Communication Alert! How Behavior Impacts Clarity

According to E. H. Schein, Consultant, the most important thing for people to understand is what goes on inside their own heads.  If we enter into a conversation without knowing how we assert our own feelings and biases, we won’t be able to tell whether the information we are receiving is based on reality or our perceptions. 

As human beings, we can’t help but filter all communication through our own personal filters which include prejudgments, expectations and alert our defenses if we hear or read a statement a certain way.  Because of our tendency towards misperception of what happened or why it happened, we may “allow” ourselves to respond emotionally to our interpretation without being aware that it is based on incorrect information.  As a result, if we don’t check whether our observation and emotional reaction were correct and appropriate, we may act rationally but make the situation worse.  How do you think an argument can brew to a boiling point after discussing the type of cheese you may want to incorporate into a salad?

To illustrate and imbed what E. H. Schein has discovered, I’ve often used the “telephone game” in my training sessions.  I whisper a short five sentence statement into the ear of a volunteer.  That person then repeats the statement to another person and tells them exactly what I told them.  This whispering process is continued through 10 people.  Much like gossip, don’t you think?  Someone hears something interesting, they pass it along to another person, and before you know it, when you hear the information it is the truth, nothing but the truth, so help you God! 

Wrong.