Will Humor Make Martha Appeal to Gen Y?

Self-deprecation is never a way to win over an audience. It seems like a last ditch effort that should be canned immediately. Why not try evolving away from the Suzy homemaker and move toward the common carbon-footprint-reducing behavior of genY and be part of their growing consumerism.

I have a daughter in college and I asked her one time whether anyone in her group watched Martha. The look she gave me told me her answer before she mouthed it. This generation could care less about Martha.

As far as a manager using this approach, depends upon the manager and her/his reports. It totally depends upon the comfort level and more importantly the style of the manager.

There is no sure fire way or one size fits all approach to connecting with people. However, managers should at the very beginning start building relationships and continue working on that process. Once the foundation is sound, you can withstand the strongest
winds of turmoil.

Maybe the younger generation's not watching because they're just not into crafts and entertaining? Martha got started by showing people how to use the caterer's best tricks to do their own entertaining in style, like the rich people. Now folks take this stuff for granted. Do young people even like the same table decorations?

Interesting question you raise, Patricia. It's difficult to relate the goals of why Martha is doing this to the goals of why a manager would use such humor with his or her team.

While from a birds-eye view they may seem the same (establish a bond with younger generations), but their purpose and approach are quite different.

As a Gen Xer who works closely with alot of Gen Yers, I often find myself engaging in self-depricating humor to break workplace tension, liven up a boring conversation or just to make someone laugh and feel better when they made a mistake. And we all know that when people feel better, they work better.

Martha is trying to win an audience to keep her revenue stream flowing. While she is trying to show a "sense of humor" she is really coming off as whining "I'm not lame" when, quite frankly, she is.

And the approach Martha is taking isn't one of self-deprication. Just because she sanctioned this doesn't mean she's making fun of herself - the key term being "herself."

The approach I take as a manager is personal. I don't ask other people to crack jokes at my expense to make the younger staff see me in a better.

It would be more effective if Martha joined her daughter in viewing the shows themselves, with Martha both mocking her former self and getting humoursly defensive when her daughter makes a crack.

I think this approach would completely change our perception of Martha as a person and really see if she does indeed have a sense of humor.

And honestly, it's not really a self-depricating approach unless she mocks herself, not her daughter or the chairman's daughter