Hi readers! I work as a Programme Officer at a longtermist organisation. (These views are my own and don’t represent my employer!) I think there’s some valuable advice in this post, especially about not being constrained too much by what you majored in. But after running several hiring rounds, I would frame my advice a bit differently. Working at a grantmaking organisation did change my views on the value of my time. But I also learned a bunch of other things, like:
The majority of people who apply for EA jobs are not qualified for them.
Junior EA talent is oversupplied, because of management constraints, top of funnel growth, and because EAs really want to work at EA organisations.
The value that you bring to your organisation/to the world is directly proportional to your skills and your fit for the role.
Because of this, typically when I talk to junior EAs my advice is not to apply to lots more EA jobs but rather to find ways of skilling up — especially by working at a non-EA organisation that has excellent managers and invests in training its staff — so that one can build key skills that make one indispensable to EA organisations.
Here’s a probably overly strong way of stating my view that might bring the point home: try to never apply to EA jobs, and instead get so good at something that EA orgs will headhunt you and fight over you.
I know that there are lots of nice things about working at EA organisations (culture, community, tangible feelings of impact) but if you really value work at EA organisations, then you should value highly skilled work at EA organisations even more (I think a lot more!). Having more junior EAs find ways to train up their skills and spend less time looking for EA work is the only way I can see to convert top of funnel community growth into healthy middle of funnel community growth.
Thank you for this thoughtful comment, Tyler—I appreciate your perspective and I think it will help readers improve their decision-making.
On point 1: I suspect this is less true for entry level roles, especially those that don’t specify an advanced degree or technical skill requirement. But it’s valuable to know that this was your experience when reviewing applications, and this updates my opinion.
On point 2: I agree there are more early career EAs looking for EA jobs than entry level EA job openings at any given time, but I disagree with the conclusion that early career EAs should apply to fewer EA jobs.
It seems hard to get the same level of mentorship, relevant skills, at most “non-EA” orgs. If you’re working as e.g. an SWE for FAANG, your employer’s incentives are to invest in your professional development insofar as that increases your productivity and job satisfaction (for retention). If you’re working as e.g. a researcher for the Center for Global Development, your employer’s incentives are to invest in your professional development to maximize your lifetime impact on your & CGD’s shared mission (agnostic as to whether you achieve that impact while working at CGD or elsewhere).
You might be a great culture fit, or have a particularly relevant background that headhunters or EA orgs wouldn’t know about unless you actively apply.
Of the current entry level roles on 80k’s job board, there are a pretty diverse array of functions. I agree that applying to all 224 wouldn’t be a good use of time, but regularly checking back in and applying to promising leads seems like a good idea to me (especially keeping an eye out for jobs matching any specialized background/knowledge base you might have, like in policy, academia, development economics, ML, infectious disease, etc.)
I personally made the mistake of applying to a bunch of stuff all at once, feeling disappointed about not getting anything, and giving up until I felt motivated to apply again later. I think I should have applied consistently and internalized that the EV of an application working out (in my opinion) makes the application process worth it.
The post and this comment each have the tacit asterisk that individuals’ situations are unique, and that I’d be excited for the hypothetical average early-career reader to apply for more EA jobs/get more involved with EA projects on the margin. Some people don’t have the time/financial runway to apply for lots of jobs or volunteer for EA projects, and I hope my advice isn’t perceived as one-size-fits-all.
On point 3: Couldn’t agree more :)
I know 80k used to recommend careers in management consulting pretty strongly for skill development, and these days my read is that they’re starting to recommend more “direct work” roles right away. I’d love to learn 80k’s current view, and I would recommend that a reader weight the perspectives of the professionals (those with recruiting/hiring experience like Tyler, and those who research the EA job landscape like 80k) much stronger than my perspective when deciding what makes most sense for their personal career circumstances.
Thanks Sam! I don’t have much more to say about this right now since on a couple things we just have different impressions, but I did talk to someone at 80k last night about this. They basically said: some people need the advice Tyler gave, some people need the advice Sam gave. The best general advice is probably “apply broadly”: apply to some EA jobs, to some high-impact jobs outside of EA, to some upskilling jobs, etc. And then pick the highest EV job you were accepted to (where EV is comprehensive and includes things like improvements to your future career from credentialing and upskilling).
Hi readers! I work as a Programme Officer at a longtermist organisation. (These views are my own and don’t represent my employer!) I think there’s some valuable advice in this post, especially about not being constrained too much by what you majored in. But after running several hiring rounds, I would frame my advice a bit differently. Working at a grantmaking organisation did change my views on the value of my time. But I also learned a bunch of other things, like:
The majority of people who apply for EA jobs are not qualified for them.
Junior EA talent is oversupplied, because of management constraints, top of funnel growth, and because EAs really want to work at EA organisations.
The value that you bring to your organisation/to the world is directly proportional to your skills and your fit for the role.
Because of this, typically when I talk to junior EAs my advice is not to apply to lots more EA jobs but rather to find ways of skilling up — especially by working at a non-EA organisation that has excellent managers and invests in training its staff — so that one can build key skills that make one indispensable to EA organisations.
Here’s a probably overly strong way of stating my view that might bring the point home: try to never apply to EA jobs, and instead get so good at something that EA orgs will headhunt you and fight over you.
I know that there are lots of nice things about working at EA organisations (culture, community, tangible feelings of impact) but if you really value work at EA organisations, then you should value highly skilled work at EA organisations even more (I think a lot more!). Having more junior EAs find ways to train up their skills and spend less time looking for EA work is the only way I can see to convert top of funnel community growth into healthy middle of funnel community growth.
Thank you for this thoughtful comment, Tyler—I appreciate your perspective and I think it will help readers improve their decision-making.
On point 1: I suspect this is less true for entry level roles, especially those that don’t specify an advanced degree or technical skill requirement. But it’s valuable to know that this was your experience when reviewing applications, and this updates my opinion.
On point 2: I agree there are more early career EAs looking for EA jobs than entry level EA job openings at any given time, but I disagree with the conclusion that early career EAs should apply to fewer EA jobs.
It seems hard to get the same level of mentorship, relevant skills, at most “non-EA” orgs. If you’re working as e.g. an SWE for FAANG, your employer’s incentives are to invest in your professional development insofar as that increases your productivity and job satisfaction (for retention). If you’re working as e.g. a researcher for the Center for Global Development, your employer’s incentives are to invest in your professional development to maximize your lifetime impact on your & CGD’s shared mission (agnostic as to whether you achieve that impact while working at CGD or elsewhere).
You might be a great culture fit, or have a particularly relevant background that headhunters or EA orgs wouldn’t know about unless you actively apply.
Of the current entry level roles on 80k’s job board, there are a pretty diverse array of functions. I agree that applying to all 224 wouldn’t be a good use of time, but regularly checking back in and applying to promising leads seems like a good idea to me (especially keeping an eye out for jobs matching any specialized background/knowledge base you might have, like in policy, academia, development economics, ML, infectious disease, etc.)
I personally made the mistake of applying to a bunch of stuff all at once, feeling disappointed about not getting anything, and giving up until I felt motivated to apply again later. I think I should have applied consistently and internalized that the EV of an application working out (in my opinion) makes the application process worth it.
The post and this comment each have the tacit asterisk that individuals’ situations are unique, and that I’d be excited for the hypothetical average early-career reader to apply for more EA jobs/get more involved with EA projects on the margin. Some people don’t have the time/financial runway to apply for lots of jobs or volunteer for EA projects, and I hope my advice isn’t perceived as one-size-fits-all.
On point 3: Couldn’t agree more :)
I know 80k used to recommend careers in management consulting pretty strongly for skill development, and these days my read is that they’re starting to recommend more “direct work” roles right away. I’d love to learn 80k’s current view, and I would recommend that a reader weight the perspectives of the professionals (those with recruiting/hiring experience like Tyler, and those who research the EA job landscape like 80k) much stronger than my perspective when deciding what makes most sense for their personal career circumstances.
Thanks Sam! I don’t have much more to say about this right now since on a couple things we just have different impressions, but I did talk to someone at 80k last night about this. They basically said: some people need the advice Tyler gave, some people need the advice Sam gave. The best general advice is probably “apply broadly”: apply to some EA jobs, to some high-impact jobs outside of EA, to some upskilling jobs, etc. And then pick the highest EV job you were accepted to (where EV is comprehensive and includes things like improvements to your future career from credentialing and upskilling).