Funny Business

Discover the Benefits of Humor in the Workplace

As a popular comedian, actress, writer and producer, Tina Fey’s business is „funny business.“ While your day-to-day business is most likely more serious, using humor as an organizational tool can facilitate a great number of benefits. The benefits of humor in the workplace can include—and are not limited to—promoting group identity and cohesion, improving communication, reducing conflict and tension, increasing leadership effectiveness and increasing group effectiveness and productivity. Plus, laughing is fun!

Our [e-newsletter] readership has let us know that you appreciate a good laugh. This is just one more reason why we’re fortunate to be connected together through time, space and culture.

In the following article, we look at different types of humor; list its business benefits; note some risks of humor; and, ask for your insights on the use of humor in the workplace.

Defining Humor and Its Impact

On a high level, researchers Janice Witt Smith and Mak Khojasteh of Winston-Salem State University in the U.S., characterize humor as “an organizational tool which, when used appropriately, can be effective in facilitating a better work environment“ (2014). How much would you pay for an effective organizational tool? Humor—when done well—comes at no cost.

4 Types of Humor

There are specific types of humor. You may recall the piece on humor in our Jan. e-newsletter and completed the Humor Styles Questionnaire (HSQ). Respondents to the questionnaire are classified as one of four humor types. These include:

• affiliative humor which fosters group cohesion;
• self-enhancing humor used by individuals as personal amusement or a coping mechanism for stress;
• aggressive humor used to “put down” others;
• and, self-defeating humor that involves participating in self-deprecation.

Which tends to be your humor style?

„Inclusionary Putdown” Humor

There’s also the nuance of “inclusionary putdown” humor. In Smith and Khojasteh’s article, Use of Humor In The Workplace, they state that “Researchers Jenepher and Ashforth (2002) found that ‘inclusionary putdown’ humor helps temporary groups[i] form a group identity and develop solidarity…In practical terms, ‘putdown humor’ can be finding the use of insults, demeaning jokes, teasing, sarcasm or self-depreciating remarks toward someone else as amusing or humorous“ (Jenepher & Ashforth, 2002) (Smith and Khojasteh, 2014). Contrary to popular belief, inclusionary putdown humor is not a man’s game alone; women, too, can and do play that game.

The Impacts of Humor

How one receives humor has three primary impacts, according topsychologist Steven Sultanoff, Ph.D., former president of the Association for Applied and Therapeutic Humor. These include cognitive, emotional and physiological impacts. In the 2012ForbesWoman article, Are Funny People More Successful in Business?, Dr. Sultanoff explains that „workplace humor may offer some perspective on a situation, which helps people process it.” For example:

“After a company leader sent a memo saying they needed to ‘shrink’ a difficult problem, [Dr.] Sultanoff recalls, one employee posted a tiny copy of the memo on a community bulletin board” (qtd. in Goudreau, 2012).  

What kind of impact do you think was had by this bulletin board posting?

Selected Benefits of Humor in the Workplace

Humor Promotes Group Identity & Cohesion

• “Humor can serve to facilitate trust, ease tension and establish a sense of group cohesion,” says Anthony Pescosolido, a management and organizational behavior professor at the University of New Hampshire (qtd. in Smith and Khojasteh, 2014).
• “When the group is able to move beyond…demographic characteristics and see themselves as an identity group related to the task, the humor has had a functional and beneficial effect” (Smith and Khojasteh, 2014).

Humor Improves Communication

• “One of the greatest contributions of humor in organizational communication is that it allows expression of facts that were not socially acceptable, no matter if it is self-enhancing, affiliative or self-defeating. As Ullian (1976) indicates, it is often used to transfer information that is socially risky” (Smith and Khojasteh, 2014).
• “Humor can be a useful tool in assisting the organization in providing information to its employees in ways that can decrease their stress and enhance their cohesiveness” (Smith and Khojasteh, 2014).

Humor Reduces Conflict & Tension

• “[B]ecause we can only feel one emotion at a time,“ shares Dr. Sultanoff, „humor creates an emotional lift by displacing frustration with the joy of the joke and a physiological reduction of stress hormones“ (qtd. in Goudreau, 2012).

Humor Increases Leadership Effectiveness

• “Steve Cody, 57, is co-founder and managing partner of Peppercom, a mid-size communications agency based in New York. He’s also an amateur stand-up comedian, performing frequently at the New York Comedy Club. Cody wanted his employees to reap the business benefits of comedy too, so he launched a 90-minute comedy workshop for his new recruits and staffers to attend every two months. He says it infuses them with confidence, bonds them with coworkers, teaches the nuances of reading an audience and environment, and livens up their presentations. The new refreshed and fun culture is also helping him secure business” (Goudreau, 2012).

Humor Increases Group Effectiveness & Productivity

• “[Dr.] Sultanoff says that people who are funny likely will be perceived as more enjoyable and as better employees because they are in fact more successful. ‘If someone is using humor then they are connecting with people and building relationships, which creates opportunities that other people may not have’” (qtd. in Goudreau, 2012).
• “Using humor also increases attentiveness and persuasiveness. For a leader, it helps you relate by breaking down power structures and equalizing people in the organization” (Goudreau, 2012). Where leadership and organizations are relatively more hierarchical by cultural choice, how can humor be best facilitated in the workplace?

The Risks of Workplace Humor

• “The appropriate type and timing of humor are important; whether or not it is positive or negative is critical; and the length of time that the employees have been in place also makes a difference. Humor, like any ingredient to the leadership ‘recipe,’ must be used in the proper proportion and supported by other organizational mechanisms to be successfully implemented and to result in the types of outcomes important to the individual and the organization” (Smith and Khojasteh, 2014).
• “Whether or not the humor is offensive is from the perspective of the recipient, not the one sharing the humorous joke or anecdote” (Smith and Khojasteh, 2014).
• “’Even if someone isn’t offended by it themselves, they might be offended that it’s against the rules,’ he [Dr. Sultanoff] says” (qtd. in Goudreau, 2012).

Humor is a Practice

Goudreau also reminds us that the benefits of humor are true for humor that works. What works with one group of people or within one organization may very well differ from another group or organization. Humor—like intercultural competence and professional development in a global workplace—is a practice. There are risks associated with all practice. The horizon of rewards is what inspires us to continue the journey towards improved practice.

Share your insights on the use of humor in the workplace.

• What stories and lessons learned have you experienced?
• How can humor play a role in the stages of group development?
• How do you encourage humor in the workplace and manage its possible risks?

Photo Credit Title Photo: Getty Images.

Photo Credit Quotation Tina Fey: Grammarly.