Random journaling and my predictions: Pre-Retrospective on the Campus Specialist role. Applications for the Campus Specialist role at CEA close in like 5 days. Joan Gass’s talk at EAG about this was really good, and it has led to many awesome, talented people believing they should do Uni group community building full time. 20-50 people are going to apply for this role, of which at least 20 would do an awesome job.
Because the role is new, CEA is going to hire like 8-12 people for this role; these people are going to do great things for community building and likely have large impacts on the EA community in the next 10 years. Many of the other people who apply will feel extremely discouraged and led on. I’m not sure what they will do, but for the ~10 (or more) who were great fits for the Campus Specialist program but didn’t get it, they will do something much less impactful in the next 2 years.
I have no idea what the effects longer-term will be, but definitely not good. Probably some of these people will leave the EA community temporarily because they are confused, discouraged, and don’t think their skill set fits well with what employers in the EA community care about right now.
This is avoidable if CEA expands the number of people they hire and the system for organizing this role. I think the strongest argument against doing so is that the role is fairly experimental and we don’t know how it will work out. I think that the upside of having more people in this role totally overshadows the downsides. The downsides seem to mainly be money (as long as you hire competent, agentic people). The role description suggests an impact of counterfactually moving ~10 people per year into high impact careers. I think even if the number were only 5, this role would be well worth it, and my guess is that the next 10 best applicants would still have such an effect (even at less prestigious universities).
Disclaimer: I have no insider knowledge. I am applying for the Campus Specialist role (and therefore have a personal preference for more people getting the job). I think there is about a 2⁄3 chance of most of the above problem occurring, and I’m least confident about paragraph 3 (what the people who don’t get the role do instead).
The other people who were good fits but weren’t hired might do something less impactful over the next two years, but I think it’s still unclear whether their career will be less impactful in the longer term. There are lots of jobs with quality training and management that could teach you a lot in the two years you would’ve been a campus specialist. I would encourage everyone who’s applying to be a campus specialist to also apply to some of those jobs, and think carefully about which to pick if offered both.
Some things you could try:
-Testing your fit for a policy/politics career
-Learning the skills you’d need to help run a new EA megacharity
Yes, I agree that this is unclear. Depending on AI timelines, the long-term might not matter too much. To add to your list:
- What do you or others view as talent/skill gaps in the EA community; how can you build those skills/talents in a job that you’re more likely to get? (I’m thinking person/project management, good mentoring, marketing skills, as a couple examples)
Thanks for posting this, Aaron! I’m also applying to the role, and your thoughts are extremely well-put and on the mark.
20-50 people are going to apply for this role, of which at least 20 would do an awesome job.
I think we have two disagreements here.
My thought is that over 50 people are going to apply (my expectation is 65+); perhaps this doesn’t matter too much (quite a few disappointed people regardless), and I don’t think either of us has particularly good evidence for this.
I’m uncertain as to whether 40% (assuming your prediction of 50 applications) would do an “awesome” job. ‘Awesome’ needs to be defined further here, but, without going into the weeds, I think that a recently graduated person having a fleshed-out entrepreneurial aptitude + charisma + a deep understanding of EA is extremely rare (see Alex HT’s post).
More on the 2nd thought: I’d reckon (high uncertainty) that CEA may struggle to find more than ~12 people like this. This does not imply that there are not far more than 12 qualified people for the job. Primary reasons I think this: a) the short application timeline; b) my uncertainty about the degree of headhunting that’s gone on; and c) the fact that a lot of the best community builders I know (this is a limited dataset, however) already have jobs lined up. All of this depends on who is graduating this year and who is applying, of course.
Hey Ed, thanks for your response. I have no disagreement on 1 because I have no clue what the upper end of people applying is – simply that it’s much higher than the number who will be accepted and the number of people (I think) will do a good job.
2. I think we do disagree here. I think these qualities are relatively common in the CBers and group organizers I know (small sample). I agree that short app timeline will decrease the number of great applicants applying, also unsure about b, c seems like the biggest factor to me.
Probably the crux here is what proportion of applicants have the skills you mention, and my guess is ⅓ to ⅔, but this is based on the people I know which may be higher than in reality.
Awesome—thanks for the response. Yes, I agree with the crux (this also may come from different conceptions of the skills themselves). I’ll message you!
Hey I applied too! Hopefully at least one of us gets it. I think they probably got more than 50 applications, so it almost starts to become a lottery at that point if they only have a few spots and everyone seems like they could do it well. Or maybe that’s just easier for me to think haha.
Random journaling and my predictions: Pre-Retrospective on the Campus Specialist role.
Applications for the Campus Specialist role at CEA close in like 5 days. Joan Gass’s talk at EAG about this was really good, and it has led to many awesome, talented people believing they should do Uni group community building full time. 20-50 people are going to apply for this role, of which at least 20 would do an awesome job.
Because the role is new, CEA is going to hire like 8-12 people for this role; these people are going to do great things for community building and likely have large impacts on the EA community in the next 10 years. Many of the other people who apply will feel extremely discouraged and led on. I’m not sure what they will do, but for the ~10 (or more) who were great fits for the Campus Specialist program but didn’t get it, they will do something much less impactful in the next 2 years.
I have no idea what the effects longer-term will be, but definitely not good. Probably some of these people will leave the EA community temporarily because they are confused, discouraged, and don’t think their skill set fits well with what employers in the EA community care about right now.
This is avoidable if CEA expands the number of people they hire and the system for organizing this role. I think the strongest argument against doing so is that the role is fairly experimental and we don’t know how it will work out. I think that the upside of having more people in this role totally overshadows the downsides. The downsides seem to mainly be money (as long as you hire competent, agentic people). The role description suggests an impact of counterfactually moving ~10 people per year into high impact careers. I think even if the number were only 5, this role would be well worth it, and my guess is that the next 10 best applicants would still have such an effect (even at less prestigious universities).
Disclaimer: I have no insider knowledge. I am applying for the Campus Specialist role (and therefore have a personal preference for more people getting the job). I think there is about a 2⁄3 chance of most of the above problem occurring, and I’m least confident about paragraph 3 (what the people who don’t get the role do instead).
The other people who were good fits but weren’t hired might do something less impactful over the next two years, but I think it’s still unclear whether their career will be less impactful in the longer term. There are lots of jobs with quality training and management that could teach you a lot in the two years you would’ve been a campus specialist. I would encourage everyone who’s applying to be a campus specialist to also apply to some of those jobs, and think carefully about which to pick if offered both.
Some things you could try:
-Testing your fit for a policy/politics career
-Learning the skills you’d need to help run a new EA megacharity
-Working or volunteering as a community organizer
Yes, I agree that this is unclear. Depending on AI timelines, the long-term might not matter too much. To add to your list:
- What do you or others view as talent/skill gaps in the EA community; how can you build those skills/talents in a job that you’re more likely to get? (I’m thinking person/project management, good mentoring, marketing skills, as a couple examples)
Thanks for posting this, Aaron! I’m also applying to the role, and your thoughts are extremely well-put and on the mark.
I think we have two disagreements here.
My thought is that over 50 people are going to apply (my expectation is 65+); perhaps this doesn’t matter too much (quite a few disappointed people regardless), and I don’t think either of us has particularly good evidence for this.
I’m uncertain as to whether 40% (assuming your prediction of 50 applications) would do an “awesome” job. ‘Awesome’ needs to be defined further here, but, without going into the weeds, I think that a recently graduated person having a fleshed-out entrepreneurial aptitude + charisma + a deep understanding of EA is extremely rare (see Alex HT’s post).
More on the 2nd thought: I’d reckon (high uncertainty) that CEA may struggle to find more than ~12 people like this. This does not imply that there are not far more than 12 qualified people for the job. Primary reasons I think this: a) the short application timeline; b) my uncertainty about the degree of headhunting that’s gone on; and c) the fact that a lot of the best community builders I know (this is a limited dataset, however) already have jobs lined up. All of this depends on who is graduating this year and who is applying, of course.
Hey Ed, thanks for your response. I have no disagreement on 1 because I have no clue what the upper end of people applying is – simply that it’s much higher than the number who will be accepted and the number of people (I think) will do a good job.
2. I think we do disagree here. I think these qualities are relatively common in the CBers and group organizers I know (small sample). I agree that short app timeline will decrease the number of great applicants applying, also unsure about b, c seems like the biggest factor to me.
Probably the crux here is what proportion of applicants have the skills you mention, and my guess is ⅓ to ⅔, but this is based on the people I know which may be higher than in reality.
Awesome—thanks for the response. Yes, I agree with the crux (this also may come from different conceptions of the skills themselves). I’ll message you!
Hey I applied too! Hopefully at least one of us gets it. I think they probably got more than 50 applications, so it almost starts to become a lottery at that point if they only have a few spots and everyone seems like they could do it well. Or maybe that’s just easier for me to think haha.
I think conceptualizing job hunts like this for very competitive positions is often accurate and healthy fwiw