Surprising, isn't it?

"I think it's the duty of the comedian to find out where the line is drawn and then cross it deliberately." - George Carlin

A joke consists of just two parts - the set-up and the punch. You send the mind in one direction, then pull the switch. For instance: "I am originally from the Ozarks. Not everyone in the Ozarks lives in a trailer park. There's a huge waiting list." - Nancy Norton.

"I ran three miles today. Finally, I said, 'Lady, take your purse.' " - Emo Philips

Done well, a comedy set will "kill" . . . just like a successful military operation.

Notice the importance of surprise - the military version of the set-up and punch - in these quotes from "Warrior's Words" by Peter Tsouras (a book of quotations that devoted five pages to "surprise"). Napoleon's Maxim 95: "War is composed of nothing but surprises. While a general should adhere to general principles, he should never lose the opportunity to profit by these surprises. It is the essences of genius. In war there is only one favorable moment. Genius seizes it."

"Who can surprise well must conquer." - John Paul Jones

What got me thinking about surprise was reading a story in Stanford Magazine about Brian Wansink's research into the psychological component of eating. The author, Barrett Sheridan, visited Cornell University's food and brand lab to participate in a number of experiments, including one that made use of the box lunches given to the group.

Sheridan writes: "I sat down with my turkey sandwich, apple, and chips and ate. I even got a little toy rhinoceros in my lunchbox, which delighted me to an embarrassing degree."

Later the participants learned the box lunches were part of research for Boeing, seeking to find ways to increase passenger satisfaction. "After we finished our meals but before we knew anything about the study, Wansink's assistants handed us a questionnaire that asked how much we'd have been willing to pay for the meal. Those who received a toy said they would have paid $6, while the toyless ones thought the meal worth only $3.50. The toys made us healthier, too - toy-receivers ate slightly fewer chips and more of their apple."

The author concludes: "Wansink had included 'worthless, two- or three-cent toys in about half the lunch boxes on the theory that pleasant surprises, even tiny ones, increase satisfaction. He was wildly right."

In my own study of effective leaders, the ones I call gifted bosses, there is an underlying theme of management by surprise - coming up with unexpected strategies, rewards, and leading questions. (For example, I heard recently of an intriguing way to clarify what's important and what isn't, from Tim Propp, chief financial officer of the Thunderbird School of Global Management: "What can we stop doing?")

The wise boss understands what military leaders know, as explained by Marshal Ferdinand Foch: "Inaction leads to surprise, and surprise to defeat, which is, after all, only a form of surprise." What could be inscribed on most of the tombstones of dead business endeavors is this: "I didn't see it coming."

I recently spoke to a regional managers' group for a major corporation. They told me that they'd lost their lead in their market due to some clever maneuvering by their chief rival. One said, "But we've adjusted, and now we're going to get the lead back."

I asked, "Have you figured out what their adjustment to your adjustment will be and how to adjust to it?" They looked dumbfounded, and not just by the sentence structure; they seemed to believe that they had succeeded in turning things around.

What they forgot is that every time you turn, your butt is sticking out in a new direction, unprotected. The game is to surprise without being surprised.

Surprising, isn't it, how important surprise is to life and yet how little attention it gets.

Dale Dauten is a syndicated columnist. He can be reached at dale@dauten.com.