Humor Focused Interview with Alan Weiss, Ph.D.

Inside the mind of the Million Dollar Consultanttm

Dave Fitzgerald interviews…

Alan Weiss just kills me (Darren LaCroix) every time I hear him speak. I laugh out loud, even at the stories I’ve heard seven times! The power of his speech is the fact he’s making powerful points, he’s not there to be entertaining. Alan is so powerful and poignant going through my humor files, being Humor Speech Contest season I thought this interview is well worth having you read! Dave Fitzgerald, co-founder of The Humor Institute, Inc sat down with Alan and asked him some insightful humor questions!

I don’t know if Alan has ever been interviewed specifically on this topic before.

Why did we interview Alan?

There is so much to learn about humor if we just take the time to study, observe and ask good questions. One of the books I’m always recommending to people who want to become professional speakers is Alan Weiss’ Money Talks. It is a great book for the business side of speaking. He has been like “the Godfather” of the NSA New England Chapter.

Alan is serious about business. His speaking and consulting business brings in over a million dollars per year. His clients include Merk and Mercedes. Alan doesn’t pull any punches, and he’s not afraid to throw any either. As great of a business man as he is, whenever I’ve him speak, (heard him speak?) I’ve always noticed Alan’s audience always take copious notes and are laughing while they are writing. He taps the power of humor to convey his message. More about Alan Weiss, Ph.D.

I grabbed my comedy mentor, Dave Fitzgerald, & sat him down with Alan to see what he could dig out for the Humor Institute. We can all learn from Alan’s strategic use of humor on the platform. Please join Dave Fitzgerald as he sits down with Alan.

Dave: What makes humor so powerful?

Alan: I think there are a couple of things that make humor so powerful.

One is that it makes people comfortable, and people learn best when they’re comfortable... so the more you can relax people the more they are willing to learn... the more their defenses come down.

I think the second thing is that humor creates commonality... creates sort of a universal human, in that we recognize ourselves and consequently we don’t feel alone... so if a speaker is using humor he or she embraces the audience... If somebody is using humor in a meeting they embrace the rest of the meeting... an executive uses humor to lessen the tension, the difference, between him or her and the employee... so I think it creates a commonality.

The Third thing is that I think it creates an interesting reference point... and that is if you have humor, even if the topic later gets serious, it changes radically. You always have that to refer back to... and you hear somebody say...... (let’s just say “lampshade” was the keyword) and they’ll say “Hey that’s a Lampshade thing” and they’ll go back to the humor and it serves as a relief.... as a vent... so I think it’s important for all those reasons.

Dave : Have you ever had a situation where humor backfired on you? Where it didn’t work?

Alan: HA HA HA YEAH! I don’t know how long this tape is but... I’ll give you two or three examples. One example is that I used humor that was inappropriate for the setting and.... the interesting thing about humor is that something funny in one setting might not be funny in another setting... so I used humor in a setting where I thought that any kind of humor would work... it was a boisterous night... but, my humor can easily get to be very sarcastic and very caustic... and you really need to be among a tight circle of friends that know each other and trust each other to get away with that kind of humor... so ...that humor has backfired on me.

Another time that humor has backfired is when I was ignorant of the culture of the situation I was in... I don’t mean a foreign culture I mean the organizational culture and while sometimes you can make a joke like “Oh what do those people on the 44th floor think they’re doing” and everyone loves to laugh at upper management... sometimes you can’t do that if those people have just been fired... or there’s a brand new team there... or there’s been some kind of internal company trauma... somebody was sent to prison or somebody has cancer... so I find that unless you do your homework very carefully and understand the cultural context, something funny one place might not be funny in another.

Dave: Timing can be so critical... I’ve heard it said that comedy can be tragedy plus time... if something tragic happens you might be able to talk about it a year from now but you can’t talk about it the next day.

Alan: You know, you’re more of an expert on this than I am. But when I was doing my psychological studies I really believe what I found... and that is almost all humor is based in pain and even the most simplistic... like watching a baby do something silly... you’re almost laughing because the baby can’t do it right... now I’m sure somebody could cite an exception but, humor is, I think, based in our pain and we’re seeking to relieve that pain and I think it’s an important aspect of the underpinnings of humor.

Dave: Can you give me an example of a time when you were giving a talk and it was going... maybe just okay and you used some humor and it really turned the audience around to come with you.

Alan: Let me give you two examples if I may... real quickly... one is and I use this all the time... it’s a great technique for me... I make a point in a room and in this particular instance - and it happens frequently - because I’m a very confrontational, almost provocative speaker... somebody said, “ I disagree with your conclusion, I don’t think it’s right, I don’t think it’s appropriate to mention it here. I have evidence to show that you’re absolutely 180 degrees wrong on this and I’m not going to let you go on”. And I said “don’t hold back... tell me how you feel” ....and the room fell apart and even he laughed! I use humor like that all the time to relieve what might otherwise be a tense situation. I find that one of the most effective uses of humor for me, because you do get in tense situations when you’re consulting and training and speaking, is to relieve that tension and to get the audience, if not on your side, at least back to neutral. The other thing I wanted to say is that I was making a speech once, I was the third person on the agenda... the president of the company spoke first, then two managers, and then me... well what happened was they released some balloons... the balloons were helium but one had this aberrant aerodynamic where it kept going up and down right at eye level. Now, with the president, no one dared snicker - but with the two managers everyone started to snicker... even one of the manager’s eyes was going up and down... and I said to myself, if I allow that to happen to me I am DEAD... so I walked up and changed the whole front end of my speech and said it’s wonderful being with you today to hear about your vision, to hear about your long term outlook... and as I said so I was sidling toward the balloon and people were horrified as I walked toward this balloon. I said you know what’s interesting, and I reached up and grabbed the balloon and said. "Who says you can’t catch your dreams". I put the balloon under the podium and I said, "Now what if this podium keeps going up and down?" The best kind of humor is spontaneous, I think, and sometimes you get lucky.

Dave: That leads me right into my next question. What percentage of your humor is planned and what percentage is spontaneous?

Alan: I’d say about 30% is planned... about 30% of my humor is true stories. I used to tell generic stories; I don’t do that anymore. I found that if one person in a room of 300 heard it, it’s no good. I used to think that was an acceptable error rate, so to speak. But the Japanese wouldn’t accept that in their cars and I don’t accept that in my humor. So, no more generic stories.

I only use personal stories. That way I’m confident that no one has heard them. Either they are naturally funny stories or I embellish them a little bit... I know no one else would embellish stories - but I do.

The rest of my humor is Ad Lib... I find it’s the most rewarding kind... it’s probably the riskiest. But after you’re in this game for a long time you develop sort of a sixth sense about what you can probably get away with. That to me is the most effective kind of humor, and it brings the audience behind you dramatically because they respect that so much.

Dave: There is a trust with the audience and the person speaking and if they can see that you are quick on your feet, they will be even more inclined to give you that trust.

When you say that it can be risky and you mentioned the one person in 300 knowing the generic story, let me ask you: Do you worry about “political correctness” or do you worry about offending that one person? Do you try to make yourself so mainstream that you won’t offend anyone? That seems like it could really take the edge off the humor.

Alan: No, I never do that. I truly believe... I heard a guy named Bob Penard say that 5% of the people that come to any speech come to dislike you. They come to dislike you because they don’t like your background or they don’t like your hairstyle or they believe they should be where you are. You can’t cater to that. I kid around by saying in my groups amazingly it’s about 15% come to dislike me... I can’t understand that. I ignore that... I am careful about my pronouns Dave. I think it’s he or she and things like that I think that’s proper but I don’t worry so much about a couple of people being offended.

The great story to me was in Mr. Saturday Night when Billy Crystal just drops them all dead at the Catskills every table is screaming and he walks off stage and his agent says you got a lifetime contract here they love you! Billy Crystal says yeah but did you see that one guy at table four... he didn’t laugh. And too often we get caught up in that stuff. I’m there for most of the audience the 90%.

Dave: I know when I first started doing stand-up comedy I would get wrapped up in that one person with that sour look on their face and it was so important for me to get them... I would actually spend time on them trying to figure out what I could do to please them... Thankfully I have moved on from that... I work to the people that are into it... as a matter of fact I look for them.

Alan: I think that I matured about... well... actually it was yesterday morning I matured... I matured about 8 years ago when I realized that my job is not to be a savior, not to be a hero... my job is really post heroic and that is ...it’s a person’s responsibility to learn it’s person’s responsibility to decide what they want to laugh at... all I can do is do the best I can to present it, to set the table, to set the tone... and if I do that successfully, a lot of people will be happy I’ve done my job... but every time I’ve tried to walk on water a funny thing happens... my knees get real wet!

Dave: Do you always use humor to make a specific point about motivation or training? Do you ever just throw in a funny story to lighten up the mood?

Alan: I seldom do that because I find that humor out of context tends to defocus me as well as the audience. I always use humor to make the point or I’ll use humor to make a bridge point... if I want to go from one point to another and there’s no segue that’s obvious, I might use humor to get there, but I never throw in a gratuitous story. However, I do have what I call reserve stories... and my reserve stories are stories that I might use 10% of the time and they’re in response to something that happens spontaneously in class. Somebody will bring up a question about something and I’ll say let me tell you about that. And it looks like I’ve just developed this off the top of my head, but it’s a story I’ll tell maybe 3-4 times a year just for that instance. Those are tremendously powerful because people learn.

Dave: Do you think that humor is underutilized in the business world in general?

Alan: Humor is underutilized in society in general, but especially in the business world. It’s underutilized in the business world because of several things... one is that executives are under this impression that they’re duty is to be sort of somber, serious, stern taskmasters... and it’s not! Their real accountability is to leverage the talents of other people and that’s a high communication challenge; and communication, as we talked about, has a strong humor component if it’s going to be comfortable.

The second thing is what you said earlier Dave. We’ve become very timid in the workplace about who you offend. There’s a difference between good cheer and happiness and the kind of sarcasm that I said can get me in trouble. I think as long as we’re well-intentioned, a well intentioned other party will tell us if we are a little off base. But there is this timidity, a reticence in the workplace, to use humor.

A third thing is a peculiar development and that is... with all the stand-up comedians taking over television shows... the Seinfelds and the Reisers and so forth, it’s put such a high standard on what constitutes humor today that I think people are afraid to let themselves be natural.

People are afraid to try to be funny. There’s a standard out there that says you can’t befunny because you’re not humorous by nature - you’re a manager so why should you try to be. Yet when I find some managers who use humor in their presentations, whether it’s a meeting of 7 people or a conference of 700, they’re much much more effective... they just need some coaching on how to do it right.

Dave: Interesting you say that about coaching. I’ve heard all my life from people that I’m a natural that there are people that are naturals... comedy takes timing... you either have it or you don’t... Do you think that’s true or do you think that people who appear not to have it can learn to develop that skill?

Alan: One of the things I find helpful is not to look at life as an on/off switch and that is... the eternal question... are leaders made or born?

And the answer is both - and in this case, the answer is both too. There are some people who have the talent, the natural abilities and the behavioral set to be funny. There are others who do not have it naturally but they can learn it... they can learn certain skills. Will they ever be as funny as the performer... I don’t know... but we can all improve our ability to communicate with humor... we can all improve our ability to tell a story, to help laugh at ourselves which is excellent therapy. I think a lot of us do have the natural attributes, but the rest of us can develop them very well.

Dave: So you think it is worth it then, for people to learn how to use humor at least to make an attempt to go in that direction.

Alan: I think that the more accountable you are for helping people, whether it’s through management, through counseling or support... whatever it is... whether it’s customers or employees... the more accountable you are for helping people, the more important it is to learn some of those traits of humor because it is what creates perspective for us. When we can create perspective for an angry customer or an unhappy employee... what do we usually do with an unhappy employee?... you give that employee more money... now you have a wealthier unhappy employee. That’s not what it’s about... you have to get at the underlying cause and to get through the defenses -- humor is very important.

Dave: Any other thoughts you might want to add about humor?

Alan: I’m tempted to say it’s very serious business... but somebody already said that. It’s a very important part of my life and I find that as helpful as it is in working with my audience and my clients it’s so much more helpful to me because it assists me in getting through what is otherwise a very ambiguous and uncertain world.

Dave: Well thank you very much Alan Weiss... absolutely great to hear you!

Alan: My pleasure Dave.

(I feature Alan's book in Get Paid to Speak by Next Weektm System)

More about Get Paid to Speak by Next Week (That features Alan's book)

Want to learn more about humor? www.humorbootcamp.com

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