Erica is a dedicated international development professional with over 15 years working on projects to support global environmental sustainability.
She also does stand-up comedy.
To date, she has brought her quirky and witty comedy to 23 countries in six different languages, everywhere from riverboats in Myanmar to comedy clubs in Albania. She sees comedy as an essential tool in the professional skill set for its ability to engage audiences, break tension, control the room -- and leave a lasting impression.
This talk is a 25 minute crash course into the science of what triggers laughter and how to deploy comedic devices in the writing or speaking you do at work. You’ll learn about "how far you can go" via the benign violation theory of humor, and walk away with 5 tricks: word substitution and specificity, placement of "punch words", calling the room, broken assumptions, and leveraging the power of the opposite. By "making it funny" you can design attention-grabbing hooks, keep audiences engaged, and create the connections you need to level up your work.
This talk is a 25 minute crash course into the science of what triggers laughter and how to deploy comedic devices in the writing or speaking you do at work. You’ll learn about "how far you can go" via the benign violation theory of humor, and walk away with 5 tricks: word substitution and specificity, placement of "punch words", calling the room, broken assumptions, and leveraging the power of the opposite. By "making it funny" you can design attention-grabbing hooks, keep audiences engaged, and create the connections you need to level up your work.