A wireless communication system includes a wireless master node having a plurality of channels, and a number of wireless slave nodes having a plurality of the channels. The master node and the slave nodes are structured to wirelessly communicate over a particular channel. The master node and the slave nodes are structured to decide to hop to a different channel. The master node and the slave nodes are structured to select: (a) the different channel, in order to be as far away as possible from a number of the channels, which are known to cause interference to wireless communications between the master node and the slave nodes, or (b) the different channel, in order to be as close as possible to one of the channels of a different master node, which is compatible with the former master node, but without the different channel being employed by the different master node.