Happy Thursday, everyone.
I'm Frank Richardson, an organisational psychologist observing the workplace with curiosity and care. Each week, I share insights to help HR leaders better understand the people behind the processes and build cultures where both individuals and organisations can thrive.
This week in workplace whiplash 🌀
From AI gaps to culture casualties to leadership jokes, the work world is taking no prisoners.
🏢 Hollywood & Media Cuts Hit HR Strategy Hard
Major media companies are undergoing sweeping layoffs, spotlighting how fragile culture becomes when talent and trust pivot overnight.
👉 Deadline📊Executives Are Using AI. Employees? Not So Much
A new global survey found 87% of senior leaders report using AI tools, while only 27% of their broader workforce do, ramping up trust and fairness challenges.
👉 Business Insider⚠️ DEI Programs Under Siege: Corporate Culture in Flux
Large companies are quietly retreating or rebranding DEI initiatives amid regulatory backlash, raising questions about the authenticity and resilience of culture efforts.
👉 Washington Post
After a week of layoffs, AI anxiety and culture theatre, it’s fitting to look at the one leadership skill that can both build trust and backfire fast: humour.
At one job, you could pinpoint the day my manager discovered memes. Within a week, our Slack was flooded with “When it’s Monday lol” posts (the kind of content that made you die inside). We’d exchange silent eye rolls, then dutifully hit 😂, performing enthusiasm for the algorithm and our boss’s ego.
According to a recent RBJ piece, “Laughing All the Way to the Top”, leaders who use humour build trust, culture, and even profit. But it’s the kind of finding guaranteed to make HR professionals groan. Because if you thought the CFO’s puns were bad before, wait until they find out laughter boosts engagement.
Somewhere right now, an executive is Googling “funny icebreakers for Q4 town halls.”
The premise isn’t wrong: humour can make leaders more relatable. It breaks tension, signals warmth, and fosters psychological safety. But the corporate world has a way of turning every human behaviour into a KPI. We’re now one thought-leadership post away from “comedy as a competency framework.”
🤝 Supported by Leapsome
Retention looks fine—performance doesn’t. From a survey of 2,400 HR leaders and employees, discover 2026’s hidden risks: quiet disengagement, AI anxiety, and trust gaps—and the plays that reverse them. Get benchmarks, manager scripts, and ready-to-run strategies your HR team can deploy. See how people-first organizations reshape work with clarity, care, and smarter strategies to drive performance through change.
🧠 The behavioural science lens
Research in Harvard Business Review found that leaders who use humour appropriately are seen as more confident and relatable, and that humour can increase creativity and collaboration. The same guidance warns that misplaced sarcasm or inside jokes can alienate teams just as fast.
Humour is social calibration. Psychologist Robert R. Provine observed over a thousand real-world laughter episodes and found that people are roughly 30 times more likely to laugh in company than when alone. We don’t laugh because something’s hilarious, we laugh because we’re connected. (See the APA’s summary: “A laughing matter”.) When leaders use humour well, it says “we’re in this together.” When they miss, it says “I’m out of touch and trying too hard.”
Power changes the punchline. Status shapes how humour lands. A peer-reviewed study in the Journal of Applied Psychology shows that leaders who use self-deprecating humour are rated as more approachable and humble. When jokes flow downward in the hierarchy, they often read as cruelty with a smile.
Humour can’t fix burnout. Laughter can temporarily reduce stress hormones, as the Mayo Clinic notes, but it can’t solve the systemic issues creating that stress. When humour becomes a shield, i.e. “If we can laugh about the chaos, we’ll survive it”, it veers into denial.
Authenticity matters more than wit. People don’t expect their boss to be a comedian; they expect them to be real. Genuine humour, the kind that emerges from humility or shared struggle, creates belonging. Forced humour feels like a mandatory fun run: everyone’s pretending to enjoy it, but no one is.
🚀 What this means for leaders (and HR)
Use humour as a bridge, not a performance. Good humour isn’t about being funny, it’s about being present. A small, well-timed laugh can diffuse tension or reset a tricky moment, but it’s not a leadership skill to perform on cue. If you’re trying to “lighten the mood,” make sure the mood actually needs lightening.
Focus on timing, not tallying. You can’t quantify humour in engagement surveys. If you want more laughter at work, look at what’s blocking it (workload, fear, burnout), not whether people are hitting their weekly “fun quota.”
Read the room. The best leaders treat humour like any other form of communication: context is everything. Jokes that land in one team can sink in another. If people are smiling politely instead of laughing, it’s not working. Ask for real feedback instead of relying on forced reactions.
Build safety before banter. If your workplace feels tense, no amount of jokes will fix it. Psychological safety isn’t built by humour; it’s what allows humour to exist. Get that right, and laughter will show up naturally.
💬 Final thoughts
A funny boss can be a gift. The kind who knows when to make people laugh, and when to let silence do the work. But humour isn’t leadership in itself; it’s an outcome of safety.
If people can laugh honestly around you, you’re doing something right. If they’re only laughing for you, maybe it’s time to rethink the act.
How's the depth of today's edition?
If something here speaks to you, I’d love to hear it.
Until next week,
Frank
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