A project to investigate and prioritize project proposals such as all of these
Research That Can Help Us Improve, Effective Altruism, Empowering Exceptional People
Even long lists of project proposals like this one can miss important projects. The proposals (including my own) are also rarely concrete enough to gauge their importance or tractability.
Charity entrepreneurs are currently mostly on their own when it comes to prioritizing between project proposals and making them more concrete. There may be great benefits to specialization and economies of scale here that a dedicated organization could realize:
Charity entrepreneurs are currently more likely to succeed if they are in the intersection of the sets of all people who are (1) excellent at running and scaling a charity, and (2) sufficiently broadly knowledgeable and impartial to recognize the best proposals from a very wide range of proposals. If they could draw on a separate organization (whose staff don’t all need to be excellent at running and scaling charities) to take care of the second problem, many more of the entrepreneurs from the first set could succeed.
A separate organization could categorize project proposals by the additional nonentrepreneurial aptitudes that are needed to realize them. That would make the number of projects that entrepreneurs have to weight more manageable for them. Conversely, the organization could also match entrepreneurs with complementary aptitudes who might not otherwise have met and thus widen the sets of suitable projects if they are few.
A separate organization could be networked with existing organizations like 80,000 Hours and Impact CoLab and form an efficient funnel for prospective entrepreneurs.
A separate organization could also be networked with funders and advisors who are interested in particular project proposals.
A separate organization could, over time, build expertise in efficiently drafting business plans and prioritizing them far beyond what any individual entrepreneur might achieve.
I’ve considered starting such a project, but I’ve currently prioritized impact markets higher.
A project to investigate and prioritize project proposals such as all of these
Research That Can Help Us Improve, Effective Altruism, Empowering Exceptional People
Even long lists of project proposals like this one can miss important projects. The proposals (including my own) are also rarely concrete enough to gauge their importance or tractability.
Charity entrepreneurs are currently mostly on their own when it comes to prioritizing between project proposals and making them more concrete. There may be great benefits to specialization and economies of scale here that a dedicated organization could realize:
Charity entrepreneurs are currently more likely to succeed if they are in the intersection of the sets of all people who are (1) excellent at running and scaling a charity, and (2) sufficiently broadly knowledgeable and impartial to recognize the best proposals from a very wide range of proposals. If they could draw on a separate organization (whose staff don’t all need to be excellent at running and scaling charities) to take care of the second problem, many more of the entrepreneurs from the first set could succeed.
A separate organization could categorize project proposals by the additional nonentrepreneurial aptitudes that are needed to realize them. That would make the number of projects that entrepreneurs have to weight more manageable for them. Conversely, the organization could also match entrepreneurs with complementary aptitudes who might not otherwise have met and thus widen the sets of suitable projects if they are few.
A separate organization could be networked with existing organizations like 80,000 Hours and Impact CoLab and form an efficient funnel for prospective entrepreneurs.
A separate organization could also be networked with funders and advisors who are interested in particular project proposals.
A separate organization could, over time, build expertise in efficiently drafting business plans and prioritizing them far beyond what any individual entrepreneur might achieve.
I’ve considered starting such a project, but I’ve currently prioritized impact markets higher.