Our Team

EXPERT COMMUNICATORS AT YOUR SERVICE

Dušan D. Nešić (he/him)

Dušan is a professor of finance and economics, so his job is to digest complex ideas and make them simple. Furthermore, for over 10 years he has held lessons in communications, confidence skills and public speaking, delivered to individuals and groups of over a hundred as lectures, workshops or faciliations. His audience ranged from middle school students to TEDx Speakers and senior executives in multinational companies. He delivered trainings by himself, with translators, with powerpoints, games, tools, online or with nothing but a field to stand in. Finally, he taught teachers how to teach better, aiming for bigger impact, seeing this project as the next logical step in improving his impact on the world. Currently he facilitates EA VP In-Depth sessions.

He is of Serbian descent, but he lived and worked extensively in South East Asia.

On the organization side, he has led volunteer teams in international organizations since university, and worked in small and large corporations, so he knows different approaches taken in leadership, and is able to scale an operation such as this.

Yulia Ponomarenko (she/her)

Yulia Ponomarenko is a software engineer with a background in computer science and communication science. She has been involved in animal rights activism for over three years, where she learned a lot about individual outreach and effective communication strategies. She has made several public appearances as a speaker, mostly in the context of animal ethics seminars at her university.

She is passionate about improving group rationality and epistemic communities. Yulia wants to help others confidently express their confusions, uncertainties and doubts. She is convinced that honesty about what we don’t (yet) understand is crucial for making progress on the world’s most pressing problems. She strives to create opportunities for open communication among cooperators, particularly on topics that may be perceived as “beyond questioning” or “taboo.” She also aims to help individuals develop the skills needed to communicate effectively in these situations.

Yulia’s interests include farmed animal welfare, S-risks, ethics and the philosophy of science. In her free time, she enjoys learning trivia facts about influential philosophers of the 20th century.

Maja Laura Jaryczewska (she/her)

She is a Polish artist as well as a social activist. On the artistic side she has exercised her creativity as a pianist, vocalist, composer and writer. She has first hand experience with EA for around 2 years, as President of the Effective Altruism Poland Foundation and PR & Fundraising manager. Simultaneously, she is also a Giving What We Can Ambassador. Her previous social activist engagements not directly involved with EA include volunteering for Open Cages and Anima International (European animal rights organizations based on the EA principles).

Besides social engagements, she is involved in media outreach for a few years. She worked with the media team in Open Cages and she made several public appearances, both as a speaker and as an artist. She finds power to speak out of her honesty and desire to share her true self. As EA Poland president she writes articles for Polish media and takes part in interviews e.g. about mental health.

Maja Laura’s interests include among others: nuclear threat, philosophy, history, policymaking, AI, global health, and effective giving.