Sarcasm or humor?

Both effective, both leave lasting impressions, only one that positively gets your point across.

There is a fine line between sarcasm and humor. Your ability to manage both can make all the difference in whether or not people follow you. Adding humor to highlight a topic or opinion is effective, even necessary to get a point across. I challenge that humor becomes sarcasm when "highlighting" a topic becomes "defending" a topic. It's when healthy banter or the volley of opinions becomes a game of who has the last word or who is right and who is wrong. We have all witnessed when that line of humor and sarcasm gets crossed. A leader's impact is made, feelings get hurt, credibility erodes. Humor becomes a taunt or sneering, backhanded remark. A verbal assault and bullying of the recipient becomes irreparable.

Understand that sarcasm comes from insecurity, a lack of confidence or knowledge on the particular subject. It comes from judgement, rumor, or even gossip. Yikes! Neg-a-tive! As a leader of an organization, why would you want any part of that? All roads end badly. Alarmingly many leaders don't even know they do this and are shocked when coached about it. they cant understand why their perception or image is not more healthy. It would be easy for me to further highlight all the bad things sarcasm can cause or delve into the things to avoid saying. I could even share all the benefits of adding humor to your dialog. Instead lets focus on the things we can do or say to overcome your insecurities.

Ask questions.
Read.
Talk less, listen more.
Write down your thoughts.
Do more thinking.
Exercise.
Find a mentor.
Travel.
Join a community.

Just imagine the possibilities...