Leading with Laughter

There are some great articles and talks out there about the Leadership and humour.?Have you read any or aware of any such body of work?

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With everything, I think it makes sense if we have experienced it ourselves and bring it back to our own experience and share our perspective and I want to focus on this as there might be a feeling that too often when we talk about leadership, we are somehow looking outward at someone else known to us and many others and regarded as a great leader with great leadership.

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But I want to bring it home as each one of us is a leader in our own right starting with self-leadership and the ability to guide and influence others.

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So, I invite you to feel and see what ‘leading with laughter’ for you shows up as, feels like and sounds like while I share some specific examples of mine.

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The Action Research Presentation

The year is 2019 during my PGCE (Post Graduate Certificate in Education) training and the time had come for us trainees to present a piece of Action Research that we had undertaken to the rest of our classmates and our teachers.?The presentation was to be recorded with immediate feedback given from our peers and teachers and the presentations were going to take place over a consecutive number of weeks.?My week came, my peers presented, and the nerves were building up inside me one by one they each took to the front of the class and delved straight into their presentation. I was also worried about the length of my presentation and feared that it was long.?So my turn came, I walked up with my USB stick and pieces of paper with notes me with my memory.?I stood at the front, put my USB stick in and loaded up the first slide of my presentation with had an of avatar of me.?I looked right up at the class and said, “So this is what it feels like to be up there”!?Everyone burst out laughing including my teaching.?This was the perfect segway for me into my presentation and findings.

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It felt like setting the set and I sensed a shift from ‘Oh God’ to ‘Let it Go’ (reminding me Elsa’s rendition in Frozen)

When we laugh, we open our bodies and we are naturally in a receiving, positive and relaxed state.?This is what I created with the stipulation at the start, and I saw everyone sink into their chairs.?Suffice, to say I went well over the 20 minutes timescale we had been given and it didn’t feel like so.?The feedback that stayed with me aside of the in-depth academic research that I had done was that my presentation was full of enthusiasm, gusto, passion and humour.?

So, what does lead with laughter enable us to do?

• Enables us to level things up as in we are ONE thus accelerating a bond and likeability of each other which helps with trust.
• Releases any tensions we might be experiencing through hysteria and bringing us back to release and calmness.
• Connects with all the representational styles – auditorily, kinaesthetic, visualy and thus connecting with all
• Creates a calmness yet alert is the state that helps with being open to receive, learning and expanding our minds

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Where do you stand on generating laughter in a room?

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The Yellow bandana

The other day I was slightly late to my Wednesday Pilates class as one does, I scribbled into a tight space at the back that I could find amongst the backroom levellers.?I don’t know why they love it there but let’s just say they have found their comfortable spaces.?As I got settled setting up my ring and ball, the exercise instructor Marie said something, and everyone looked right at the back towards me.?I looked at my left-hand backroom leveller and asked what Marie had said and my left-hand leveller said Marie said she was confused as I wasn’t wearing the yellow ‘bandana’.?I was in fact wearing a blue one.?So, I took a breath and said out lout, “Marie, it needed a wash!” and everyone burst out laughing.?We symbolically rubbed shoulders then and did at the end.?

Again, when we inject laughter in a group what does that do?

What does this do to the relationships in the room?

"Laughter is important because it’s it makes you feel good inside you it shows to the other person that you have really enjoyed something”, said Viola my daughter .

I use laughter as a tool, naturally occurring and purposeful and it is in those moments when I observe and feel a shift in the energy.?My daughter is right, it makes others feel good inside.

I have loved watching the late Desmond Tutu and the Dalai Lama in conversation to the extent that I am there with them experiencing the joy and laughter.?A little fly nestled between their bodies.?

What are your thoughts on Laughter and Leadership?

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Does Laughter and humour make you a better leader?

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My friend Reggie Hanson posted recently about this and was asking leaders whether they are having fun and enjoying the job and talked about ‘fun’ as a productivity tool and shares that, “fun becomes the grease in a machine carrying away heat and chips and minimises friction”

I am now visualising chips with garlic mayonnaise.?What are you left visualising?

Leading with laughter is a leveller and a humanist approach that unites people from my experience.

What does leading with laughter do for you?