Leader humor effectiveness—The divergent dynamics of leader humor over time in East Asia and North America

Abstract

Management research on humor, which has mainly been conducted in Anglo‐Saxon regions, generally tends to assume that the use of humor by a leader toward his or her subordinates has positive effects. However, despite the popularity of such studies in Anglo‐Saxon regions, less attention has so far been paid to the aspects of the cultural context of leader humor, particularly with regard to time. We argue that leader humor is not so effective in East Asia because of different preferences in relation to communication style and divergent expectations and value sets during early phase leader–member interactions. On the other hand, however, we also argue that leader humor may become equally if not more effective in the mature phase of leader–member interactions. While cultural differences, along with the current popularity of positive emotions, including humor, at work, are much more apparent at the early stage of a relationship, our exploration uncovers areas that are important for effective cross‐cultural communication training and the development of managers for global assignments.

A place and time for humor: leader humor in Confucian cultures

“…In fact, humor may be interpreted negatively when individuals are unfamiliar with one another because Confucian culture promotes order (seriousness), self-discipline, and a strong work ethic, which may be at odds with the use of humor (see Hsieh et al, 2005). Furthermore, leader humor may be more effective when individuals are familiar with one another; however, contextual information does not increase until later in a relationship (Yang, Horak, & Chi, 2020). Accordingly, adopting leader humor in the workplace in Taiwan may require a more intricate strategy.…”

“…Similarly, culture is a crucial contextual factor that influences the appreciation of certain behaviors (Chang, 2017;Yang & Li, 2017). For example, in some East Asian countries where Confucianism is the dominant cultural paradigm, seriousness is valued over lightheartedness; thus, humor may not be appreciated in the workplace (Hsieh, Hsiao, Liu, & Chang, 2005;Yang, Horak, & Chi, 2020).…”

Leadership in Transformational Change: Proactively Creating a Branding Effect to Overcome External Resistance

“…Organizations in transformational change not only need to unite with their teams toward a common goal but in an organizational enterprise, peers may be maintained all the time. The influence of common team orientations can be extended to the real team and diverse cultures [2]. Meanwhile, Unity has been in from the awareness and recognition of the interdependence between organizations.…”

The Impact of Leader Humor on Employee Creativity during the COVID-19 Period: The Roles of Perceived Workload and Occupational Coping Self-Efficacy

“…Academics call for organizational management research to be carried out in a specific context [ 25 ]. One of the most important implicit hypotheses about the leader humor effectiveness is that divergent expectations and value sets during leader–employee interactions, employees can understand the intention and information of leaders using humor in the mature phase rather than early phase [ 30 ]. Similarity attraction theory holds that individuals more easily interact and socially connect if they share common personal characteristics [ 31 ].…”