Workplaces have increasingly embraced fun and humor over the past decades. While humor was once frowned upon, managers now recognize its benefits. Appropriate humor can make employees more approachable and improve business productivity. Laughter releases endorphins that improve well-being by relieving tension and lowering blood pressure. Employers can encourage humor by starting a board for jokes and photos or designating silly days with light-hearted activities. This helps create a relaxed environment where spontaneous humor can emerge.

1. How Humour Harmonises
In the dark old days of typewriters and carbon paper, the work place was not meant to be fun.
Work was to be endured, not enjoyed. It was all serious stuff. No pain, no gain. Any fun and
frolicking was seriously frowned upon and seen as time wasting and counter productive.
Fast forward to today and see how many recruitment advertisers describe their work place as a
‘fun place to be.’ Fun is now the acceptable ‘F word’in the work place.
It is no longer seen as counter productive. Managers are embracing the positive effects of
having fun and laughter at work.
Humour has to be appropriate, of course. It doesn’t mean you have to go to work in a chicken
suit or that you are going to hold custard pie fights in your lunch hour.
The appropriate use of humour can make you more approachable, which is ultimately good for
business and productivity.
Laughter, particularly shared laughter, releases endorphins which create a feeling of well
being. It also relieves tension and lowers blood pressure. As long as people aren’t collapsing
in a soggy heap, this can only be a positive thing.
So, how do you inject more humour in to the work place?
Start a humour board where people can pin jokes, cartoons, photos and amusing anecdotes.
You might need some ground rules. ‘Keep it clean and don’t be mean’
is a good rule to start with.
Silly days are always good. They don’t have to involve props or dressing up.
You can put on a silly accent or talk like your jaw is wired shut. Or hit invisible flies with a
newspaper. Or pretend you have a toffee stuck to the roof of your mouth.
If you have an environment where people feel relaxed enough to be themselves, than
spontaneous humour will surely follow.
So, go on…release your inner clown!