Clear Voice by Clearthought Academy
“Humans think in stories, and we try to make sense of the world by telling stories.”Yuval Noah Harari, author of Sapiens
A programme for founders and leaders who want to think and write better.
Clear Voice will help you communicate better with your customers, your teams and your investors, and tell compelling, powerful, memorable stories consistently.
Clear Voice Club registrations are paused for now. We’ll announce dates for the next cohort soon.
Hari ShenoyHari
Sidin VadukutSidin
Deepak GopalakrishnanDeepak G.
Utsav MamoriaUtsav
Niharika AnjanNiharika
Aditya RamakrishnanAditya
Tanvi AgrawalTanvi
Devansh MalikDevansh
Vikramjit ChaddaVikramjit
Nimit KathuriaNimitStories you can write in emails, on LinkedIn, on X, on Substack and in investor updates.
Stories that let you speak authentically when you interview people, talk to the press, sit on a podcast, and take centre stage on a panel.
Stories crafted in a Clear Voice that is uniquely yours.
People are drawn to leaders whose stories they can follow. On LinkedIn.
Sure, AI will write something for you.
But if it could have been written by anyone, how is it uniquely you?
And if it was written by someone else, how do you voice it clearly and compellingly in the high-stakes moments that matter?
Why
As a founder or a leader, your job is to
Bring your audacious vision to life.
Convince customers, investors and future colleagues to join you.
You cannot do it alone, so you need to attract great people to build and sell.
All three need to know your story before they trust you.
Customers
People buy a product or a service from a company that gives them a compelling reason. A good story provides that reason, and gives your sales and marketing teams a head start.
Colleagues
Great people join leaders who have a clear why, what and how. They do their research long before they meet you, so make it easy for them. Employer branding is a fancy way of saying our story is compelling enough that people want to work with us before we are ready to hire.
Capital
Potential investors need a great pitch. Current investors need stories they can repeat to their partners about how well the investment is going. Make it easy for them.
Your Clear Voice becomes the input for your teams. It trickles down into marketing messages, cold emails, product copy and every other place your brand speaks.
All three will create a story about you anyway. How well it reads depends on how well you can articulate it yourself.
The objections
What stops you
“I don’t have time. I need to get shit done.”
Telling stories to bring people along is a critical part of the job. It is the part that makes the rest of the work land.
“Ugh. This is too cringe.”
Granted, it might be total cringe when you start. The first time you rode a bicycle you fell off. That did not stop you getting back on and going at it until you got it right.
“I’ll get a copywriter to ghostwrite for me.”
Then you might as well have the copywriter speak on your behalf at interviews, in board meetings and on podcasts. Leaders who craft their own stories come across as more authentic, more compelling and more charismatic.
“I can always use AI.”
How much AI slop do you find inspiring? If you were an investor or a customer reading generic messages from a founder, how much confidence would you have in their ability to deliver?
The work
How the programme worked
This is a past-cohort example. Session content is illustrative; no future cohort dates or faculty availability are promised.
Weekend 1
Past-cohort examplePhilosophy, Purpose and Practice
Hari Shenoy will help you align philosophy, purpose and practice to help you express yourself in the most authentic manner possible.
Philosophy
Help you understand and define your current world view. Knowledge and wisdom serve as a strong foundation to help you bring about meaningful change.
Purpose
Help you clearly articulate the part you play in shaping the world through your philosophy. If you already have a clearly articulated purpose, we will pressure test and sculpt it to refine it better.
Practice
Writing is a practice. It is not a mountain to climb. It is a daily journey that allows you to distill your best thoughts and ideas consistently to help you understand yourself better, help others understand you better and to help you take consistent steps to achieve your purpose.
In the Clear Voice program, you will get assignments to follow that will help you move from Philosophy to Purpose to consistent Practice.
Followed by
The Six Percenters, Chuck and Utsav
Chuck and Utsav will condense their best practices and recommendations from running “The Six Percent Club” and “Unstuck” to the Clear Voice Program.
They will help you discover your unique and unfair advantage; identify and overcome your biases and what is possibly holding you back. Create a system and rigour to be regular. And understand the algorithm while not being hostage to it.
Weekend 2
Past-cohort exampleWhat actually works on LinkedIn
What actually works on LinkedIn
- Finding Your Value WordsThe exercise Niharika runs when she onboards a client. Five routes to the words you position yourself on.
- Your content mapA pillar format that becomes a monthly exercise, so the writing starts with the topic already chosen.
- The algorithm, and the corners of LinkedInNewsletters, post types and the parts of the platform most people miss.
- OutboundIdentify, message, track, convert. Including the tech stack that requires.
Niharika’s outline
1. I use an exercise called “Finding Your Value Words” when I onboard a client, to identify what speaks to them, what they live by, and what they pursue. There are five ways to land on those value words, and all five are fun, interactive exercises. Those words then help you position yourself and make sound decisions about your personal branding.
2. Next, building your content map and developing your pillars. We use a simple format internally to think about posts across a set number of topics. That format becomes a monthly exercise, and you walk away with the map ready. Makes writing super easy.
3. The algorithm, and the nooks and corners of LinkedIn. Newsletters, posts, types of posts, the basics, but more from an ‘if you know, you know’ point of view.
4. Making money on LinkedIn, and selling your skills there. How to go about outbound on LinkedIn, and the best DM and email drafts. This one comes with a tech stack you need to have: Sales Navigator, possibly Apollo, and a paid LinkedIn account for sure. Identify, message, track, convert, in four parts.
Building in public
Tanvi works it out as she goes, in the open. Hiring, the business model, funding, the state of the ecosystem, and the hospital canteen that sells only samosas in a building where doctors tell patients to eat better.
- 5,000 to 28,000Followers since December 2024.
- 25%Of Elfina’s paying clients name LinkedIn as where they found it.
- Lead investorCame through the feed, along with several of her best therapists.
She does it in mental health, where a reader may act on what you post, and where patients, therapists and investors all read the same feed.
a copywriter’s view on how founders should communicate.
A master wordsmith and creative director who teaches the art of persuasion through copywriting and storytelling.
More on Vikramjit
Years of crafting narratives for brands, and a view on how words move people to action and build lasting connections.
Weekend 3
Past-cohort exampleon scaling yours and your team’s voice.
Four pillars: finding your voice, scaling it, scaling it across a team, and building an AI content engine on top of the three. Aditya takes the middle two, both of which he has done two or three times over, with the research and the practical lessons behind each. The fourth is where it compounds or collapses, and it only works in that order.
Aditya’s outline
Most people don’t know what their own sentences sound like. That’s what makes the AI trap so easy to fall into. Once you’re writing heavily AI-ed content, “slopping at scale” is irresistible. The job is to learn what your personal “good” looks like, then scale it, then scale it with AI.
Four pillars:
1. Finding your voice. Being able to write authentically, knowing what “you” sound like. It’s hard to avoid “bad” AI slop when you don’t know what your “good” sounds like.
2. Scaling your voice. Figuring out what to write about, ideating topics, building a discipline. Going from one masterpiece post once in a while to doing it three times a week, months on end.
3. Scaling your team’s voice. One lonely founder shouting into the ether doesn’t cut it. How do you scale the first two across a team of people?
4. Building an AI content engine. Take the first three and build an engine so it does most of the heavy lifting. The challenge is resisting the temptation to post a hundred times a week. Behold, slop.
The fourth is where everything either compounds or collapses. Once you know what your voice sounds like, can sustain it at volume, and have spread it across your team, AI becomes a genuine force multiplier. But only in that order.
who’s fighting the battle against what he calls “the founder’s frown”
Sidin is an Indian author, columnist, and startup consultant who helps early-stage companies translate their vision into growth.
More on Sidin
Twenty five years across manufacturing, management consulting, media, publishing, impact investing and deep-tech B2B SaaS. Four novels and two non-fiction titles with Penguin and Simon & Schuster. Works context before content, and protagonists before product.
on where you take it from here.
The closing session. What the practice looks like on the Monday after, and how the cohort keeps reading each other’s drafts once the three Saturdays are done.
Bonus
1:1 time
Past-cohort format included individual mentor time. Any future cohort format has not been announced.
The community
A WhatsApp and email group with the other founders in the past cohort, which stayed open after the programme.
Peer feedback
Your drafts read by people who know what you are trying to do, and theirs read by you. That habit can help keep the writing going.
Past-cohort curriculum · illustrative only
Three Saturdays, eight sessions
This is an example of a previous cohort’s format. Future dates, session details and faculty availability have not been announced.
Weekend 1 · past cohort example
Illustrative scheduleFinding your voice
Where writing sits before it becomes marketing. Reading as the input, discipline as the engine, and what it takes to get past the cringe.
Hari ShenoyGuest masterclass
Your unfair advantage
Putting a number on the thing you have been circling for two years, and naming the biases that keep you quiet about it.
Deepak Gopalakrishnan and Utsav MamoriaBetween the weekends
One assignment, with feedback before you walk into the next Saturday.
Weekend 2 · past cohort example
Illustrative scheduleGuest masterclass
What actually works on LinkedIn
Content pillars, the parts of the platform most people miss, and publishing live while the room watches.
Niharika Anjan and Devansh MalikGuest masterclass
Building in public
Working the business out in the open, where a reader may act on what you post.
Tanvi Agrawal, founder, Elfina HealthGuest masterclass
A copywriter’s view
Persuasion through copywriting and storytelling, and how founders should communicate.
Vikramjit ChaddaBetween the weekends
One assignment, with feedback before you walk into the next Saturday.
Weekend 3 · past cohort example
Illustrative scheduleGuest masterclass
Scaling your voice and your team’s
What changes when more than one person writes under the company’s name.
Aditya RamakrishnanGuest masterclass
The founder’s frown
Context before content, and protagonists before product. What to do when the page is accurate and still does not sound like you.
Sidin VadukutWhere you take it from here
Closing the three weekends, and how the practice and the cohort keep running once the last Saturday is over.
Hari Shenoy and Nimit KathuriaWhat you leave with
Past-cohort outcomes · illustrative only
What participants worked towards
- Your Clear Voice, evolvedThe practice of telling compelling, authentic stories about yourself, your company, your vision and your mission.
- Blunt and kind feedbackFrom mentors who will tell you where the narrative goes slack, which is the part almost nobody gets.
- A bank of storiesBuilt with the mentors, ready for LinkedIn, Substack, podcasts and the other moments that matter.
- A system that keeps producingSo the next story does not depend on the next flash of inspiration. Run it yourself or hand it to your comms team.
- The cohort, for goodLifelong access to a room of founders and mentors who read each other’s drafts.
Past cohort faculty · illustrative, not an availability statement
Who runs it
Two people across all three Saturdays, and eight guests
The arc across the three days is built and held by the same two people, so the programme keeps its shape from the first hour to the last.
Runs a performance marketing practice and a training arm, and has spent the last year working out in public what a founder can say and when.
Profile →
Hari Shenoy is a writer. He aspires to be a writing athlete, having written for at least two hours each day for the last five years.
Read more
Trained as a facilitator at Google and has run day-long rooms for years. Comes at writing from discipline and practice rather than from marketing.
He has been on many side-quests in his life. Side-quests that got him an engineering degree and an MBA. Side-quests that led to him working for 11 years in big-tech, leading sales and operations teams in APAC and EMEA regions.
Writing has shaped his life much beyond the creation of his resume, job and college applications and other forms of persuasive communication.
Through that he continues to write many things - hip-hop songs, a musical theater show, stories on substack and linkedin and much more.
Guest masterclasses
Meet your masterclass experts
Twenty years of making things in public while running a brand strategy studio. Podcasts, newsletters, cartoons and stand-up, in most cases at the same time.
The Six Percent Club →
Writes Tumse Na Ho Paayega on thinking and living better, makes Postcards from Nowhere on travel and history, and is under contract for a book.
Tumse Na Ho Paayega →
Runs Elfina, a mental health company, and works the business out in the open. Took her LinkedIn from 5,000 to 28,000 since December 2024, and a quarter of Elfina’s paying clients name it as where they found her.
Profile →
Designs GenAI training that people can actually use at work. Most recently led the team at Skillsoft building AI programmes for enterprise learners. Takes the LinkedIn session with Niharika.
Profile →
Runs personal branding for founders and trains corporate rooms on it. Brings the exercises that turn a vague sense of a topic into a month of writing.
Profile →
Sidin is an Indian author, columnist, and startup consultant who helps early-stage companies translate their vision into growth.
Read more
Twenty five years across manufacturing, management consulting, media, publishing, impact investing and deep-tech B2B SaaS. Four novels and two non-fiction titles with Penguin and Simon & Schuster.
A master wordsmith and creative director who teaches the art of persuasion through copywriting and storytelling. Years of crafting narratives for brands, and a view on how words move people to action.
Profile →Who it is for
Founders and leaders who have something to say and no settled way of saying it
Founders
You are building something, and the people you need on your side have no way to hear what you think.
Leaders / senior operators
You are senior enough that how you communicate decides what gets built, who joins, and what gets funded.
Anyone who writes under their own name
The LinkedIn post, the Substack, the company-wide email and the investor update are the same skill wearing different clothes.
A past cohort, for context
The programme format
This curriculum and format describe a previous cohort and are illustrative only. Future dates, faculty participation and programme details have not been announced.
- →Past-cohort example: eight live sessions across three weekends
- →Past-cohort example: a writing assignment with feedback
- →Past-cohort example: individual mentor time and peer feedback
- →Past-cohort example: session recordings and a participant group
Clear Voice Club registrations are paused for now. We’ll announce dates for the next cohort soon.
Thanks for your interest.
We’ve saved your details and will contact you when we announce a future cohort.
No seat has been reserved and no payment is required.
The point of the practice
Build a voice that sounds like you
Clear Voice is about developing your own way to write and speak: grounded in what you know, useful to the people you serve, and consistent across the moments that matter.
Find your point of view
Surface the ideas, experience and perspective only you can bring to a story.
Write with intention
Practice shaping a clear message for customers, colleagues and investors.
Make the skill repeatable
Carry useful habits into posts, presentations, interviews and everyday communication.
About the past-cohort example
The usual questions
Is this only about LinkedIn?
LinkedIn is where most of the practice happens, because it is where most of you already are. The skill moves to your Substack, your investor update and your all-hands email without changing.
Is it live or recorded?
The curriculum above reflects a past cohort. Its delivery format and recording arrangements are illustrative and may differ in a future cohort.
What if I miss a session?
Past cohorts used session recordings and assignments. Any format or attendance arrangements for a future cohort will be announced later.
Do I need to be posting already?
No prior publishing experience was required in the past-cohort format shown here.
Will someone write the posts for me?
The past-cohort curriculum focused on participants developing and writing in their own voice.
Are registrations open now?
Clear Voice Club registrations are paused for now. We’ll announce dates for the next cohort soon. You can register your interest below.
A clearer voice begins with a point of view
Explore the past-cohort curriculum and share your interest. We’ll be in touch when a future cohort is announced.