Nolan Martin :
So you’re a comedian who has worked in everything from foreign affairs to organizational change to assisting nonprofits. Why do you think humor and laughter are such effective tools for problem solving? And are these tools really universal and leading to more creative and successful outcomes regardless of where in the world someone finds themselves negotiating?
Why Humor and Laughter Unlock Creativity, Problem-Solving, and Cross-Cultural Connection [00:16]
Courtney Bickert :
So I will attempt to answer both of those. It’s important to note that laughter and humor are different things, though obviously closely related. Laughter is a physiological emotional response, and humor is not always, doesn’t always cause laughter.
It can and is the source for laughter, but it also is about finding the incongruous. Finding the odd exploring curiosity. So when we talk about a sense of humor, it’s not always the person who makes everybody laugh out loud or is the class clown, it’s somebody who’s curious and observing things and making different kinds of connections.
But both of them scientifically are known to enhance creativity and problem solving. And why is that? One thing, for instance, laughter, like most of our emotional responses actually trigger or activate one part of our brain. And what’s unique about laughter is it actually activates multiple parts of our brain.
So when you think of somebody as left brain, right brain, when you’re laughing, you’re actually using both. So you’re automatically, your brain is physiologically thinking and working in a different way when you laugh. And also physiologically, when we laugh, our body swaps cortisol in our bloodstream and replaces it with things like dopamine, which is a transmitter that enhances learning, motivation, mood, those kinds of things.
Endorphins, which we know from like exercise, those also are the same things, and by swapping out the cortisol, it actually decreases anxiety and causes a relaxing effect. So those are things that are happening just in your body that are going to naturally make you more creative and help you problem-solve.
We also know that laughter is a, because it’s relaxing, it also creates, as does humor as well, a sense of safety and a sense of calm. So when you’re feeling safe and secure. And it also creates a bond with the other person. So when you laugh together or share a sense of humor or share a joke, you are automatically creating a bond with that person.
And that also enables problem solving, joint problem solving. So all of this together you can imagine is a secret sauce for innovation and it’s really, it’s been proven, there’ve been several studies where at different universities, including MIT and others. Like Northeastern, where they took students or professors and they put them in two groups and gave one group a piece of comedy or a funny movie to watch, and the others nothing.
And they put them in the room with the same, a room, with the same set of questions. And those that had watched something funny beforehand came up with 30% more answers and what was judged to be like 38% more innovative or creative. So it’s proven to have a difference to your point of, is it universal?
In fact, it is. So it is a myth when somebody says, ugh, he doesn’t have a sense of humor. Actually we do. We all have a sense of humor, and humor and laughter are actually found in all societies and have been forever that we can find in science. And they’re also found in apes. And some scientists believe in rats.
There is a lot of study also that laughter itself has an evolutionary role to play in species, which I find very interesting. So is it universal? Yes. We all have it. Does it mean that we all share the same sense of humor or that we get each other’s jokes? Of course not. We even, coming from similar backgrounds, have often different senses of humor, or we have different experiences that we’re pulling on.
When we come from different cultures, we have different things that we find relatable or they’re funny because they played a certain role in our shared experiences in the past, but that doesn’t mean you can’t appreciate and share each other’s sense of humor. And in fact, there’s been a lot of work done on using humor for cross-cultural studies and engagement because it opens the door for a lot of really interesting questions in a very safe way.
So if you don’t get somebody’s joke, you can say, I don’t get it. Why is that funny? And they can say well, because in my country when you’re growing up, the aunt always does X, Y, Z and so we find it funny. And so then you are getting insight into different cultures and different people in ways that you might not otherwise.
It is also because of the bonding nature. You’re creating laughter and of humor, you’re creating bonds across individuals through humor and laughter that you may not be able to create easily in other ways because of cultural differences. Of course there are risks and so when using humor professionally especially, but in general socially as well, of course in other cultures or other situations, it’s important to be thoughtful.
Aram Donigian :
So Courtney, given your expertise and experience. How does one kind of know when and how to interject humor into a conflict situation? And are there any specific scenarios or moments that you know, you’ve seen can be, can particularly like humor can be particularly advantageous?
Using Humor to Ease Tension, Build Trust, and Strengthen Negotiation Outcomes [05:31]
CB :
Yeah, I would say there isn’t necessarily a science behind when to use humor, when you know when is the right moment, what is the right way? There are some tools to use. One is your opening moment is whether it’s how you enter the room, how you take the podium, how you sit at the table. That is in standup, that’s called taking the mic.
And what you’re taught is that you have those first few seconds to control the energy in the room and to create empathy with the audience cause generally they want you to succeed. And that’s true in going into a negotiation or a meeting. Everybody generally wants each other to succeed. You may have different agendas and different goals, but it’s a real opportunity to do that and create empathy and set the mood.
And one of my favorite stories is of the CEO of Korn Ferry and he, Gary Burnison, he was called in to intervene in a negotiation that was going particularly badly and tough for a couple of their senior leaders. And he tells a story of walking into the meeting and just saying, welcome to the détente. And they all apparently bust out laughing.
And he said, instead of a battle, we gotta brainstorm. And so I think that the opening moment is often a time and you’re, you can be coming in with a story of your morning or it’s a really easy moment to set the mood. It’s also helpful to prep yourself to be more lighthearted before you go in, and whether that’s doing for yourself, like what you did in preparation for this podcast interview, which is think of something funny that made you laugh or think aha, or watch something for a few minutes, or read a couple funny jokes or anything that would put you yourself in a lighter mood because that’s the mood you’re gonna go in with, and that’s probably the mood you’re going to sustain and share with the others around the table.
It also opens you up for being ready when the moments do arise. Where humor can fit in. So that can be anything from a funny noise happens outside and that provides an opportunity to ask a silly question about it, and that automatically creates then a shared experience. That you’re laughing about or you all think is odd or curious, or somebody brings up something that reminds you of a silly or quirky story, that’s an opportunity to throw that in, to make things more human.
So there really isn’t a science to it. I think one of the key things is your own frame of mind, being honest and being natural and true to yourself. So it’s not something you’re trying to force on people or force. I’m gonna try to make these people laugh ’cause they’re gonna see right through that. So it’s just being at ease and looking for the opportunities.
AD :
You know, negotiating, dealing with conflict. Man, it really tenses us up and we don’t show up as well as we might want to, as authentically as we would like to when we’re, when coming in that way. If I heard you right there, it sounds like there’s also this piece about self-management.
CB :
Yes. I think that’s a lot of it is putting yourself in the right frame of mind before you go into something like that and exactly that coming into it, having had a little bit of a laugh because then you will also be relaxed. The other thing that we know about humor, and there’s been tons of studies on this, not only does it make people feel safe, makes people feel relaxed, it also ends.
It also instills confidence in you and makes you seem more competent. So they’ve done a lot of studies, and this is really important for leadership as well as negotiation, but people who are seen as having a sense of humor, and again, that’s not being the class clown necessarily, are seen as more competent, more trustworthy and confident.
And so if you think about putting others at ease in a negotiation, having those characteristics is important, but also being in a position, a strong position at the negotiating table, those are very important as well.
NM :
And I was wondering about the application during difficult negotiations and how to use kind of the humor to transform that into a more collaborative and successful endeavor. Do you have an example like that you could share?
How Humor Defuses Tension & Turns Conflict Into Collaboration [09:59]
CB :
One example I have of when I used it was I was in charge of leading a strategic planning retreat for our whole business development team for, it was a five day retreat actually, and part of the mandate was we were gonna have to make cuts and we were gonna have to make budget cuts.
And so going in, it was sort of ominous and things had been tough at the organization and there was a lot of tension and people weren’t necessarily looking forward to spending five days, part of which was going to be to making really difficult decisions that had a lot of impact on the team. We started it with some humor, some of that first exercise, but I actually started it with the joke exercise that we will do at the end of this, which is providing people the opportunity to write until their own joke and making it easy by providing some sample setups and they can come up with the punchline.
And we actually started with that and what that did was it gave people the opportunity to say things that were on their mind, but in a very safe way and in a funny way, and from the moment one, then we also already had some inside joke. That we could use to talk about this primo situation, but in a joking way. And that was really helpful. And we would use, we would hang those up on the wall.
We also had other jokes on the wall and people would hang those up throughout the week. And what it actually started was a trend that we could, at any time when things were getting really uncomfortable or people were starting to argue or get emotional and activated, somebody could just say did you hear the one about, or a guy walked into a bar and it would just set the, it would stop everything.
And it was kind of accepted, because it was part of the inside joke of the group, it was a way that we could just socially acceptably reboot and restart. And so that was an experience where it worked really well. I think it’s hard to know. It’s not always, not all conflict situations, obviously call for humor and again, not trying to force humor in a conflict situation, especially a particularly risky one, but it can in less risky situations, perhaps diffuse things.
I had an example where we were going across the border from Kazakhstan to Kyrgyzstan and we were stopped by the border guards and they wanted to bribe. We weren’t allowed to give any money and we didn’t want to and wouldn’t have, so we were refusing the bribe, pretending like I didn’t understand any Russian, and finally he was like, really, one of the guards was so frustrated and was like, don’t you have any magazines or anything? At least some magazines, like magazines with pictures.
And so I opened the trunk and I handed him like three economists. There are some pictures. And he actually got, that he’d been got, and he thought it was very funny and we, and left us through. So let us through. There are moments where it can work and it’s just reading the social cues.
NM :
Thank you so much for joining us today, Courtney. So that is it. Yep, that is it for us on today’s podcast. If you haven’t already, please rate review and subscribe to Negotiate X Podcast and we’ll see you in the next episode.
