It's easy to get mired in the day-to-day details of your company's business goals and the technology necessary to achieve them, but work doesn't have to be humorless. Satire has its place; in fact, it can be a great way to demonstrate the everyday issues companies and employees deal with, such as clueless managers, overloaded employees, and inefficient systems. Humor is critical to the workplace, and managers who can summon some up will reap the benefits. To lighten up the workplace, laugh at yourself, post a joke of the week and look at the light side of situations. But proceed with caution--making fun of a person's faith, sexual orientation or ethnicity is never a good idea.

Learn more about the benefits of humor in the workplace:
- read the column at CIO