section_path: In the workplace
section_name: In the workplace
paragraph_text: In the workplace
  
  Humour is a ubiquitous, highly ingrained, and largely meaningful aspect of human experience and is therefore decidedly relevant in organisational contexts, such as the workplace.
  
  The significant role that laughter and fun play in organisational life has been seen as a sociological phenomenon and has increasingly been recognised as also creating a sense of involvement and possible comradery among workers. Sharing humour at work not only offers a relief from boredom, but canalso build relationships, improve camaraderie between colleagues andcreate positive affect. Humour in the workplace may also relieve tension and can be used as a coping strategy. In fact, one of the most agreed upon key impacts that workplace humourhas on people's well-being, is the use of humour as a coping strategy toaid in dealing with daily stresses, adversity or other difficultsituations. Sharing a laugh with a few colleagues may improve moods, which ispleasurable, and people perceive this as positively affecting theirability to cope. Fun and enjoyment are critical in people's lives and the ability forcolleagues to be able to laugh during work, through banter or other,promotes harmony and a sense of cohesiveness.
  
  Humour may also be used to offset negative feelings about aworkplace task or to mitigate the use of profanity, or other copingstrategies, that may not be otherwise tolerated. Not only can humour in the workplace assist with defusing negativeemotions, but it may also be used as an outlet to discuss personalpainful events, in a lighter context, thus ultimately reducing anxiety and allowing more happy, positive emotions to surface. Additionally, humour may be used as a tool to mitigate theauthoritative tone by managers when giving directives to subordinates.Managers may use self-deprecating humour as a way to be perceived asmore human and "real" by their employees. The attachment to the notion of fun by contemporary companies hasresulted in workplace management coming to recognise the potentiallypositive effects of "workplay" and realise that it does not necessarilyundermine workers' performance.
  
  Laughter and play can unleash creativity, thus raising morale,so in the interest of encouraging employee consent to the rigours ofthe labour process, management often ignore, tolerate and even activelyencourage playful practices, with the purpose of furtheringorganisational goals. Essentially, fun in the workplace is no longer being seen as frivolous. The most current approach of managed fun and laughter in the workplaceoriginated in North America, where it has taken off to such a degree,that it has humour consultants flourishing, as some states haveintroduced an official "fun at work" day. The results have carried claims of well-being benefits to workers, improved customer experiences and an increase in productivity that organisations can enjoy, as a result. Others examined results of this movement while focusing around the science of happiness—concerned with mental health, motivation,community building and national well-being—and drew attention to theability to achieve "flow" through playfulness and stimulate "outside thebox" thinking. Parallel to this movement is the " positive " scholarship that has emerged in psychology which seeks to empirically theorise the optimisation of human potential. This happiness movement suggests that investing in fun at theworkplace, by allowing for laughter and play, will not only create enjoyment and a greater sense of well-being, but it will also enhance energy, performance and commitment in workers.