The Trick to Bragging in a Job Interview
‘Humourbragging’ can make you seem less conceited when you’re boasting
2 min
It is a classic problem for entrepreneurs, job seekers and, well, anyone: If you brag about your accomplishments, you seem more competent—but less likeable.
The solution? Add a dash of playfulness when discussing your talents.
A team of researchers have found that “humourbragging”—referring to your accomplishments through a veil of humour—allows people to play up their skills without coming across as smug or conceited. And that makes them more likely to get hired or get their pitch accepted.
“The self-enhancing humour helps them be seen as confident without sacrificing likability,” says Jieun Pai , an assistant professor at Imperial College London who led the research .
Laughs get results
The researchers used a series of studies to test the impact of what they called humourbragging. In one instance, they sent out two résumés to 345 companies—but one version of the résumé added a dash of self-promotional humour instead of being purely serious: “The more coffee you can provide, the more output I will produce.” The résumés with the joke got an email or a callback by 156 companies, versus 125 for the others.
Another study got similar results when looking at humorous bragging on the first four seasons of “Shark Tank”—people who used humour to highlight their accomplishments were more likely to get funding than others.
In another case, the researchers found that study participants were more likely to hire a pastry chef who used some levity in selling themselves. One candidate described making a soccer-themed cake for a boy’s fifth-birthday party and capped off the story by saying they got the biggest tip the bakery has ever seen. The baker who was the hiring favourite told the same story, including the part about the tip, but ended up by saying, “I am just glad that I only had to make the soccer ball, not actually kick one.”
Pick your jokes wisely
People need to be cautious, though, when using humour to sell themselves, Pai says. Self-deprecating humour without any bragging at all, or humour intended to belittle others in any form, doesn’t have the same positive impact that humorous bragging does, according to the research. “We sometimes use self-deprecating humour, but that backfires and downplays your achievements,” she says. “It doesn’t help you be seen as more competent.”
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Governments around the world are offering incentives to reverse a downward spiral that could threaten economic growth
2 min
The Australian birth rate is at a record low, new data has shown.
Figures from the Australian Bureau of Statistics have revealed there were 286,998 births registered around the country last year, or 1.5 babies per woman.
Birth rates in Australia have been in a slow decline since the 1990s, down from 1.86 births per woman in 1993. Declining fertility rates among girls and women aged 15 to 19 years was most stark, down two thirds, while for women aged 40 to 44 years, the rate had almost doubled.
“The long-term decline in fertility of younger mums as well as the continued increase in fertility of older mums reflects a shift towards later childbearing,” said Beidar Cho, ABS head of demography statistics. “Together, this has resulted in a rise in median age of mothers to 31.9 years, and a fall in Australia’s total fertility rate.”
The fall in the Australian birth rate is in keeping with worldwide trends, with the United States also seeing fertility rates hit a 32-year low. The Lancet reported earlier this year that, based on current trends, by 2100 more than 97 percent of the world’s countries and territories “will have fertility rates below what is necessary to sustain population size over time”.
On a global scale, the Lancet reported that the total fertility rate had “more than halved over the past 70 years” from about five children per female in the 1950s to 2.2 children in 2021. In countries such as South Korea and Serbia, the rate is already less than 1.1 child for each female.
Governments around the world have tried to incentivise would-be parents, offering money, increased access to childcare and better paid maternity leave.
Experts have said without additional immigration, lower birth rates and an ageing population in Australia could put further pressure on young people, threaten economic growth and create economic uncertainty. However, a study released earlier this year by the University of Canberra showed the cost of raising a child to adulthood was between $474,000 and $1,097,000.
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Just 55 minutes from Sydney, make this your creative getaway located in the majestic Hawkesbury region.
