It’s lobster season in my neck of the woods.
Atlantic lobster is a favoured dish that has been fished from these seas for centuries. Area fisher people sell their catches to the local market where they are put through a filtering system to improve the quality of the lobsters.
Filtering is a way to remove unwanted features or components. Subsequently, the lobsters live in a cleaner environment and stay healthier.
How many of us have thought about filters in the workplace?
Do you have a filtering system in place to improve operational effectiveness?
Filters for lobsters lead to improvement, however, filters in the workplace can influence our ability to communicate with another person. If communication is not filter-free, team members cannot perform their jobs effectively.
Good workflow management keeps business processes running smoothly. This means having a process in place to ensure filters, caused by elements within a person (internal filters) or the environment (external filters), are not related to information distortion.
Internal filters include a person’s feelings, beliefs or attitudes about an individual that may interrupt the communication process. The pre-conceived ideas we have about someone’s age, gender, skin colour, physical features, and so on can influence the relationship we have with them.
External filters have to do with elements in the environment, like noisy equipment, phone calls, temperature, lighting, etc. These are the more commonly thought about distractions that prevent successful communication.
The first thing we must do is remove these negative elements—the obvious barriers and the internal assumptions that impact our ability to communicate effectively.
As a trained human resource manager, I partnered with the Wiley organization as a DiSC® facilitator because I believe in the power of connecting with people without barriers.
It’s human nature to make internal judgements when we meet someone. We seem to be pre-programmed to default to making assumptions. The important thing to remember is that if we want to connect, we must correct our distorted thoughts.
Like the process of filtering Atlantic lobsters, there needs to be a system in place to help remove barriers, thus, providing a cleaner healthier environment.
Filters can be a very effective tool in any workplace, once we are aware of undesirable features. We can put strategies in place to “filter out” the negative.
