You raised an important point that seems to me frequently overlooked. This is also one of the reasons why giving career advice is hard—there is limited amount of advice that can be given generally and much of the work is hidden in going through the specific options the advisee has.
One thing that could take this even further is to address how these two—the general cause area and specific individual considerations—play together. Overlooking cause area considerations entirely would be wrong, obviously.
The way I see it is that I should start with general considerations about cause areas and about my skills, which will help me discover where to start looking. Then I can start making the options more specific, starting with the most promising cause area where I have a chance to succeed. If I don’t find anything promising, I can dig deeper or move to the second most promising area, etc. One counterargument to this would be the risk that (if overemphasizing general considerations) I can get exhausted along the way and give up, while focusing more on what seems available and specific can help me find initial success earlier and motivate me to look further.
I wonder what are your thoughts on how the general and specific play together.
You raised an important point that seems to me frequently overlooked. This is also one of the reasons why giving career advice is hard—there is limited amount of advice that can be given generally and much of the work is hidden in going through the specific options the advisee has.
One thing that could take this even further is to address how these two—the general cause area and specific individual considerations—play together. Overlooking cause area considerations entirely would be wrong, obviously.
The way I see it is that I should start with general considerations about cause areas and about my skills, which will help me discover where to start looking. Then I can start making the options more specific, starting with the most promising cause area where I have a chance to succeed. If I don’t find anything promising, I can dig deeper or move to the second most promising area, etc.
One counterargument to this would be the risk that (if overemphasizing general considerations) I can get exhausted along the way and give up, while focusing more on what seems available and specific can help me find initial success earlier and motivate me to look further.
I wonder what are your thoughts on how the general and specific play together.