“The best ideas come as jokes. Make your thinking as funny as possible.”
– David Ogilvy
Ogilvy was a British advertising tycoon, founder of Ogilvy & Mather, and known as the “Father of Advertising.”
I love this advice. I think he’s exactly right:
Humor is often the heart of creativity. It’s when we try to be truly novel—making people or ourselves laugh with a combination of words, ideas, images, or inflection—that something new can emerge.
You can’t make a person laugh with something they expect or have heard before.
You can’t make a person laugh by remaining on safe ground.
You can’t make someone laugh with the ordinary or mundane.
Laughter is born from surprise. A collection of words, assembled and spoken in a specific way, surprises us and produces a laugh.
Surprise is born through many things:
- Originality
- Misdirection
- The repurposing of something old into something new
- A shift in angle or perspective
- An unforeseen comparison
- The novel use of a previously understood word or phrase
- The contrast between two unexpected ideas or images
- Tone, pace, volume, or pause
All of this is fertile ground for creativity. It’s where ideas are waiting to be born.
When you try to be funny, the best ideas often emerge, as David Ogilvy understood.
Sadly, when working with adults in professional and business settings, humor is often feared, discounted, or ignored. Serious people doing serious things feel the need to speak in serious ways at all times.
“We’re selling our new wiz-bang. We need to treat this moment with gravitas and solemnity.”
“We’re elevating our service to greater heights. We want our customers to know we mean business.”
“We’re launching a new initiative. People need to understand its importance.”
In so many of these instances, attempts to be funny, infuse a moment with humor, or brainstorm ridiculous and hilarious ideas in search of the best idea are frowned upon by frightened executives, cowering administrators, and nervous CEOs who think that humor signals a lack of earnestness and resolve.
- It happens to me when consulting all the damn time:
- I propose a splash of humor, and I’m immediately shot down.
- I write a joke for a keynote opening, only to find it scratched out later.
- I suggest an amusing image for a marketing deck and watch it replaced with something flat and forgettable.
- I say something daring and unexpected in a meeting and watch administrators cringe.
One administrator has said to me, more than once, about my conduct in meetings:
“I don’t know how you get away with the things you say.”
Most of the time, it’s because it was funny. Amusing. Slightly daring. More honest than most.
The kind of stuff the majority of people like and appreciate.
The kind of stuff so many are afraid to say.
I’ll bet that David Olgilvy said amusing, off-beat, funny things in meetings all the damn time. I’ll bet his brainstorming sessions encouraged ridiculous ideas and hilarity. I’ll bet his rough drafts were filled with attempts at humor.
Why?
“The best ideas come as jokes. Make your thinking as funny as possible.”
