Fawlty Towers, Monty Python, Blackadder - Britain may consider itself as a bastion of comedy, and the global headquarters of the sense of humour.

But in terms of fun, Britons are being denied their fair share by a corporate culture which prefers talking up success to dress down days, a survey has revealed.

While many Japanese firms provide employees with punchbags of bosses, and Latin American companies target job enjoyment, UK chiefs surveyed by the Institute of Management gave workplace fun a lowly rating.

Fun came 11th out of 12 priorities for boosting staff creativity, bosses said, behind factors such as "communicating success" and first-place "working closely with suppliers and customer".

"Whacky ideas such as... allowing pranks, introducing brain teasers and games to warm people up before a meeting are way down the scale in the UK," the institute said.

"So are home-made end-of-project rewards such as home videos and silly thank-you badges, or doubling the budget for trivial items such a staff-designed team T-shirts."

The only priority UK managers ranked behind fun was "budgeting time for creative processes in every job", the survey found.

Work pressures

Institute researchers blamed fun's lowly rating on increasing work pressures.

Monday's survey comes a month after the IoM revealed that, even when on holiday, three quarters of UK managers remain contactable by work colleagues.

The institute's Quality of Working Life 2000 survey revealed that less than 40% of managers had fun at work.

But IoM director general Marc Chapman urged executives to remember the importance of job satisfaction.

"Contrived 'fun' that is imposed is not the answer," he said.

"But having a sense of fun, while getting on with the job in hand, could be a way of lightening the load and staving off the blues - as well as enhancing creativity."

And companies are increasingly recognising the importance of creativity to business success, with 60% of firms reorienting their culture towards enhancing it, Monday's survey found.

Sombre outlook

Nonetheless, fun looks likely to play little part in that rejig, report author Professor Amin Rajah said.

"The UK's attitude to fun does not look like changing much over the next two years.

"It will continue to place fun in the position of 11th out of 12."

Not that all myths surrounding Britain's position as a refuge of humour are necessarily misplaced.

Certainly the country may rank behind the likes of Chile, Argentina and Brazil in the workplace fun league.

But the outlook for UK workers over the next two years is considerably less gloomy than that for employees in many neighbouring states, Professor Rajah said.

"A European grouping made up of Belgium, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, the Netherlands, Sweden and Switzerland intend to take fun in the workplace even less seriously than the UK," he said.