My friend, Joanna is a beautiful, brilliant retired computer wizard. She was the only woman executive working for a large international company, and was in charge of the creative geniuses, whose innovative work made them what regular people would call, “other worldly folks.”
No one in her department showed up for work before 2 p.m. For them, “Dawn” was the name of a dishwashing detergent, not a time of day. None of these computer nerds were morning people. So, when the Head of Human Resources sent a memo requiring Joanna and her department to attend a motivational workshop at 7a.m., her creative staff spent the afternoon developing imaginative excuses as to why they would be absent. Unfortunately, since she was the Department Head, Joanna felt arm twistingly obliged to make an appearance.
Business people attend many meetings, and motivational speakers are hired to “energize the team”---whatever that means. Here is where I am obliged to reveal that since my co-author Lynne Alpern and I taught a course called, “Adding Humor to Your Life,” and had written the book Humor at Work, we were invited to entertain at different venues around the country. However, we never claimed to “create contagious leadership skills.” Our simple aim was to make people laugh and sell some books.
A motivational speaker differs from an inspirational speaker. Inspirational speakers usually tell the audience about overcoming a Sisyphean obstacle, while motivational speakers try to energize and influence workers to pull together and move them to action. At 7a.m., the only movement Joanna wanted was toward the coffee pot.
The speaker began by shouting, “My aim is to expose the child in you!” He began by asking the audience to jump up and down, and shout out, “Let’s have some fun.” No way was Joanna going to risk breaking a heel on her designer shoes, nor did she think this was going to be any fun, so she stood up and quietly developed the mantra, “If he knows what’s good for him, he will keep away from me.”
After a few more childish exercises, the speaker said, “Now that you all have recaptured the child inside, I want to find out, “What was the best advice you remember getting when you were very small?”
“You,” he said, pointing at Joanna. “You, tell us the best advice you ever received as a little girl.” The room fell silent. None of her colleagues thought Joanna was ever a “little girl.” Joanna took a sip of coffee, patted her coiffure with her manicured fingers and replied, “Don’t eat the yellow snow.” She was allowed to leave early.
Esther Blumenfeld (ask and ye shall receive)