Perception filters in project management

Perception filter is the processing of new information in our brain, how it will be interpreted is individual and is affected by prior knowledge, cultural aspects, personality, former experiences and much more. Perception is the way the receiver intercepts information, decodes it, and acts thereafter. Communication is important in all fields of work and in everyday life, it is something granted for most but can be interpreted and received differently from person to person. Language, words and expressions reach individuals on different levels due to different processes in the brain. This human phenomena is called a perception filter. There are two aspects to consider, perception and understanding, how one perceives information and action, how one converts information into action. Research led to the conclusion that neurological framework and environmental experiences might be the reason for this. The perception filter functions in our consciousness, it is not physically a part of the brain, and also affects our learning. If an individual scans through a random series of book titles most of them will go unnoticed and be forgotten within a short period of time. This is due to the lack of connection to prior knowledge in the mind, and when something catches one's interest it is often because it connects with something that already is stored in the long term memory. This is developed by the perception filter, and the information can be added to the long term storage. The amount of information that each person is exposed to each day is enormous, the perception filter is an aid to filter out some of it, because the brain can not absorb all the information that is given to it. Studies have also shown that genetics can play a large role in perception of emotions, different genetic profiles affected differently by social interactions.

Table of content:

Summary

Body

Meeting the needs as a leader

How perception filter influences the success of project management

Perception filter - how it affects learning

Filter emotion perception

References

Summary: Perception filter is the processing of new information in our brain, how it will be interpreted is individual and is affected by prior knowledge, cultural aspects, personality, former experiences and much more. Perception is the way the receiver intercepts information, decodes it, and acts thereafter. Communication is important in all fields of work and in everyday life, it is something granted for most but can be interpreted and received differently from person to person. Language, words and expressions reach individuals on different levels due to different processes in the brain. This human phenomena is called a perception filter. There are two aspects to consider, perception and understanding, how one perceives information and action, how one converts information into action. Research led to the conclusion that neurological framework and environmental experiences might be the reason for this. The perception filter functions in our consciousness, it is not physically a part of the brain, and also affects our learning. If an individual scans through a random series of book titles most of them will go unnoticed and be forgotten within a short period of time. This is due to the lack of connection to prior knowledge in the mind, and when something catches one's interest it is often because it connects with something that already is stored in the long term memory. This is developed by the perception filter, and the information can be added to the long term storage. The amount of information that each person is exposed to each day is enormous, the perception filter is an aid to filter out some of it, because the brain can not absorb all the information that is given to it. Studies have also shown that genetics can play a large role in perception of emotions, different genetic profiles affected differently by social interactions.

Body:

Meeting the needs as a leader in projects (PMBOK GUIDE 2021)

In order to meet the needs of employees or group members it is important for the leader to take certain actions. There are different situational leadership models that can be applied for this purpose. These can be strategies on how to present scenarios or optimize the leaders’ approach towards processes and work efforts of the team. A project is dependent on the functioning of communication in the team, communication models are developed so that the receiver of information will experience it in an effective way, and that it influences him or her. The sender must therefore differentiate its’ communication form based on stakeholder needs, cultural styles and personalities. There are studies showing that when an idea is transmitted it is influenced by the sender’s role which causes different perceptions. It can be a matter of the sender’s competence, language, stereotypes, knowledge, thinking patterns and so on. Simultaneously, the individual perception is also reliant on the character traits that the receiver holds.

Moreover, other methods also point out that the ability to perceive and take in information is also dependent on one's capacity to keep the focus, the use of natural language, to manage several information cues at once among other characteristics. Another concept is the richness of communication, which describes how effectively and how rapidly the shared information is learned by the receiver. The richness of communication can also be affected by how the information is being transmitted physically, whether it is over the phone or face to face, in more complex matters of conveyed information the latter option is preferred. (page 153-157)

In addition, projects are not solely about the teams and the leaders, a great part of it is the work and communication with the stakeholders, everything from a few of them in certain cases to millions in others. This is also a reason why the way of communicating is of the utmost degree important, a project will not succeed with unsatisfied stakeholders that hinders the project. Firstly the stakeholders of a project need to be determined, secondly the project team and manager need to understand the stakeholders’ perspective, their different values and feelings in the situation. In order to be able to communicate in a way that is perceived well by the receiver, the stakeholders, to communicate in a way that will reach and influence them in the right direction. The communication must integrate with the knowledge and needs of the stakeholders in order to go through the perception filters. (page 8-13)

How perception filter influences the success of project management (Belling 2004)

Being a project manager demands a certain ability to understand and read the emotions and thoughts of coworkers, among the knowledge to use the tools and skills of project management. It is of great importance that a project manager accepts the existence of perception filters and has the ability to use the power of this concept, this is the base of interpreted emotions and thoughts. Unintentionally, ones’ perception filters will lay as a foundation on how the world is apprehended, and in work-related matters, mostly, the underlying personal experiences will affect the learning and knowledge of the employees. The task that the project manager has is to determine what perception filters, based on the team members background, culture etc, the team members possess and how to approach them.

Maturing as a project manager consists of knowledge in multiple work areas, firstly the task solving and competence skills, secondly the soft skills, such as professional behavior and emotional coaching of team and customers. As the soft skills have become more and more crucial for the profession, it is important to apply the awareness of filters and perception, especially in projects that handle large organizational changes. It is important that a project leader that wants to be a part of the development of today, works on these abilities.

The perception filter works in a way that only small parts of all of the information that the brain is exposed to, is filtered through and reflected upon, this depends on the receptors’ earlier references. The message that is communicated to the receptor will be compared to similar, already experienced situations, and when one is found it will operate as the framework for the current situation. This filter will form the experience of the information and how it is interpreted, for example if the receptor interprets a message as a compliment or an insult, based on how they relate to the matter. Furthermore the filters can work as blockings, if during a meeting, a lot of information is being communicated the listeners filters can lead to that only parts of the message is being received. What is relevant for one coworker, and therefore filtered through, will be remembered, but this can easily be completely different for the other colleague. What can be different is with what kind of perspective one works from, if it is personal or purely business, this will affect ones' selection of captured information. The desired team member for a project manager is therefore an individual that holds an even combination of both emotional and business knowledge to avoid information being blocked away and receive a proportional part of the message.

Perception filter - how it affects learning (White 2012) The brain is a complicated part of our body, it is thinking and choosing not to think about millions of visions each day. For example, walking down a street, one is meeting hundreds of faces in the time span of a couple of minutes, but still, during these minutes you will only have noticed and remembered a few of these faces or just the one you were looking for to meet. Another situation, hundreds and hundreds of noises go unnoticed each day, but the whistle from a train at night outside your new apartment waking you, will disturb you. Some time later this noise won’t bother you, the mind learns to adjust and the sound goes unnoticed thanks to the perception filter. This is one part of the perception filter, but it operates in all parts of our consciousness, and also for our learning. When teaching, the perception filters in the students affect how much of the given information that is absorbed and taken in, and this should be taken in account for.

There are models explaining this phenomena, for example the Bloom’s taxonomy that describes the cognitive ability in the form of a hierarchy, the Perry model that provides college students’ ethical and intellectual development, or sectioning of different personality types in order to understand peoples’ interactions. This is something foreign to traditional textual educational models.

The perception filter is not a physical part of the brain, it is an idea. When scanning through book titles and summaries, the eyes scan through many of them and stop at some of them to read further. This depends on whether something in the title or outlook was caught in our perception filter, see figure xi. The one that caught our eye will have a link or connection to something our memory already has knowledge about. The book went through the perception filter and can now be processed and added to the long term memory, this is important, if one doesn’t have the capacity to read all the titles on the shelf. However, during an education, some subjects and information will have difficulty slipping through the perception filter, and this is something teachers need to account for. It can be difficult to acquire the information from the speaker in the long term memory if it is not presented in the right way, the speaker needs to adjust the tone, choice of words et cetera after its’ audience.

Filter emotion perception (Taschereau-Dumouchel 2015)

Multiple cognitive neuroscience studies have been made on our emotion perception, it is a development from social cognitive processes in our brains and physiological aspects. Genetic studies have found that the brain responding to perception of emotions is affected by genetic variants in our bodies. It is a difficult area of study, but progress has recently been made.

References:

Svendsen Aylott, A. M. (2020). Effective communication: filters and perception. BMJ Publishing Group. 42(10). 586-588.

Taschereau-Dumouchel, V., Hétu, S., Chagnon, Y. C., Jackson, P. L. (2015). Measuring how genetic and epigenetic variants can filter emotion perception. PHILADELPHIA: Copyright Wolters Kluwer Health, Inc. 25(5). 216-222.

White, H. B. (2012). Visualizing the perception filter and breaching it with active-learning strategies. Wiley-Blackwell. 40(2). 138-139.

PMBOK GUIDE. (2021). A Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge and The Standard for Project Management page. 7th edn. Project Management Institute, Inc.

Belling, B. Mangalaars, F.A.H. (2004). How filters and perceptions influence your thinking, behavior and success in project management. Project Management Institute. https://www.pmi.org/learning/library/filters-perceptions-influence-thinking-behavior-success-8462

Jackson, R.L. Hogg, M.A. (n.d.). Perceptual Filtering. Sage knowledge. https://sk.sagepub.com/reference/identity/n183.xml