“It's not you, it's me”: transformational leadership and self‐deprecating humor

Abstract

Purpose -The purpose of this paper is to investigate leaders' use of humor as an expression of how they value themselves relative to others. The paper suggests that humor can minimize or exacerbate the status differences between leaders and followers. The paper hypothesizes that leaders' use of self-or in-group-deprecating humor would be positively associated with ratings of transformational leadership as they minimize those distinctions, whereas leaders' use of aggressive humor would be negatively associated with ratings of transformational leadership because it exacerbates status distinctions. Design/methodology/approach -A total of 155 undergraduates (58 males, 97 females; M age ¼ 20 years, SD ¼ 1.31) were assigned randomly to one of four conditions, each depicting a different type of humor in a leader's speech. Findings -Leaders using self-deprecating humor were rated higher on individualized consideration (a factor of transformational leadership) than those that used aggressive humor.Research limitations/implications -The authors encourage future field research on the role of humor as an expression of leaders' self-versus other-orientation. Originality/value -Humor and work might seem inconsistent, but this study demonstrates how leadership can use humor to improve leader-follower relationships. Furthermore, it contributes to our understanding of self-deprecating humor which has received scant attention relative to other forms of humor.

Embracing the Carnivalesque: Young Children’s Humour as Performance and Communication

“…It would be positive for the practitioners to initiate the creation of such conditions by ensuring that the nonphysical environment facilitates the generation of what Fine & Wood (2010) call a 'joking surround.' This would be a space where, arguably, affiliative humour-that oils the wheels of social interaction, creating a sense of common ground and lessening perceived social gaps between people (Vaillant, 1977;Hoption et al, 2013) would thrive.…”

The Review of Humorous Leader

“…Empirical research shows that when leaders use self-defeating humor, the score of personalized care index is high. But when leaders used offensive humor, they scored lower on measures of personalized care [19]. Wisse and Rietzschel (2014) studied the relationship between self-defeating humor and leader-member exchange (LMX), and found that self-defeating humor of leaders positively affected leader-member exchange, which was positively moderated by subordinate self-derogatory humor [20].…”

Transformational Leadership and Individual Creativity: The Mediating Role of Structural Empowerment

“…The TLs can be defined as a leader's behavior that inspires his/her followers to perform beyond expectations and transcending self-interest to the interest of the organization [6]. Its dimensions are (1) idealized attributes, (2) idealized behaviors, represents a set of attributes and behaviors which make the leader as a role model by subordinates, (3) Individualized consideration, it focuses on the communication and behaviors between the leader and his/her subordinates [7], (4) Intellectual stimulation, is related to the ability of the leader to convince subordinates to need to abandon old ways of thinking and adopt creative ways [8], (5) Inspirational motivation means the leaders' ability to articulate a vision while demonstrating optimism and enthusiasm [9]. The TLs dimensions were and still are the field of the researchers to know its relationship and influence on a lot of behaviors, such as organizational learning, job satisfaction, turnover etc.…”