“Do you write the jokes?”: The Ultimate Guide to Using Humour in Speeches

“Do you write the jokes?” is a question I get asked a lot, as a speechwriter.

My husband always smiles when he overhears because he doesn’t think I’m very funny. His family are always testing out new puns on one another. He can do a whole monologue of fish jokes…

“Just for the halibut, this is a nice plaice, for cod’s sake!” But I don’t have the memory for those kinds of lines. I struggle to recall even the simplest of “knock knock” jokes and often, I miss the punchline all together.

I know how perplexing it is when you’re sitting there, completely bemused, and everyone else is doubled over in hysterics, so I always advise leaders against anything with a double entendre. To be fair, most of them already know that this is dangerous territory. CEOs and business leaders are often speaking to international audiences where at best, humour doesn’t translate, and at worst, it’s misconstrued entirely. I learnt early on after my move to the US that my dry British wit isn’t received the same way as it is at home.

So, is it ever safe to use humour in a speech?

Conventional wisdom says tread carefully and I agree with this approach. But what does that even mean?

It means, start with the audience and the message the speaker is there to deliver.

I’m going to state the obvious here: Do not use humour if you’re announcing any kind of bad news. Layoffs, cut backs, poor financial performance, reputational crises, and responses to any kind of geopolitical upheaval should all be met with a calm, clear, consistent tone. Don’t try and break the ice at a town hall with some light banter before you announce that you’re letting go of 10% of employees. It’s confusing, disrespectful, and awkward as hell.

So, when can you use humour?

If you have good news, or a message to deliver, or new research to share, some light, self-deprecating humour can be a really good thing, especially at the beginning of the speech or presentation. It can make the speaker more likeable and engaging, which means the audience is much more likely to listen (and trust) what they have to say. Self-deprecating humour can be a particularly useful tool for someone who is usually perceived as powerful and intimidating, but wants to come across as more - well - human.

This is all very abstract, who does it well?

One of my favourite speeches is Brené Brown’s, The Power of Vulnerability. She opens with a very relatable (and vulnerable) story about her identity (she’s not sure if she’s a researcher or a storyteller), and the punchline to the story is a self-deprecating joke. The audience laughs and she uses the moment to springboard into the main content of her talk. The audience now thinks of her as funny and likeable so they’re all ears for what she has to say next.

Arianna Huffington also uses humour very effectively in her talk, How to Succeed? Get More Sleep. She shares a small anecdote near the start about a dinner with a boring guy who boasted about how little sleep he had the night before and the audience full of women find it hilarious, because they’ve all been in her shoes. They know what it’s like to be stuck next to a guy who talks not stop about how hard he’s hustling.

Do I write jokes for speakers?

Yes, when it’s appropriate, humour can be an uplifting and powerful tool for speakers and speechwriters. Usually I keep it light, self-deprecating, and low risk. If the audience doesn’t laugh the speaker can move swiftly on without feeling undermined. But a handful of times I’ve written for someone with a huge personality, where the audience (and the speaker) expected something outrageous and uproarious. These are often after-dinner or cocktail party speeches where the audience is already well lubricated with a few glasses of red.

Those speeches are a huge amount of fun to write, awesome to watch delivered, and hopefully give the audience a few laughs too!