Perceived wisdom suggests that humour is a useful tool for breaking the ice and putting people at ease. Indeed, it can be used to good effect in the boardroom; to defuse tension, for example, when disagreement risks tipping over from debate to interpersonal conflict. Not all jokes have their desired effect, however, as objections to ‘banter’ in the workplace can attest: some see it as discrimination, bullying, and anti-inclusive behaviour.

If the thought of telling a joke at work conjures up images of The Office’s fictional boss David Brent and makes you cringe, cease and desist, that might not be a bad thing.

Research I conducted with Xiaoran Hu of the London School of Economics and Political Science, and Michael R Parke and Grace M Simon of the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania shows that attempting to get a laugh from work colleagues isn’t always a good idea. It puts people, particularly subordinates, under pressure to consider whether they need to fake laugh in order to be seen to be enjoying the boss’s jokes, even when they do not believe they are funny.

Our research shows that leaders attempting to elicit laughter or amusement from their employees all too often unwittingly push employees towards reduced job satisfaction and even burnout.

While most research in the past has suggested that people are more productive when they experience positive emotions such as amusement or laughter, our research shows that this is often not the case.

Joking aside

It is particularly not the case if the joke fails to land and the person on the receiving end of the joke has to decide whether to fake laugh or let the joke, and by extension the teller, fall flat. Subordinates feel under pressure to laugh when the boss tells a joke, even if they view the joke as unfunny.

The decision to fake laugh or not places the employee under pressure, particularly if there is a large status gap, such as a board member telling a joke to a shop floor worker during an on-site visit. It is the same whenever there is a power difference, so it applies equally for an executive joking around with an intern.

Deciding whether to fake laugh or not takes energy, which could otherwise have been spent on the task in hand. This feeling of obligation is exacerbated in situations where there is a greater power differential.

More junior employees who believe in the inherent wisdom of their elders, or their superiors in the chain of command, tend to feel more obligated to fake a positive emotion each time their boss tells a joke and this can lead to feelings of emotional exhaustion.

We know that people who work in customer-facing roles find their work more tiring than those who are not subject to the same requirement to be polite and cheery day in and day out.

Having a boss who jokes around too much puts them in a similar position. It forces them to be inauthentic and, just like inappropriate banter can erode feelings of inclusion, feeling under pressure to laugh in order to be included can have a negative impact on employees’ mental health and emotional wellbeing.

Under pressure

Given that the use of humour is never neutral or irrelevant—if you’re telling a joke, you’re automatically trying to elicit a response—it’s worth thinking of the potential impact before deciding whether the use of humour is appropriate or not. Not only do you force someone to take a split-second decision about whether or not to laugh, they’re forced to decide whether to laugh a little or a lot and how convincing their laughter must sound.

You might think you’re being funny, but your subordinates will likely be factoring in what the potential consequences of not laughing might be and what the associated risks of being found to be fake laughing could be.

No-one wants to be the David Brent of their organisation, so consider how funny you genuinely are and the impact your joke telling might be having. Chairs should think hard about not joking around too much. Other directors should also avoid the overuse of humour with the executive.

That’s not to say that there’s no place for humour in the boardroom or workplace. Simply that you need to pick your moment and realise that people are rarely as funny as they think they are. More importantly, keep in mind that a little humour, like Marmite, goes a very long way.

Randall S Peterson is a professor of organisational behaviour and academic director of the Leadership Institute at London Business School.