This is not just in writing, but in any form of communication including presentations or public speaking. Writing simply and learning how to present things in

This is not just in writing, but in any form of communication including presentations or public speaking. Writing simply and learning how to present things in such a way that anyone can understand has probably been the most valuable skill for my career progression. I have seen too many cases where technical/domain experts miss this and instead use words that only people who work in the same domain as them would understand. The result is that when they do a presentation at least half the people in the room have no idea what they are speaking about but are too polite to say anything. I also live in a country where most of the population are not native english speakers and this has allowed me to understand that a lot of people think by using complicated language they sound smarter, which is the furthest possible thing from the truth. In one incident I actually had someone who liked to show everyone how smart he was ask me, if I can help him find a more complicated way/wording to say something in a presentation he was working on so he can sound smarter. My only assumption was that for him people not understanding acted as a giant ego boost. He was PhD, that was also lecturing at one of the local universities. I can only imagine that his students had absolutely no idea what he was talking about most of the time and I am sure he took great pride in it. In university, back in Canada where I was born I had a similar experience when one of my math teachers started the year off by telling the entire class how he is very proud of his vocabulary. Needless to say on one of the tests he used a word that no one understood. After numerous students asked him the same question he finally got angry and announced to the entire class what the word meant. Personally I encourage my team to do the following in every work presentation: 1. Pretend you are presenting to a friend or family member who has no idea about the subject matter 2. Any words that would be known by people who are either inexperienced or outside of your expertise should include a definition the first time you use it. It can be written or it can be verbal, but it needs to be there