How to audit your own profile for signal vs. noise Read your profile out loud. Every time you say something and think, "well, everyone says that", it's noise. Every time you say something specific enough that you could point to a document, a product, or a person to prove it, that's signal. Most profiles fail this test instantly. "Passionate about building great products", noise. "Shipped the onboarding flow that cut drop-off by 34% in Q2 2024", signal. Here's a quick audit you can do in 20 minutes: 1. The stranger test Imagine a stranger reads your headline and summary. Can they tell what you've actually built, solved, or delivered, or just what category of professional you are? If the answer is "category," you've described a job title, not a person. 2. The "anyone could say this" filter Go through every bullet point. If a version of you, with a completely different experience, could honestly copy-paste that line, cut it. "Results-driven professional with 5+ years of experience" describes literally millions of people. Delete it. 3. Replace claims with coordinates Claims: "Grew the user base significantly." Coordinates: "Grew active users from 8K to 31K between March and November 2023." Coordinates have a who, what, when, and how much. Claims don't. Hiring managers believe coordinates. They've learned not to believe claims. 4. What are you actually proud of? Forget the profile for a second. What's the one thing in your career that you'd tell someone about at dinner? That's probably the thing most worth verifying. If it's specific enough to tell a story about, it's specific enough to feature prominently. 5. The "would I trust this person based on this?" question Read it from the perspective of someone deciding whether to pay you for something. Not "is this impressive", but "do I believe this?" Those are different questions, and most profiles answer the first while failing the second. The whole point is to give people something they can actually verify. A strong profile should make you easier to trust, not just easier to find.