Page 52 - The Big Book of Business Quotations: Over 1,400 of the Smartest Things Ever Said about Making Money - PDFDrive.com
P. 52
Humor
With a gross domestic product valued at about $18 trillion, the US economy is
serious business—too serious, in the sober judgments of two sources that
periodically monitor the emotional pulse of the American workplace. According
to the Harvard Business Review, on-the-job humorlessness is constraining
productivity, creativity, and collaboration. And the humor drought exists even
though 91 percent of executives believe that a sense of humor boosts careers,
according to Robert Half International, a top human resource consulting firm.
Yet it seems that the only time business leaders deign to release their inner
comedian is in the opening lines of a speech before a somber business audience.
The levity deficit in American office buildings and factories seems puzzling,
given the plethora of witty quotes below. They indicate that the funny bone is
sharp within the labor force across occupational fields.
Business is like sex. When it’s good, it’s very, very good; when it’s not so good,
it’s still good.
—George Katona, business analyst (from the Wall Street Journal, April 9, 1969)
Big business never pays a nickel in taxes, according to Ralph Nader, who
