Harnessing humour as a superpower at work

“A group of behavioural scientists walk into a bar…”  

Sounds like the start of a joke right - it’s not.

Those ten people were gathering to perform sketch comedy and two of them ended up researching the hypothesis that humour is serious business and that it is vastly underleveraged in most workplaces today.   

Dr Jennifer Aaker and Naomi Bagdonas now teach the course Humor: Serious Business at the Stanford Graduate School of Business and have co-authored the book Humor, Seriously: why humor is a secret weapon in business and life.

They explain what levity does to our brains and how anyone can harness it and use it skilfully at work.

Can you spot the finger in the photo? Now that's funny.

What is your humour type? Here is the quiz.

(This program first aired on Radio National on Monday November 2, 2020.)

Producer: Maria Tickle