Over the years, I’ve sat through countless meetings. Most of them have been the kind where everything said could be done in an email. I think it’s fair to suggest that most folks find meetings a drag. But have you ever been in that tortuously boring meeting where one perfectly timed joke changed everything? I have.
The room transforms. Everyone gets lighter. Discussion suddenly opens up. The group is more alive. What moments before felt like pure drudgery instantly shifts to good or, perhaps, even collaborative energy. Here’s the thing: to the untrained comedic mind, this might be easily shrugged off. This is exactly the sort of thing executives dismiss as coincidence. But me, I see it as strategy.
Let me shift gears for a moment then circle back. Here’s something I’ve discovered teaching college writing classes: students who can come up with/write a great joke can usually come up with/write great business copy or marketing ideas. These same people can often deflate tense moments. In short, they have some skills others don’t and, as such, can do things others just can’t.
As I said, I teach college writing. But I teach writing by teaching joke writing. And, as most any joke writer or comedian will tell you, the best jokes remove all the extraneous language. They get to the point. They don’t waste time. They demand precision in a way that all the flowery writing instruction never captures. Precision is everything. Every word has to matter. Every pause must count. Every setup must deliver exactly what the audience needs to hear to form assumptions. Every punchline must connect. And so, this isn’t merely entertainment; it’s communication mastery.
Now, back to meetings. Research from Wharton, MIT, and London Business School proves what I’ve observed in many meetings: humor can actually bring about great results. Leaders who use humor can generate higher levels of psychological safety in their teams. This looks like employees speaking up more, contributing honestly, and performing better. Research from the University of Massachusetts found that 98% of the most successful companies deploy humor intentionally!!! That’s incredible but not surprising.
The bottom line is: if people can share a laugh, they can share a goal. That’s why the pharmaceutical CEO who argues, “Lives are on the line! This isn’t the place for jokes,” misses the point entirely. Of course, timing matters, as does context. But dismissing humor completely creates sterile environments where people dread showing up to work. Why would any boss want that?!
Numerous business schools are already recognizing this shift. Columbia, Duke, MIT, and UCLA now include improvisational comedy in their leadership curricula. Again, that’s incredible!!! It’s a brilliant move! And many great business leaders have tapped into that DNA. Professional sports teams bring in comedians for team building. Even the White House hosts comedians for strategic purposes. And, among comedians, these corporate comedy gigs are a standard practice.
So, my contention is this: future CEOs can truly benefit from improv classes and stand-up workshops, as can their employees. There’s a lot they can learn from comedians for tasks like leading their own seminars or conducting interviews or workplace drama. The skills that define tomorrow’s leaders are exactly what improv builds: communication, agility, collaboration, presence, and a growth mindset.
Maybe that’s what more of our meetings should or could focus on, things like teaching employees how to be precise, how find common ground, how to share a laugh, how to demonstrate communication mastery, and the like. People might actually enjoy those meetings! To me the question isn’t whether companies will require humor and comedy skills in their leadership competency models in the future. The question, particularly for business leaders, is: who will master this advantage first, you or your competitors?