I came to our blog this morning to write  about our forthcoming session at the  Human Resources Institute of  Alberta (HRIA) Conference on 28th April 2011.  However, I then realised that today is in fact April Fool's Day and that whatever I wrote may actually be mis-interpreted as a hoax, joke or even complete fallacy.   I will return to write about our session at the HRIA Conference, which is called 'What CEOs really want from HR leaders' and that is no joke.

Instead, realising the date, I became curious about the origins of April Fool's Day.  So like so many researchers I turned immediately to Wikipedia.  I won't regurgitate the origins or even some of the best pranks that have been played on April Fool's Day, oh well maybe I will just mention the BBC one that involved the Swiss Spaghetti Harvest and the CBC one that involved the Royal Canadian Mint launching the three-dollar coin, which was to be affectionately called the 'threenie'!

So what relevance might April Fool's Day have to our business - learning?  Well the best April Fool's Day jokes in my opinion are those that cause us to laugh at ourselves and this is a VERY good thing.  The ability to laugh at oneself shows an awareness and humility that are crucial in learning.  Note that humour and humility have the same root word.  It is mistakenly thought that as one becomes more senior the more one 'knows'.  All too often we let our ego get in the way of ability to learn and some of the best learning is to be had through making mistakes.  Allowing yourself to make mistakes, being ok with that and even laughing at the mistakes you make can be liberating.  Let me misquote Albert Einstein here and say that here was one of the most brilliant thinkers of our time and all he 'knew' was that the more he learned the less he actually 'knew'.

I will share with you a recent example of me laughing at myself, well actually there are many I could choose from but here is the most recent example!  I was in Paris last week for a training session and decided to get up early to walk from my hotel to the training venue.  A walk through the streets of Paris on a beautiful spring morning caused me to have a spring in my step.  I had dressed that morning as Parisian as I could with a smart black linen dress, neck scarf and some red lipstick.  It was as chic as I could manage but I felt smart and appropriately attired in Paris, the fashion capital of the world.  Imagine then my embarrassment as, after I had been walking for a good 20 minutes through the centre of Paris during morning rush hour, a wonderful gentleman walked up to me from behind and in french explained that my zip was down on the back of my dress showing my upper underwear.  Hmm.  I had to laugh at myself.  Beautifully dressed from the front but in my eagerness to get out the door I hadn't finished dressing myself.  Thanks goodness someone told me though and particularly before I arrived at the training session!

Humour at work is a much under utilised tool and can be all too often misplaced and misunderstood.  Michael Kerr, a professional humourist, yes a man who earns money from making people in the workplace laugh, knows the power of humour. Michael has written two books: Inspiring Workplaces and You Can't Be Serious, the latter of which offers over 200 ways to introduce humour into your workplace.  So you don't have to rely on wardrobe malfunctions like me and Janet Jackson to make you or your colleagues laugh.

If you have a chance today try a bit of humour.  And if you get caught out by an April Fool joke, then try a jolly good laugh at yourself.  Apparently laughing burns more calories than frowning it can't be that bad!

natalie@emergelearning.ca