Using humor in business communications
Why use humor in business communications? Done correctly, humor can add personality and life to an otherwise dull or routine project.
Anecdotes, humorous quotations or clever observations can help to win over a reader and make them more receptive to your message. In fact, many business books contain cartoons scattered throughout them designed to reinforce the text or garner a knowing chuckle from a reader who has “been there and done that.” (Indeed, that’s the entire basis of cartoons like “Dilbert” or television shows like “The Office.”)
However, if not handled with tact, comedy can backfire and ruin an otherwise fine piece of writing. Writer Suzan St. Maur penned an article a few years ago on using humor in business that makes several good points. She writes that it’s easy to get humor wrong, especially when communicating over the Internet, which is often devoid of context. Sometimes, it’s the body language or the inflection that turns a tasteless joke into a tasteful one. When that human element is missing, all bets are off as to how the recipient of the message will take it.
Still, humor can be used successfully if the proper precautions are taken. St. Maur advises writers to use jokes about situations, not people. All of us can relate to certain situations—a plumbing emergency, a toothache or a speeding ticket, for example—but we may take offense at jokes aimed at ethnic groups, minorities or public figures. St. Maur goes on to say that humor is best used like a spicy condiment in business communications: sparingly, and avoided altogether if one doesn’t know the tastes of one’s audience.
There are other ways in addition to those mentioned by St. Maur to inject a little levity into one’s writing. One is to be self-deprecating. 
While readers may be quick to condemn an author if that author pokes fun at someone else, they may be inclined to laugh along with the author if they’re poking fun at themselves. And the ability to laugh at one’s self and point out one’s own foibles can be viewed as a sign of wisdom, humility, confidence and a certain level of comfort in one’s own skin.
Another way is quote famous and respected humorists, whose work has gained a measure of respect and acceptance in general society. For example, Mark Twain once said, “Suppose you were an idiot and suppose you were a member of Congress. But I repeat myself.” A comment like that might offend if an unknown author made it, but coming from Twain, it is likely to make others smile.
Whatever approach an author uses, it’s always best to have respected co-workers (or two or three) review the piece before it goes to print. If it causes raised eyebrows in the office, it’s likely to do a lot more damage with a wider audience. As Shakespeare, himself no stranger to satire and the clever use of humor, wrote in Henry IV, “The better part of valour is discretion.” When in doubt, don’t.
It’s a Small, Small World
The British Empire
Did you know that English is spoken as an official language in more than 80 countries, territories and dependencies? Moreover, it is spoken unofficially by nearly everyone in at least two others: the United States and Australia? Add in the many countries in which a large portion of the population speaks English, such as France, Germany, Italy, and the Netherlands, and the countries in which English is spoken for business or political purposes, such as China and Japan, and you can’t help but realize the breadth and depth of the English language around the globe.
This is nothing new, and it reflects the impact of hundreds of years of British colonialism and the global impact of post-World War II American economics and culture. What is new, however, is the Internet. Suddenly, the nearly one billion speakers of English around the globe have access to each other’s newspapers, magazines, websites, blogs, Facebook pages—in short, they can truly tap into the global consciousness of English speakers.
The impact of spoken English clearly has tremendous impact for written communication as well, especially for companies doing business in emerging economies. The potential for miscommunication and misunderstandings is greater than ever before. Slights and unintended insults that may never have had legs 15 years ago will now likely travel the globe in minutes.
Consider this small example that materialized as a result of an opinion column written by New 
York Times columnist George Vecsey on allegations of football recruiting violations committed by the University of Tennessee. In the column, Vecsey poked a little fun at southern culture, with lines like “If you’re ever in the neighborhood, y’all come see us, y’heah?”
In the pre-Internet era, this column may have gone largely unnoticed, even though it was in the New York Times. But in 2009, Vecsey’s column created a minor blowup in the blogosphere, generating this response from east Tennessee journalist Ben Garrett and this follow-up from southwest Virginia journalist Dan Smith, among others. Smith, a career newspaperman and member of the Virginia Communications Hall of Fame, whose members include Roger Mudd, Ann Compton, and James J. Kilpatrick, called Vecsey “a Yankee newspaperman too lazy to do his homework and too steeped in redneck, inbred stereotypes” and said that Vecsey’s column was “mostly wrong, mostly bigoted, mostly shows his uninformed a** to the rest of the world.”
Yikes. Especially that “rest of the world” part.
The lesson here is for writers: consider the audience. In our electronic age, audiences may be far wider than the primary readership an author intended. A gaffe poking fun at a foreign culture, committed by a careless company spokesperson, could cost millions in lost sales, have a negative impact in vital emerging markets, cause irreparable damage to the company brand, and even generate international political ramifications. Remember, the written word carries a big stick!