Question that came up 3x+ in Twitter/texts/emails:
Can you go on a call with me to discuss whether this job is a good fit for me?
My response:
As I’m partially responsible for hiring for this round, our internal policy is that I shouldn’t have calls with potential candidates for this role about the job, as there’s a risk that I will accidentally leak information about our hiring criteria in a private call, and this will be unfair for candidates who aren’t in my network.
Please let me know if you think this policy is bad; we’re constantly re-evaluating our policies to balance various factors, including efficiency and fairness.
One thing I’d add: It seems likely to me that if a call is worth the person’s time + Linch’s time, then it’s actually a better move to just apply. The initial application stage takes 2 hours or less, and people will learn through the application process, and at each stage a substantial fraction of people don’t proceed (cutting down the total time cost and making the question “Is this job a good fit for me?” less relevant to ask). If a 30 min call is worthwhile, it seems like the conclusion will probably be “may as well apply”, in which case I’d just skip to “may as well apply”.
I’m still very happy for people to reach out to me, but mainly so I can encourage them to go ahead and apply! (Assuming they indeed think a 30 min call would be worth their time. I obviously don’t think every single person in EA should apply.)
Also, to be clear, I don’t say this just for Rethink specifically or for orgs I work at specifically. E.g., yesterday I said roughly the same thing to someone who was interested in working at the Center on Long-Term Risk and wanted to know what working there was like for me—I encouraged them to probably just apply to work there instead of spending more time thinking about whether they’d want to accept an offer in the unlikely event they receive one, and to focus our call on other things.
(I think one actually check whether that argument seems sound by laying out the various time costs, learning benefits, and probabilities, and I haven’t done this, but I’d guess this is basically correct.)
+1 to thinking one should just apply. Related: I think it’s usually still useful to hear about the perspective of more rather than less potential coworkers and wonder if it makes sense for orgs to have a „This is what our employees say it’s like to work here“ document. I would’ve read that before applying, but I wouldn’t have reached out about it. Though I guess learning about the perspectives of your potential co-workers is a nice way to get to know them once you’re far enough into the application process?
fwiw, I do think it seems good to have publicly available info (not just via 1-1s) regarding what various people at the org think it’s like to work there, what a “day in the life” is like, etc. More generally, it seems good for people to write job profiles and “typical workday” writeups. Though I’m unsure how useful those things are and whether RP should prioritise producing more such things.
Some things that partially cover those needs which RP already has:
Maybe the Q&A recording from this round (but I haven’t watched it) and the internship hiring round earlier this year (but I can’t remember that Q&A well)
Question that came up 3x+ in Twitter/texts/emails:
My response:
As I’m partially responsible for hiring for this round, our internal policy is that I shouldn’t have calls with potential candidates for this role about the job, as there’s a risk that I will accidentally leak information about our hiring criteria in a private call, and this will be unfair for candidates who aren’t in my network.
Please let me know if you think this policy is bad; we’re constantly re-evaluating our policies to balance various factors, including efficiency and fairness.
One thing I’d add: It seems likely to me that if a call is worth the person’s time + Linch’s time, then it’s actually a better move to just apply. The initial application stage takes 2 hours or less, and people will learn through the application process, and at each stage a substantial fraction of people don’t proceed (cutting down the total time cost and making the question “Is this job a good fit for me?” less relevant to ask). If a 30 min call is worthwhile, it seems like the conclusion will probably be “may as well apply”, in which case I’d just skip to “may as well apply”.
I’m still very happy for people to reach out to me, but mainly so I can encourage them to go ahead and apply! (Assuming they indeed think a 30 min call would be worth their time. I obviously don’t think every single person in EA should apply.)
Also, to be clear, I don’t say this just for Rethink specifically or for orgs I work at specifically. E.g., yesterday I said roughly the same thing to someone who was interested in working at the Center on Long-Term Risk and wanted to know what working there was like for me—I encouraged them to probably just apply to work there instead of spending more time thinking about whether they’d want to accept an offer in the unlikely event they receive one, and to focus our call on other things.
(I think one actually check whether that argument seems sound by laying out the various time costs, learning benefits, and probabilities, and I haven’t done this, but I’d guess this is basically correct.)
+1 to thinking one should just apply. Related: I think it’s usually still useful to hear about the perspective of more rather than less potential coworkers and wonder if it makes sense for orgs to have a „This is what our employees say it’s like to work here“ document. I would’ve read that before applying, but I wouldn’t have reached out about it. Though I guess learning about the perspectives of your potential co-workers is a nice way to get to know them once you’re far enough into the application process?
fwiw, I do think it seems good to have publicly available info (not just via 1-1s) regarding what various people at the org think it’s like to work there, what a “day in the life” is like, etc. More generally, it seems good for people to write job profiles and “typical workday” writeups. Though I’m unsure how useful those things are and whether RP should prioritise producing more such things.
Some things that partially cover those needs which RP already has:
Some info here: https://rethinkpriorities.org/career-opportunities
Maybe some of RP’s linkedin posts: https://www.linkedin.com/company/rethinkpriorities/posts/?feedView=all
This post, the comments, the attached FAQ, and Lizka’s shortform
Maybe the Q&A recording from this round (but I haven’t watched it) and the internship hiring round earlier this year (but I can’t remember that Q&A well)
Maybe other stuff I’m forgetting
Thanks for the pointers, I hadn’t seen Lizka‘s shortform and found it very useful for my evaluation of working at RP.