Interesting is dangerous. 

Not because interesting things are bad. Quite the opposite. They are memorable, they spark discussion and they tend to stick in people’s minds long after the research has finished. 

The problem is that interesting and important are not the same thing. 

Every project throws up things that make us sit up: an unexpected behaviour, a striking quote, a surprising difference between groups, something quirky that nobody had thought about before. Those moments are often what makes research enjoyable. They are also the moments most likely to attract attention. 

And that’s where the danger starts. 

Interesting has gravity. We notice what is surprising because it stands out. Once we notice it, we want to understand it. And once we’ve spent time understanding it, it can start to feel important simply because it is interesting. 

Perhaps a handful of people are using a product in an unusual way. Perhaps one group behaves very differently from everyone else. Perhaps a new behaviour feels culturally significant. 

All potentially worth noticing. But not necessarily worth acting on.

The danger comes when the conversation shifts from “that’s interesting” to “we should do something about that” without anyone really examining the leap. 

When interesting starts to feel important

There is often an implicit hierarchy in research where the newest or most unexpected finding feels like the most valuable. Yet some of the most useful findings are not surprising at all. 

They confirm that something we suspected is genuinely important. They show that a behaviour is more widespread than we realised. They reveal which of several possible explanations matters most. Or they give people enough confidence to make a decision they were already leaning towards. 

None of that necessarily creates a dramatic ‘aha’ moment. But it can be far more valuable than discovering something fascinating that has little bearing on what happens next. 

The point of insight isn’t to surprise people. It’s to help them see more clearly. 

What would we do differently?

One useful question can cut through a lot of this: if this is true, what would we do differently? 

Not every finding needs to result in an immediate action. Some insights matter because they change how we understand a market, a customer or a problem. But there should be some consequence. Would it alter the decision? Change the priority? Challenge an assumption? If the answer is no, then we may simply have found something interesting, but not important. And that’s fine. 

Curiosity still matters. Some of the best discoveries happen precisely because somebody notices something unexpected and follows it. Good research should leave room for that. But curiosity needs judgement. 

A useful, unexpected finding tends to do one of three things: challenge something important we thought we knew, point towards a meaningful shift in behaviour, or open up an opportunity that could materially affect the choices in front of us. 

That deserves attention. 

An entertaining anecdote probably doesn’t.

Not everything should become the story 

There is also a cost to treating everything that is interesting as equally important. The more findings we elevate, the harder it becomes for anyone to know what really matters. A debrief full of memorable observations may feel rich, but a smaller number of findings that genuinely change understanding or decision-making is far more useful. 

That means making choices. Leaving things out. Sometimes saying: “Yes, that’s interesting. But it isn’t the story.” 

That can be uncomfortable, especially when something feels new or exciting. But insight isn’t valuable because of how surprising it is. It is valuable because it helps people decide where to focus. 

Interesting findings are worth noticing. But they shouldn’t automatically become the story. 

The most valuable insights are the one that changes how we understand the problem, or what we do next. 

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