What Cuts Through the Noise?

This issue closes what turned out to be a trilogy the past few weeks:

• Don’t Accept the Defaults looked at the hidden choices that shape us before we notice them.

• Who Gets to Interrupt You? asked who deserves the right to spend your attention.

• Now, in What Cuts Through the Noise?, I will explore what breaks through once the clutter is cleared—what sticks, and why.

If there’s a common thread across all three, it’s this: clarity wins.

We talk a lot about clarity as storytellers—how to strip away the fluff, frame the signal, and make sure people actually understand what we’re trying to say. But there’s another side we don’t talk about enough: clarity as story consumers. We’re all awash in pings, posts, and pitches, and we don’t just need to communicate clearly—we need to recognize clarity when it shows up.

That’s the harder part. Because when you’re the one sending a message, you control the framing. When you’re on the receiving end, you’re forced to sift. And the world isn’t exactly short on noise.

Why Some Signals Stick

Not every message earns the right to be remembered.

Most land, fade, and vanish before the next scroll. A few lodge themselves in your head—you bring them up at dinner, quote them in a meeting, or find yourself replaying them days later.

What makes the difference?

1. Clarity In People Like Bad Pizza I wrote about measuring success in context. Sometimes success was finding the best pizza. Other times it was the comfort of whatever was easiest to eat in front of a movie. The difference was clarity of outcome. Messages that spell out “what this is really for” have the best shot at being remembered.

2. Relevance In Don’t Accept the Defaults, I pointed out that default settings serve someone else’s agenda, not yours. In Who Gets to Interrupt You?, I argued that interruptions are a hidden tax on your attention. The lesson: signals only matter if they serve your priorities. If they don’t, they’re noise.

3. Resonance In Who Are Your Sensemakers? I said: “To share is human; to give context, divine.” That’s resonance: when something doesn’t just inform, but connects to the story you’re already living. It’s why bad pizza can still be the right choice—because in that moment, it fits the narrative.

Clarity. Relevance. Resonance.

Signals stick when they’re clear, relevant, and resonant. That’s not just about how we tell stories. It’s about how we consume them.

People don’t remember what they barely notice. They remember what they dwell on—what feels worth the scarce currency of their attention.

So the real challenge isn’t just to get through. It’s to be worth sticking around for.

The Signals That Last

Not every signal that grabs your attention deserves to keep it. Some stick because they’re engineered to be loud—provocative headlines, outrage cycles, emotional bait. They lodge in your head for a moment, but without clarity or context, they fade or distort. Those aren’t true signals. They’re noise in disguise.

The ones that last deliver clarity. And clarity works in both directions.

As I wrote in The Three Skills That Still Matter Most, lasting value comes from vetting, synthesizing, and curating. That’s how you filter the noise. As I said in Who Are Your Sensemakers?, it’s not enough to share information—you have to add context. That’s how you make your signals worth hearing. And as I showed in People Like Bad Pizza, success is always contextual. What sticks depends on how your audience defines success in that moment.

So here’s a filter you can use, whether you’re sending or receiving:

Berkson's Bits

In the old days, I used to file things in folders. I had directory structures on file systems. I had folders in my email.

In the age of search, putting the stuff somewhere based on a structure became less important. Broader buckets and some tagging and it was pretty easy to find stuff.

In the age of agentic, I don't even need the broader structure.

Now the hard part is just remembering what I was trying to do.

What I'm Listening To...

My musical tastes are eclectic. I saw Trombone Shorty last year at The Rooftop at Pier 17 last year. He came out of a deep tradition of New Orleans jazz, from a musical family. I love his jazz/funk style. I'm also a huge fan of NPR's Tiny Desk Concert series. So here's a bit of both.

The defaults will keep trying to decide for you. Interruptions will keep taxing your attention. But clarity is how you win. Send signals that are clear, relevant, and resonant. Build filters that reward the same. 

In the end, only the signals people remember — and act on — are the ones that matter.

Looking forward to continuing the conversation...

Alan