Humor and its role in leadership effectiveness

¶ … Humor and Leadership" (Journal of Organizational Culture, Communications and Conflict, 2005), Blane Anderson examines the use of humor by military leaders through a series of interviews with three leaders from the United States Armed Forces. The purpose of the study conducted by Anderson was to consider five specific issues in relation the role of humor in leadership practices: (1) whether humor can be used to improve leadership style; (2) whether humor in this context is more likely to be effective when it is practiced or spontaneous; (3) how the subjects developed their use of humor; (4) how the subjects know when to use humor and when not to use humor; and (5) whether humor is necessarily a natural gift or a tool that can be learned deliberately.

Methodology

The researcher purposely selected subjects of similar age and demographic backgrounds to eliminate extraneous variables. He also deliberately selected subjects from each of three branches of the U.S. Armed Forces (Army. Marine Corps, and Navy) to avoid leadership styles and practices possibly linked to the culture of any specific military branch. The subjects signed informed consent forms that detailed the nature of the study and its processes as well as fully disclosing that the interviews would be taped by the researcher. The subjects were then interviewed individually at their respective places of work on the subject of their use of humor within their leadership responsibilities and duties. Their answers were subsequently transcribed and first open coded to identify specific themes emerging from the interviews before being axially coded to enable retrospective analysis by the researcher to determine exactly how their responses related to the five research questions.

Discussion and Study Findings

According to the researcher, ten different themes were identified from the open coding. Those themes were: (1) when to use humor; (2) when not to use humor; (3) that humor is best when it is deliberate; (4) that humor is most effective when it flows naturally; (5) that humor can facilitate the effectiveness of leaders; (6) that there must be an agreement on the source of humor; (7) that it is important for leaders using humor to be aware of any applicable boundaries; (8) that when used appropriately, humor can increase morale; (9) that the experience and process of mentoring is important to the development of a useful sense of humor in leaders; and (10) that no formal training or instruction in the use of humor was used by any of the subjects.

According to the researcher, the findings of the study comported closely to the available previous literature on the subject of humor as a leadership tool. Specifically, all of the study subjects indicated that the use of humor by military leaders in the field has a positive effect on troop morale and increases the achievement of operational organizational objectives. There was consensus among the subjects that humor used by leaders reduces vocational stress workplace stress but that it is equally important to know when to use humor and when not to because the use of humor inappropriately can have negative consequences in terms of the confidence level of subordinates rather than any positive benefits. All of the subjects described having relied on humor to "break the ice" or to reduce tension in meetings and presentations delivered to a group audience.

The subjects also agreed that that the use of humor by leaders is more likely to be effective when it is practiced and planned in advance in a deliberate fashion but that it is not necessary to study the use of humor in any formal way. Their comments suggested (by inference rather than directly) that humor need not necessarily be spontaneous to be effective and they provided examples of the ways they had deliberately planned how to use humor at the start of meetings as well as in specific places in presentations.

In principle, one of the themes that emerged from the data was that all of the subjects had made deliberate attempts to improve their general ability to use humor and that they perceived their effectiveness as leaders to have improved significantly by virtue of having learned how to incorporate humor into their personalities for the purpose of using humor in their leadership roles. The subjects provided anecdotes about other leaders and mentors of theirs whose leadership skills and styles they admired and tried to emulate in general as well as more specifically in relation to the use of humor in leadership functions.