This article explores the use made of humour in three different private sector organizations. It draws on observations of managers working towards a management qualification and, from the jokes they exchange, it argues that studying humour may offer insights into sentiments not easily articulated in ‘serious’ conversation. Humour’s ambiguity enables contentious statements to be made without fear of recrimination. Equally, constructing jokes by juxtaposing two different frames of reference provides a glimpse of alternative (and shared) perceptions of ‘reality’. This sensitivity to complexity makes humour a particularly appropriate vehicle for conveying ambitions, subversions, triumphs and failures and this article considers some of the ‘serious’ messages underlying the jokes.

This is article evaluates the

The Management NVQs were (according to their proponents)

In 1997 the Management Charter Initiative (MCI) officially launched the new management NVQs (National Vocational Qualifications), benchmarks which attempted to describe the work performed by British managers. This article is a review of those qualifications. It remembers some of the main problems associated with the original management NVQs and, drawing on some of the best theoretical and empirical accounts of managerial work, argues that the new qualifications have failed to live up to the MCI’s original promise, to assist the development and training of managers.

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