How to be funny when your content is not
Frankie Kemp
2 May 2025
You need to talk about your departmental strategy. It’s 3pm and the subject is about as captivating as the inside of a sock. If only you could make a dry presentation funny. You know that humour is a method that will make your presentations more engaging, helping the content become memorable.
(If you don’t know the scientifically proven reason, go here, where you’ll also realise why jokes are generally a very bad idea.)
Humour will appeal to all aspects of your audience – commercial and technical.
As you recall previous speakers who raised a chuckle, you’re stumped as to how you can emulate this. Do they have a comedic skill that you simply don’t possess?
Here are nine ways to use humour when you present. No stand-up experience necessary and not a joke in sight.
1. Shared Experience
“Nothing bonds a dev team like collectively pretending we know why the code works now when it didn’t five minutes ago.”
This software team’s reality hits on fixing the tech without knowing the cause of the problem. The humour of shared experience makes others laugh because they recognise themselves in a scenario.
2. Brutal Honesty
An Engineer or Architect might state:
“We like to say structural calculations are precise. But if it’s still standing in 50 years, that’s when we really know we got it right.”
This is more about saying something starkly true: the articulation of it catches people off guard. There’s an inherently funny quality about the sheer boldness of saying as it is – or, at least, how your audience experience a situation. This is especially true in technical fields where the expectation is to be more polished and measured, with the unexpected candour raising a chortle.
3. Unexpected Framing
“Software updates are like an overly helpful assistant who insists on reorganising your desk – right in the middle of your busiest workday. You didn’t ask for it, but now everything’s been moved, and you’re stuck figuring out where your stapler went.”
The idea here is that the update is meant to help but is seen initially as an inconvenience. It’s the unusual juxtaposition of the software update being like an assistant which jolts laughter, for the same reason as Personification does below.
4. Personification
Giving inanimate objects human traits can make technical concepts more engaging, as in a simple statement:
“My laptop has decided it’s had enough and is now refusing to cooperate. I respect its boundaries.”
I once heard a Pharmaceutical Consultant I was training explain the effectiveness of a drug, as follows:
“The drugs don’t just work – they’re seasoned diplomats, negotiating peace treaties between gut flora, stomach acid, and that one rogue enzyme that always tries to start a fight.”
In seeing these abstract elements animated through vivid characterisation it’s easier for non-technical listeners to absorb concepts. Endowing non-humans with human qualities breaks the rules of reality, adding an unexpected, and rather droll, twist.
5. Absurd Comparisons
Take this one from a client in Agriculture:
“Managing manure for sustainable farming is like curating fine perfume – balance, precision, and just the right microbial breakdown make all the difference between something that’s good to be around and something that clears the room.
This refers to the mismanagement of manure creating problems such as water pollution or soil erosion as opposed to enriching growth – when managed well. Using a simile such as perfumery would strike many listeners as unexpected. However, it works, again, due to the surprise nature of the contrasting ideas. The unexpected makes us laugh. Whether your audience is technical or non-technical, the point sinks in – much like good-quality manure.
6. Exaggeration
One of my clients, an agricultural consultant, gave a talk about how to make sourdough in a presentation skills training workshop, concluding the talk by referring to her topic as ‘her life’s work’. Her dry delivery made us all smile.
7. Overly Formal Language in Casual Contexts
“I have conducted a thorough risk assessment and concluded that attempting to parallel park in front of colleagues is a reputational hazard.”
Using formal, corporate language in everyday situations can amuse in the same way as ‘Exaggeration’, above, might. It plugs into the surprise element that makes us smile – or laugh. Either counts as humour.
8. Laugh at yourself
Laughing at yourself makes you more relatable, revealing expertise without taking yourself too seriously. A safe angle is to mock a strength of yours to avoid sounding like you’re belittling yourself or your role.
Take the following example that an Industry Analyst may use:
“As an Industry Analyst, I’ve learned to anticipate disruption before it happens. That’s why I’m the only one at this conference who’s strategically stockpiled pastries before the coffee break stampede.”
This one below, however, might trivialise the skills needed for the role itself:
“Market forecasting is exciting until you realise you’re basically making an extremely educated guess. But sure, let’s call it strategy.”
When you’ve already shown a level of credibility, either through your achievements or the level of your role, lightly self-effacing playfulness can increase appeal. If you mess up and laugh it off, it can a show a level of confidence regardless of job level.
For example, you accidentally show the wrong slide in a presentation:
“Ah, last years figures? Not what I’d intended there. The past does have a habit of pulling you back.”
Short, confident and smooth: just enough humour to acknowledge the moment without pressing the slip into everyone’s minds. This use of humour depends on the distinction between taking your subject seriously but not putting too much weight on your own gravitas. This demonstrates a level of confidence that may escape someone who doesn’t use humour, for fear of not being taken seriously.
9. Borrowed Humour
I might use a meme like this before I present on pitching. Threads, X, Instagram all have tons of great conversations, memes or videos that can be used to add levity.
There’s plenty of comic value in this 27-second clip from ‘Space Force’. Don’t watch it aloud with young ears around as John Malkovich barks expletives from the gut in the way only he can.
By the way, Malkovich’s reaction is pure improvisation. I sense it may come from some place deep in his soul…
The humour stems from the absurdity of placing a mundane situation – the computer update, which usually causes mere inconvenience – in a context where the stakes are literally sky-high. This is a visual demonstration of ‘Exaggeration’ and ‘Shared Experience’ merged together.
Remember that your audience doesn’t have to be rolling off their seats in paroxysms of hilarity to consider what you say as funny. What you’ll find is that these techniques are low risk: jokes depend on a fine grasp of timing and also have the potential to misfire. These are safer methods of raising a smile and make your serious content stick.
Your Action
1. Think of when you’ll be doing your next presentation.
2. Once it’s prepared, see where you might be able to use one of these techniques to make a point.
3. With mixed audiences, ensure that you stick to these rules as well, to keep them engaged.
4. Talk through your content with someone and watch how it lands
If you’re looking to be more compelling when public speaking , my presentation skills training will make you less vanilla and more THRILLER, even with the driest subjects.
Contact me here to discuss your needs or that of your team. Become a Communication Ninja!
