17 Reasons To Use Humor In Your Business Communications
Just in case you weren’t sure if you should use humor in your business communications, I’ve come up with . . .
17 Reasons To Use Humor In Your Business Communications
- Great way to break the ice on a tough topic
- Great way to make small talk & mingle
- Gets people to listen to you
- Gets people to remember you & your message
- Changes the mood
- Helps you burn calories. . .yes it does. . . so you can fit into your business clothes
- Keeps you healthy . . . so you can stay on the job
- Gets your point across (many a truth is said in jest!)
- Gets you through embarrassing situations
- Sells an idea/product/service
- Makes tough/sensitive /stressful situations bearable
- Makes you approachable
- Introduces you to others
- Gets you free stuff
- People expect it
- It’s fun
- It makes things more interesting for you
Get the point? EVERYONE should be trying to use humor – it would make business more fun!
Jan
4 ways you can write jokes about a serious topic!
I hiked Havasui Falls in AZ. . .and swam in the Falls!
This past weekend someone told me that his wife would never put jokes into her speeches at work because her topic is tooooo serious – I think it was like a food stamp program or something. Well certainly you can’t make fun OF the people on food stamps, but you can still include humor in your speech. Here’s a couple of ways you can match serious topics with hilarity. . .
The environment. Add humor by joking about your surroundings and avoid the sensitive topic all together – whew! People think that because their topic is serious, that they can’t have any fun. Actually, they may really NEED to have some fun to take people’s minds off of it and break the ice. So have some fun with the environment. . .the environment includes everything from the room layout to the ceilings, room location, food, the room set-up, the temperature, the city it’s in, etc. . .
A consequence of the topic. Southwest Airlines has fun with one of the most serious topics on the planet. . . airplane safety! And they do a GREAT job. One of my favorite lines, after they’ve said the safety speech that no one listened to, they end with “For those of you who listened to the safety speech, thank you. And for those of you who didn’t. . .good luck!” They give a funny consequence to not listening! So take your topic and think through scenarios and then make the connection to something that might happen. . .or just make up something outrageous that could happen as a result of your speech (In order to avoid the hassles of redeeming food stamps, we will now just make them edible!!!)
Make an analogy. I once followed a medical speaker who talked about premature babies and one that was under like 2 pounds. Well of course I can’t make fun of premature babies. . that’s serious stuff. AND the speaker wasn’t talking about them dying. . .just their weight. Sooo, since we were at a banquet with a lot of food, I did a quick analogy – “Did you hear that that baby was under 2 pounds? I think the food on my plate weighed more.” It got a great laugh and no one was offended!
Joke about yourself. Along the lines of joking about the environment, you can also avoid the topic by making a self-deprecating joke about you and/or your difficulty with understanding the issue. . .”I stood in line 3 hours at the post office to get food stamps.” A lot of successful comedy is about making your audience feel superior, which is why making the joke be on you almost always works.
So next time you’ve got a sensitive/serious/touchy topic, don’t shut down the humor. Break the tension that’s most certainly in the room by ramping up the laughs instead!
Jan
Joke Set Lists
People tell me that they’re afraid to SAY the joke after they’ve written it because they’re worried that they won’t remember it exactly. I kick off my keynotes with at least a dozen or so jokes on the group, so memory is a BIG issue for me. I’ve got a few techniques I use, but one is the one old fashioned “set list” in which you write out a word (or maybe 2 or 3, but no more) that queues your brain to say the joke. What word do you use for the set list? Well, I use three options.
For example purposes, if the new joke is:
“I just switched health plans, though I almost didn’t get the new plan. . .I had a paper cut back in ’82 that was haunting me. Apparently that’s a pre-existing condition.”
Then I use either. . .
The subject. The most obvious word to use is a word that is about the joke. In the example above, the joke is about “switching health plans”, so I’d put those 3 words on the set list to queue my brain. Then when I glance down, and have practiced a bit, I know how the “switching health plans” joke goes.
The punch line. You can also use the last words. . .”pre-existing condition” to queue your brain where to go. Think about it, in daily life, you speak without thinking out each word in advance. . .your brain knows where you want to go with your thought. Telling a joke is the same thing. So RELAX, know that you need to end with “pre-existing condition” and, again if you’ve practiced a bit, it will happen just as it does in conversation.
A word I can’t remember. Invariably every once in a while there’s a word in the joke that I just can’t seem to remember, so I put that word on the set list. For this joke, I kept forgetting the word “paper cut”. . . for some reason, I kept thinking “hang nail.” Paper cut is funnier (has the “cuh” sound), so I really wanted to use that, so to remind me, I put in those 2 words. And again, my brain remembers what the “paper cut” joke is.
There are tons of other ways to remember a joke, but these 3 set list ideas have been a big help to me. And again, remember to RELAX. Don’t worry that you don’t get the wording exactly the way you want. That comes with time and practice. But You will most likely get close enough.
Jan
No Results Found
The page you requested could not be found. Try refining your search, or use the navigation above to locate the post.
No Results Found
The page you requested could not be found. Try refining your search, or use the navigation above to locate the post.
No Results Found
The page you requested could not be found. Try refining your search, or use the navigation above to locate the post.
No Results Found
The page you requested could not be found. Try refining your search, or use the navigation above to locate the post.
No Results Found
The page you requested could not be found. Try refining your search, or use the navigation above to locate the post.