There are many benefits to workplace humor. People are more productive, get along better, and tend not to be as stressed out. But while humor is important, it’s a tricky business because there are many types of humor you should avoid using when at work.
Self-Grandiose Jokes
These are the types of jokes that build the joke teller up. They can be great jokes if they’re accurate or if they’re sarcastic. For example, if you really are the highest selling person in the biz, then it’s okay to joke about it to a point. But, if you’re also the clumsiest, you can make jokes about that too in a sarcastic way that looks like you’re building yourself up.
It’s important to be careful that in the process of building yourself up, you aren’t tearing others down or inadvertently trashing your office.
Self-Depreciating Jokes
This type of joke puts the joke teller into the hot seat and says something bad about himself in a funny way. For example, “I don’t get out of bed for less than $200 per hour unless it’s for free coffee and donuts.” This type of joke can be workplace appropriate as long as it’s not in answer to a compliment.
Self-depreciating jokes can endear you to others because they make you more relatable, but they work less well if people start to see you as a big downer cutting yourself down all the time. Make sure the things you say are funny.
Positive Audience Jokes
These types of jokes tend to be about the audience and builds them up in a positive way. Whether the audience is a team or a room of thousands, these jokes can sometimes be somewhat stereotypical. They’re okay if it’s about the profession and not about sex, race, religion, or politics – all of which are very dangerous in the workplace. Positively-focused jokes bond the people together, making them more productive.
Negative Audience Jokes
It’s very dangerous to make a joke about your audience that is negative. For example, don’t go to a lawyer convention and tell them negative jokes about their profession. They’re not going to appreciate it. These jokes are never appropriate. In fact, only self-depreciation jokes are okay in terms of negatively. Never make negative jokes about other people.
Discriminatory Jokes
It goes unsaid that any jokes that are discriminatory in nature should be avoided in the workplace. You don’t want to say anything about “all” people of a certain color, sex, orientation, or religious preferences. These are always inappropriate at work. No one needs to hear your tampon jokes, your three dudes went into a bar joke or rude jokes in this setting. It’s offensive.
Political Jokes
In most workplaces, political jokes are a big no-no. Even if people don’t speak up, you’ve made probably half uncomfortable plus mad them look at you differently. People who liked you before might not like you now. It’s too risky and should not be discussed – much less joked about in the workplace or at work events.
