The Kinds of Humor That Help Leaders Build Trust

(upbeat music) - I'm Otto Ignatius. - I'm Allison Beard and this is the HBR IdeaCast. (upbeat music) - So Allison, I think leaders often wonder whether and how they can be funny at work with their teams. I mean, I think there's something great about humor, it brings us together, it's also risky, right? I mean, one person's joke is another person's offense. Tell me about you, do you try to be funny at work with your teams? - I would say that I don't try to be funny, I try to be amusing. I think you do a really good job of sort of throwing in a joke once in a while, witty banter, the occasional Russian accent. - I appreciate this very much. But I tend to bring levity to situations with maybe some telling a funny stories or self-deprecation. And I think it's a really hard thing. We've published a lot of research showing that humor can be used for good in leadership, but as you say, it's very hard to thread the needle sometimes. - And look, there's the image we all have of Steve Carell in the office, the boss who tries to be funny, who never is, who crosses lines, and really accomplices the opposite of what he's trying to do. So there's a right way to do it. There's a wrong way to do it. The conversation though that I had with our guests, his belief is that even people who feel like, I'm not funny, they can tap a kind of funniness within themselves if they pay attention to sort of who they are and how they communicate. And that can be all part of our arsenal, but there are ways to do it and there are things to avoid. So Adam Christine is a comedian and speaker. He's author of the book, The Laughter Factor, The Five Humor Tactics to Link, Lift and Lead. And he talks about different kinds of funny that might work in the workplace and how to embrace those different styles. So here's my conversation with him. - So your basic premise is that humor can be a valuable leadership skill and that it can be learned. Let's unpack that a little bit, do leaders need to be funny? - The key to leadership is trust. And sometimes we think it's primarily about casting a vision, that's really important. But if people don't trust your vision, if they don't follow your leadership and your words, you're in trouble as a leader. And so research is showing that humor is actually a shortcut to trust. It's a very human thing to have a sense of humor and some leaders feel that, well, I must be serious, I'm a leader, but your people are silently begging to enjoy what you're talking about, what you're sharing. And maybe most importantly, it's about connection, we crave connection. - So your other basic premise seems to be that everyone is funny or can at least find their, their funny-ness. I think that's interesting, 'cause I think there are plenty of smart, amiable people who would say, I'm not funny. Can we just leave it at that, or do you think? - I do believe that everyone has a sense of humor. It's just that there are different types of humor. It's sort of like if you were playing chess, you might enjoy using the queen as your attacking piece or a rook, but you have access to the bishop and the knight and what I call humor tactics. I think the key really is not trying to be funny, but tapping into the connection and the style that's already yours. So years ago there was a book that's actually still selling zillions of copies called The Five Love Languages by Gary Chapman. Just as there are love languages, I believe there are laugh languages, and I've identified five of them. The first is Surprise. I like the acronym SAD, which stands for Surprise and Delight. If your laugh language is Surprise, you probably have a knack for delighting people with the power of the unexpected. The next is Poke, and this is probably the trickiest because it's easy to poke fun of other people. I tell my readers and clients to avoid sarcasm, but poking is powerful, especially if you poke fun at yourself and use self-effacing humor. The third laugh language is called Injokes. This one might be the best tactic for leaders. This is the power of laughing over a shared experience. This is where repeating a story, you'll notice when you get people together and they might say, "Hey, tell us about the time, that's Injokes." The next is for your punsters out there and you're listening to audience. It's called Word Play. This is Clever banter might even include dad jokes and amplify, and this is where you exaggerate stories and details, and you really, you actually heightened the pain and you form a deeper connection with people because they can relate. So sometimes our failures are the funniest things that we can share. - I want to ask though, what is the evidence that making people laugh equates to some sort of benefits for leaders for the workplace? - Well, we know that medical research is documented. I think most people are very aware that laughter releases endorphins, that de-escalates attention and stress, but I think what a lot of research is showing now that was surprising to me as I was working on my book. For example, Eric Romero produced a study in the Human Relations Journal. And what he documented was not just the health benefits of humor, but how it diffuses conflict and actually creates cohesion with people. It's hard to be upset with a coworker or a colleague when you're laughing together. - And the real key may be vulnerability. The neat Nair was a very successful CEO for HCL Technologies, a big Indian IT company. And he wrote books and articles about putting employees first. And he was a self-proclaimed terrible dancer. But he would dance at public events. Sometimes at the kickoff of his own speeches, knowing that it would be funny, a bit humiliating, but would humanize himself. Once you've done that, then people are like, okay, this guy's the real deal and I'm willing to hear what he has to say. - We want to look good. We want to look smart and we want to be articulate. But what happens is when you use, for example, self-affacing humor, I'm not talking about self-defeating humor, but when you poke fun at yourself, you not only beat people to the party, you become more approachable, more human. So I encourage leaders to start off, for example, if you're giving a presentation, the temptation is to start off with a winning story. But if you start off with a story where you flopped, perhaps in the earlier days in your career, you actually become more approachable and more authentic to people. - There is this particularly American protocol of opening every speech with a joke. And I have to do it tomorrow. I'm giving a commencement speech tomorrow and I feel pressure to open with a joke, make it a good joke. And not everyone can do that. And not every joke can carry the opening of a speech. What's your advice on whether that is something that people need to strive for? - Well, the goal is to take pressure up, not only off your audience, but off yourself. And so what I encourage CEOs, and I did a commencement address not long ago, and I felt that same kind of pressure like, I've got to win them in the first 10 seconds. But the advice that I would give is test out a joke. If you're going to do a joke, try it out on friends, try it out on family, get some feedback so that the first time you deliver it, the stakes don't feel as high. And then if it doesn't get a laugh, sit with it. Be okay with it because sometimes as we learn from, maybe the greatest talk show comedian of all time, Johnny Carson, he got bigger laughs when he didn't get a laugh. And so you don't want to scold your audience and say, oh, you didn't get it. The purpose of the humor really is to serve the situation. And so you don't want to try to overdo it. I was on a flight one time with Jay Leno, and I was coming back from Las Vegas. And I think he had just performed at Caesars, and I had probably been working at Little Caesars. But I asked Jay, I said, Jay, give me some tips on your standup and your comedy. And he said, Adam, you want LPMs. And I said, what's that? He said, laughs per minute. And I think leaders don't need to get a lot of laughs per minute, but they want to increase the number of laughs per meeting. And that doesn't mean that you have to generate all the laughs. It might be that you create an icebreaker or invite your management team to share their funny is dad joke. Somebody else might have the laugh language of amplifier where they exaggerate stories. And so the mark of a good leader is not necessarily that they're funny, but that they're open to creating fun and connection. There was another study done not too long ago by Oxford that documented that humor friendly cultures actually show a 30% increase in productivity and creativity. And I think about why that is. I believe it's because when we're playful, we feel more persuasive, we feel more productive. And perhaps most important of all, we're more collaborative. If you can feel free to tell a joke or have some fun, you probably feel more free to fail and to experiment. I mean, there is the famous example of Gerald Ratner, who ran a discount jewelry chain in the 1980s in the US, the UK. And that a fancy dinner, he made some deprecating jokes about his company, about the low price of what the company produced. And one of his lines was, people say, how can you sell this for such a low price? I say because it's total crap. The crowd loved it, but it got picked up in the UK press. It angered bargain shoppers that were his audience. Tank the stock by more than a billion, and he lost his job. There always probably should be a voice at the back of your head saying, yeah, maybe don't tell this one. It's a good one, but don't tell it. That's a funny one, but that's a great point. My philosophy is, if in doubt, leave it out. I was involved with a national conference one time in the CEO. So wanted to impress his new audience. He had just come on to this team. He convinced his production team that he was going to ride in on a Harley with born to be wild playing and win everybody over. And it was bold, it was gutsy, but it kind of flopped because it just didn't fit his personality. So if you're someone who loves language and clever banter, you want to lean into that type of humor. I'll give you an example of a type of humor really where you don't need jokes at all. And that's the power of surprise. You can surprise your audience. You can surprise your customers. And so we can plan surprises through our communication. For example, a company could be very effective doing direct mail, where someone opens a gift or an envelope, and there's some three-dimensional thing that's not swag. It's not self-promotional. So for example, you could go to Walmart and for about $2 or $3 buy one of those bouncy balls that you would give a preschooler. And you could write a note with a sharpie right in the ball that says, I had a ball meeting you at the sales conference. And imagine the mail carrier comes and brings it to the office. And it's like, it didn't cost you much, but you surprised and you delighted your recipient. And that's maybe the essence of all humor is the power of surprise. One question we're probably all dealing with now is whether or not AI is funny. In my experience, early on, it was not. You try to get funny from it, and it offered up to sort of bad puns. But then we learned how to prompt it and make this funny in the style of David Sedaris. So you could actually get something that actually seem clever. What do you think? Is AI your friend here, if you're sort of searching for humor as a leader to present to your team, to break the ice, to be vulnerable? Yes, AI is your friend, and that's great for prompting jokes, especially if you do gravitate towards witty wordplay style of humor. But you want to be careful. Really, comedy is not so much based on a joke or even the delivery. It's based on a shared experience. There was a great book called The Campfire Effect. And AI can never give us that. When I was a kid, I would go to camp. And the highlight was The Campfire where there'd be the talent show. And somebody would sing. And somebody would do a skit. And someone else would do a magic trick. And I think it's almost a primal thing where you're gathering around the fire and human beings sharing stories and connection. What I tell executives is don't try to be the funniest person in the room, be an orchestrator of the fun. And I think AI can help you do that. But it certainly can't replace the magic of human beings gathering together. I did, of course, ask Chatchee BT for a couple of jokes before this-- Oh, good. --is the latest version of Chatchee BT. So hopefully it's the funniest. But I tried to get something contextual and relevant. So here goes one line. When a boss tries to be funny, it's less comedy and more a hostage situation with snacks. OK. And then the second one, leaders who tell jokes at work remind me why mute buttons were invented. So, you know, sassy. Not bad. Little sassy-ness from her friends at OpenAI. Well, what I like about that audience is it could prompt you to come up with your own. I have noticed that Chatchee BT has certain favorite sayings. Like I've seen the snacks then come up a bit. But I think studying great comedians, witty writers is helpful. One of my favorites is Stephen Wright. And, you know, he's the one who said things like with his total deadpan delivery, he would say, "I put spot-roover on my dog. Now he's gone." And it wasn't just the words. It was his delivery. And so, as leaders, I think sometimes we think that it's about what we say. But it always goes back to how we say it and how it's received. It goes back to speech class 101, right, is know your audience. But I would take it even further and say, "Feel your audience." What are they feeling? Are they frustrated? Are they scared? Are they intimidated? Are they celebrating? And allow your humor to really fit what's happening in the room and in the moment. In your book, one of the best tips is that leaders should work at developing this in-group humor or in-group experience, so callbacks from earlier experiences or even earlier in the meeting. If you're speaking a larger group, figure out what people care about what they're thinking about. When I was at Time Magazine, I got John Stewart to do the first time 100 Gala in 2005. And he got our guest list, right? And landed specific jokes, particularly about Martha Stewart. He was fresh from doing jail time. And the other celebrities in hand. So that kind of direct engagement with the audience, in this case, the context. Talk though about how do we get better at that? How do people get better at understanding what will resonate in these kind of in-group experiences? I think it goes back to the unbelievable power of listening. Like, give you a quick example of that. You were just talking about what I call in-jokes. And those would never play at a comedy club. But I was on stage at a convention one time. And a gentleman, they told me, this guy's a lot of fun. If you're going to do something fun, involve this gentleman. And they pointed out, I didn't know his name. And I said, what is your name, sir? And he said, Ken. And I wasn't sure I was hearing it right. He said, Ken, and what I didn't realize was this guy was the president emeritus of this wonderful. It was a nonprofit organization. But I had heard he was a good sport. And so I said, Ken, is that one or two syllables? And everybody laughed. And he laughed the most. I'm just Ken. Just exactly. But what happened was it became such a hit. He started calling himself Ken. He would exaggerate it. And then the event organizer changed the lanyard and rewrote his name as Ken. And it became such a hit at that gathering that the next year when I saw him again, he brought the new lanyard with the key in spelling of his name. Now again, that's not something you'd ever see on TV or a comedy special. But in a group, it creates a callback. And there's something about callbacks that we human beings love. I haven't completely figured out why that is. I think it makes us feel like we're part of a very special community that has an exclusivity about it. I store callbacks. You know, my own view is I'm funnier in a small group than in a big group because you pay attention to what's already happened and try to deliver based on that shared experience that you have. I also, you know, if a joke occurs to me, I kind of store it and know there'll be a moment when I can throw it out. And it will look like, man, that guy is fast and clever. Should I be ashamed of that? Is that too manipulative? No, I think you should be proud of that. I think that by the way, that's exactly what Robin Williams did. Arguably one of the top three greatest comedians of our time, maybe of all time. He carried a notebook with him that had hundreds of bits and gags and jokes. And he would be backstage before he'd go on. And so when an audience member heckled him or something came up, it looked like it was all spontaneous, but it was really planned spontaneity. So I think one of the things leaders need to do is understand what works for me, what has worked in the past. And how could I repurpose the humor in different settings? The debate over telling jokes versus displaying wit. The funniest people I know cannot remember a single joke. Some of the least funny people I know memorize jokes and comedy skits and sitcom lines. Some people find it predictable and boring. What's your advice on the best approach? Is it different approaches for different moments or do you have a view on that? I think it goes back to finding the funny that fits you. Some of the greatest comedians of all time socially are very uncomfortable. I'm personally more comfortable in front of 500 people than five people. Because for me, it feels like this big audience that I'm doing my stick, but with four or five people, I feel a little more exposed. And so I think it's finding what makes you feel most comfortable. Maybe that is a performance piece. Maybe you memorize a sketch or a joke. Maybe you feel really comfortable more impromptu style. And so it's find the funny that fits you and go for it. And as leaders, I think it's also important to understand your colleagues' laugh languages. So that goes back to the power of listening, right? So if somebody, you know, just get such a big kick out of surprise, well, you can spring some surprises on them intentionally. The most important thing of all though is as a leader, what are people, when your name comes up and you're not around, how do they feel about you? Do they smile? Do they feel nervous? Another thing that's important for leaders is to use humor strategically. You want to lead your people from ha ha to aha. And so humor breaks up patterns. And we laugh when a pattern is broken. And so sometimes we can help our teams get out of their ruts by breaking a pattern. And humor's a great tool to do that. All right, so let's get really practical. So let's say people are listening to this and they're like, yes, yes, I like this. I do want to have a better sense of humor and playfulness and fun in the work environment. How do you get started? What's the process? I think the first thing is to say, what is it that makes me laugh? Because the goal is not to be funny. The goal I think is to create a culture that's fun and inviting. And there are many ways to do that. And so I like this saying, the meaning of communication is the response you get. So you want to reverse engineer it. What is the response I want to get from, say, a presentation? If your goal is to create community, it might be to share the laughter, to have somebody tell a funny story, to have somebody else ask a provocative or a witty question, or even you might have in your own company, somebody who's great at playing electric guitar, or maybe they're a amateur ventriloquist. It doesn't really matter, but you're creating engagement and participation. And it's really hard for people to feel bored when they're seeing their peers sharing their talent and their style of humor. There is the reality now that we're not physically in the office as much as we used to, that a lot of communication, a lot of engagement, a lot of meetings are done. The way we're doing this conversation right now, remotely via Zoom or whatever. I would assume that makes it harder to connect, to accomplish everything you've been talking about, this sense of fun, this sense of playfulness, this sense of humor. Have you thought about that, like, how we create the culture that you're talking about when we are more dispersed and remote, and, sure, a lot of people are coming back to the office, but a lot of people are not. What do you think about that? Is Zoom a barrier to pulling some of this off? It really is a barrier. And I think we need to be honest about that. In person is always the best in terms of humor and connection. But I think you can still invite participation. I'll give you an example. Yesterday I was giving a motivational presentation to a group of young women who are on a sports team. It was like a lecture situation where they're sitting in a classroom and they can see me on a computer. And I just can barely see these silhouettes of faces in the back. And so I immediately thought to myself, how am I going to engage them? And so I invited them to stand up. I said, everybody, stand up. Put a big smile on your face, even if it's kind of a fake. I have to be here, smile. Put your hands up toward the ceiling. And so they were all doing that. And I said, now, do your best while you're smiling, all your hands are up while you're looking up to feel bad. And they started laughing because it's hard to feel bad when you make choices with your body to feel good. So sometimes we can fall into this trap of, well, I'm getting ready to get ready, to get ready, but we are ready to connect with each other. So if you're doing a Zoom look for ways to involve people, to engage them, it's not, you know, I really believe that we feel first and we think later. So we need to bring more feeling, more connection to our meetings. And that goes back to what I shared about what Jaleno said. I think you want to increase your LPMs, your laughs per meeting. And that takes planning. It takes planning, and I guess it takes patience. I mean, part of what we write about it, our misery about being a good leader, is you don't sit down and tell everyone what to do. You sort of encourage a kind of open discussion rather than sort of my way or the highway. I want to give you a fun example. I have my dear friend, Scott Rommel, who's probably Hollywood's number one voiceover narrator. And so you'd never recognize him if you bumped into Scott at the grocery store, but he's the guy who, you know, like say the Avengers movie or something. He's like, you know, in a world that time for God. One man, he's that guy. And so he agreed to do voiceover. And we took this company. And they created their own little mini movie trailer. It's just like 30 seconds long. And Scott agreed to do the voiceover. And they had so much fun basically doing self-parity. You know, this guy is really into working out. So we're going to make him forest gump this great runner. And she's really into this. So she's going to become Wonder Woman or whatever it was. And so it's not your job as a leader to entertain your people. But I think it is your job to facilitate connection and fun and humor. So then on the flip side, how do you know if something is likely to bomb or to offend? I mean, how can you avoid that before it's too late? I think being an orchestrator of the humor is more important than being the winner. I'm the funniest person in the room. If you think something is going to bomb, it likely will bomb. And so I tell executives to avoid three P's, obviously, avoid profanity. That's going to offend some people. Avoid anything that smacks of prejudice. And then the third P is avoid politics. Are there specific leaders who you would call out, let's say, business leaders, not entertainment people, who sort of do what you're talking about well? Did they create this environment? Did they are funny in an effective way? Any models that come to mind? No specific person comes to mind. But I'll give you one example. There's a company called Inspirity, which is a HR sourcing company. And they do something brilliant. What Inspirity does is they'll have an event where they put the spotlight on their people. For example, one time, they did like a spoof on the tonight show. And what blew everybody away was James Minksu at the time was the VP of sales. He enlisted people to show off their kinds of talent. And the audience, the employees, absolutely aided up because they said, this guy's in the legal department. I didn't know he could play bass. She's like the head of HR. I had no idea that she could sing. And so we want to put the spotlight on other people. I think sometimes as leaders, we think we have to be the star. When really, we want to be the cement that glues people together. So if you're under pressure, and somebody says, tell a joke, make me laugh. Do you have a go-to joke for the works at almost any occasion? You know, it's funny. I will sometimes say, throw out a topic. And then I'll come up with something funny. So if you want to try that, throw out a topic. Humor the workplace. OK, next question. All right, that works. Now, so I think you want to have your go-to kinds of things. Find a story that you love to retell. My parents were on a flight to Hawaii from Los Angeles. And my mom and dad were excited to go. And they got in this argument about how you pronounce the word Hawaii. And my dad said to my mom, honey, it's just simply Hawaii. And my mom said, no, it's Hawaii. And back and forth, they went, my dad said it's Hawaii. And my mom said, it's Hawaii. And finally, to settle the debate, my mom reached in front of her in the seat, right in front of her. She tapped this elderly gentleman on the shoulder. She said, sir, I'm sorry to bother you. I think the state has pronounced Hawaii. My husband says, Hawaii, what do you say? And the older gentleman said, Hawaii. And she said, well, thank you very much, sir. And he said, you're welcome. We should have had a warning sign saying caution, dad joke coming. Cushion. Hey, you know what? I've noticed that dad jokes are hot. They are actually hot. In a corporate setting, people are into dad jokes. And so sometimes, if I'm doing a keynote speech, I will distribute four dad jokes. And these are so bad, they're good. And we'll have someone do kind of a fake rim shot at the end, but I'm pumped. And we'll see who can get the biggest groans. And you wouldn't believe how corporate managers are eating this up. I have no shame in telling dad jokes. Ponds for some people, wordplay, might just be their laugh language. But there are other great humor tactics, one that we didn't really get to talk about much that I think is so powerful I call amplify. And this is where you take the pain in your life or in your organization, and you just put it on steroids. You exaggerate whatever's happening. And so I encourage your listeners to really think, what is my laugh language? And maybe more importantly, what is the laugh language of those around me? And how can I spark humor with them? Well, I'm glad to hear dad jokes are hot. I'm set. So Adam, I want to thank you for being an idea cast and sharing your thoughts on how laughter can help you in the workplace. Well, I want to thank you for some of your oddisums. I like them. I'll take it. That's author and speaker Adam Christine. He wrote the book, The Laughter Factor, The Five Humor Tactics to Link, Lift, and Lead. Next week, Allison speaks to Elspeth Johnson about why you might still be having trouble delegating and what to do about it. If you found this episode helpful, share it with a colleague and be sure to subscribe and rate idea cast in Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen. If you want to help leaders move the world forward, please consider subscribing to Harvard Business Review. You'll get access to the HPR mobile app, the weekly exclusive insider newsletter, and unlimited access to HPR online. Just head to hbr.org/subscribe. Thanks to our team, Senior Producer Mary Dew, Audio Product Manager Ian Fox, and Senior Production Specialist, Rob Eckhart. And thanks to you for listening to the HPR idea cast. We'll be back with a new episode on Tuesday. I'm Adi Ignatius.