Managing Up: Humor – The Great Diffuser

Recently, I’ve been discussing ways to Manage Up: establishing good communications with your boss and pro-actively addressing your boss’s needs. However, no solution is perfect, so it’s important to be prepared for frustration and disappointment. The best way to allow humor in.

Humor is the great diffuser. It takes the pressure off tension at work (and life.) It reduces many seemingly important conflicts of the moment to the petty infractions they really are. Anger in business relationships can last for 15 seconds, 15 days, or more; and it can have serious consequences. But a humorous statement, especially when least expected, can “jam the system,” or break the cycle, reminding us that we all really strive for the common good.

So when things go awry, try it out. Be the voice of calm and levity. Certainly, injecting humor into meetings with your boss and others is a technique that requires finesse, timing and sensitivity. But when it works, it will be powerful. Over time, you will “own and hone” the ability to take a fiery confrontation down to a low simmer – or even completely defuse it with a rewarding chuckle. If your manager hasn’t already developed this skill, find ways to nurture it. He may have a dry sense of humor that you can help bring out. Your display of healthy, self effacing humor may show your boss how she, too, can win the approval of her team more easily. It was once said, “no one ever died of laughter.” Never truer in the boardroom.

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