Laughter and joy have an essential role in human life. Laughing together with your colleagues relaxes and reduces stress. It also seems to help to learn and improve our ability to collaborate. Laughter activates our sense of wonder and improves retention. Activating our brain's dopamine system adds joy to our day while improving our learning.

• When a group of new people interact with each other for the first time or encounter themselves in a completely new situation, few jokes or silly anecdotes can release the stress and atmosphere.
• While reading a book, writing silly case examples or stories to illustrate, what you have just learned, will make you apply new knowledge and also improve retention.
• During classroom training, remember to allow some small breaks for chitchat, it has a function even though you would not call it hard work. It will help you to feel more relaxed too.
• In the course material, you can use examples with some silly details to make them more memorable. As long as you keep the overall story relevant, small humoristic additions only make it more fun.

Laughing also helps to bring the team together. When there is a need for collaboration, shared joy can improve the ability to work together.

In which situations would you benefit from some laughter?

When does your team laugh together? What makes that happen?