Interview with Nitish Maini

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I'm Nitish Maini and I work with

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WorldQuant.

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At WorldQuant I am Chief Strategy Officer,

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but I started in WorldQuant eight years ago

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as a Quantitative Researcher. After spending

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a few years as a Quantitative Researcher, I

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became a Portfolio Manager and then also

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participated in other management related roles at

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the firm. In my current

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role as a Chief Strategy Officer, I spend a

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lot of time with our management team trying to

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00:00:52.800 --> 00:00:55.200
define the goals and strategy which

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the firm would like to pursue on the business and the investments side.

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I think making presentations is a very important part

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of a financial engineer's overall role

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in an organization.

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A financial engineer analyzes a lot of data, producers

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multiple models and it

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is possible that in the future their models would have

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a lot of capital tied to them in

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the real markets. So, it is important for them to

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be able to explain those ideas in a good

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way to their peers and to others so that they have confidence to

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deploy that kind of capital.

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Having done those data analyses, capturing all

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the information and producing some good results

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is good. But, then you also need

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to know how to articulate those ideas into a presentation,

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so that everybody else could

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follow and understand. So, having the

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story which you could prepare and which speaks

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to what the outcome of

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those models is trying to present in front of

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you is very important. And that really helped

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me when I hear from the financial engineers the

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way they think about the process of reaching

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00:02:26.300 --> 00:02:29.500
to the outcome. First, they define

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their objective then how did they Implement that objective? And

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then finally they looked at the results and

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did the reiteration of their whole models to finally

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come to a conclusion, which is very clear, very

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crisp and we can understand the impact of it. It made it

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very useful for me when I was hearing from the financial

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engineers.

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A financial engineer would make many different

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kinds of presentations.

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So, depending on the topic of the discussion for

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that particular presentation, sometimes it could be a brainstorming

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session with your peers trying to come up with and formulate your

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idea. The other times it could be about how

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to implement that idea and the kind of technologies you

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want to use. What is the latest trend? And how you

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should achieve that.

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Then it could be the presentation of

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results, which could be to your peers and to your managers and

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oftentimes, it could be to the senior management. So,

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I think all of this really makes it

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important for the financial engineer to understand what

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is the purpose of the presentation that

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he or she is going to make. And accordingly, define

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the flow and the structure of the presentation

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so that the audience can understand. So,

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it is important to understand the detail and the depth of

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your audience and how attached they are to this

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particular topic and accordingly frame

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your presentation.

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I think one idea which could really be useful

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for the presenters is, even though

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you are a presenter you also have to be a good listener

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in a presentation. When you're

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presenting there are often questions

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coming in from your audience and

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a presenter really needs to be attentive to

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understand what is being asked to be able to deliver the

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right answer, rather than having a

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more, around and around answer,

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which does not really express the point and answer the question,

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which the audience is asking. So, that

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is really important and one element I feel is

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important when a presenter is presenting. He's focused on what he's

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talking about, but he also has to understand how the audience

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is grasping his content. Are they

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involved? Are they engaged? Does a presenter

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need to reorganize himself during the presentation

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to be able to convey the message and also be a

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good listener to be able to answer the questions

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00:05:15.800 --> 00:05:17.400
from the audience?

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I clearly remember how the content of my

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presentation changed as I moved from a Researcher

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to Portfolio Manager to a Manager and now

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to a Strategy Officer's role. So, there

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are good stories at each level, but

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something that has been common, across

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all the roles is working with

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the team.

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When you are building these presentations and when

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you have clear objectives and you know the impact and after

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the presentations if it leads to decisions,

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which are very impactful that makes

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you and the team happy and cherish

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the work that you have done together for

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this to be able to reach this objective. And this

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does not only involve building the slide deck, but the whole

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process of creating the model, the strategy,

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the plan, which you are then expressing. So, that element

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of teamwork in the

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presentations makes me and the

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team really proud of where we finally reach and

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this is one element which I really like when

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we are doing the presentations. It helps us come together

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and cherish things.

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When a financial engineer is creating a model, sometimes it

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is simple and many of the times it is complex.

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So, one has to be able to express

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that complex idea in a simple

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form, which even the non-technical members who

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are listening, if they are a part of the audience, can understand.

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So, story in your presentation

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really helps describe that. For example, what

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does it mean? What were you trying to achieve? What

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can we conclude out of all the experiments

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that have been done? Are there any further questions

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which could be raised after looking at the results

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that are being presented? And what are the next steps that

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should be taken? So, if there is this kind of

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flow in a form of a story presented

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to the audience, to the listeners, I think

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that makes it really effective and it makes

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it very clear for the listener to structure their thoughts

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as well in what has been presented and what to take

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away from the discussion.

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That's a very important aspect of a

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presentation. More often than not,

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it is usually good to speak in a language

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which any layman can understand to be able to express

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what you're trying to talk about. So,

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the language adjustments would involve elements like,

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using more visualization tools. For example,

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to be able to demonstrate what you're going

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to talk about because a picture can

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speak a thousand words and still make it simple for the

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audience and the listeners to understand what is being

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talked about.

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Then in the language, you also

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need to make sure that you are clear with the high-level picture of what you

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are going to talk about and discuss, rather than

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just talking about a lot of details, which can actually

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take us away from the from the higher-level picture. And then

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the other element is to be able

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to express that picture

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in a language which is maybe not

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always very equation driven, which works

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sometimes as well, if your audience has a lot of technical, mathematical

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people who can faster grasp

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the idea if it is presented by equations,

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but if not, if we have

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non-technical members using a more layman language is actually useful.

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So, this is another big element in

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your day-to-day communication, not just presentations.

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WorldQuant is also a global organization

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with offices across many countries and

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00:09:46.200 --> 00:09:50.300
in our day-to-day we have to work with individuals

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from all those countries. And

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there are different cultures. There are different ways

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individuals will react to different situations. So, you

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really have to learn and notice with

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time, when we are making some comments,

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some compliments or discussing or diving

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deep into different things that how the

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individuals or how the cultures can

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react to those kinds

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of things. So again, it's a very important element

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to keep in mind when we are interacting

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with individuals from different countries, making sure that

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we are cognizant that we are talking to different cultures.

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And for the same thing we can

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have different reactions and then continue to

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notice how it is different and what is the

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best way of communicating with each of the different cultures

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that we have to interact with? So again, it's another learning exercise,

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which comes when you actually get into

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that position of talking to such global members.

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Maybe I can share a comment here

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that,

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everybody can present. Just like many other

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things, it is also an art which

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00:11:12.600 --> 00:11:16.000
comes with practice. You make

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presentations, you learn, you observe and

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that is something one has to be very conscious about. You need

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to keep learning from the success that

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you have in every presentation. Keep gathering

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feedback from your audience on what they liked, what they

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did not like and keep improving yourself to take yourself

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to the point where you can articulate your messages, you

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can understand your audience and deliver what you

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came to deliver in the presentation.

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So, that's something I would really like to highlight. It's

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not a skill which everybody has, but is

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a skill which can be nourished

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with time.

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