to gain from this approach; it can make you a more approachable leader, a better salesman, and a more original employee. And if we all added a bit of wit to our jobs, the workplace would become a more relaxed, amusing and creative place.

Recommended Reading:

For more on this, check out my article Why the Growth Mindset is Key to Success

Julian’s Substack

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