Thank you for the opportunity to ask a question about career advice here.
I’m 35 years old and currently working in the field of human rights. I lead a project focused on human rights education for teenagers via social media. Recently, I also started a new role as project manager for a project that is developing an ethical AI chatbot.
I began my career as a social worker and, alongside my work, completed two master’s degrees—one in legal philosophy and one in law. During my studies, I worked at a university-based human rights institute, where I gained experience in legal research, created educational content for students, and co-authored a few articles.
After that, I transitioned into my current role, where I work on various human rights projects. For my final law thesis, I focused on AI bias and women’s rights, which sparked my deep interest in the intersection of AI, data protection, tech policy, and human rights.
Since then, I’ve continued building my knowledge in this area through various courses. I completed the AI Governance training by BlueDot, another training focused on the EU AI Act, and one that explored AI from a human rights perspective. As a final paper for the BlueDot course, I wrote a policy toolkit on applying a human rights-based approach to AI governance in content moderation -this really encapsulates my main area of interest. I also recently completed a policy writing course.
I would love to transition more fully into the fields of tech & law, tech policy, and/or advocacy in these areas. However, despite putting a great deal of effort into each application—carefully tailoring each one—I haven’t had any success so far. Over the past six months, I’ve applied to nearly every relevant fellowship and many early-career positions, including internships and traineeships.
I approach things with a strong intersectional lens, which I believe could be a unique asset in this field.
Could you advise me on how to move forward and where I should continue looking to make this career transition?
I’m currently based in Canada but working remotely for an Austrian NGO. I’m open to relocating to most European countries.
Thanks for writing in. It’s great that you’re thinking of using your career to help AI go well, and have been building skills and applying for roles to that end.
I’m sorry to hear you’ve been struggling with landing a role. Here are some ideas:
Are you getting enough feedback on your application materials? It’s good to solicit input from trusted sources, mentors, others on similar journeys as you, so that you’re sure that you’re not missing some key pieces in your applications.
Are you talking/connecting to people in roles/orgs you’re interested in? As we get more experience, it’s more likely that we’ll find roles through our network and collaborators; so it’s useful to invest in those relationships, not just by being a jobseeker, but by aiming to help out and add value wherever you can (maybe by giving feedback/critiques, exchanging your expertise for something you want to learn, or volunteering in some way).
Are you continuing to make your skills and experience legible? As my colleague @Matt Beardputs it “you should obsessively improve at an in-demand skill set in a legible way”. Those skills could be within writing, speaking, research, analysis, code, hardware, interpersonal collaboration, project management, organisation building, strategic thinking, and so on. The idea here is analogous to “build it and they will come”, and countless folks have translated their visible expertise into high-impact roles. Check out our skills pages for more details.
A related thing is to use such public productivity and output as a way to increase your feedback surface area, to pick up on where you can grow. Aim to post your work in places where folks are happy to engage in good faith and offer constructive input. The EA Forum and LessWrong are great places for this!
Are you maybe the right person to start a new org working on something because nobody else is doing it, and it’s incredibly important? I often say in advising calls “You can just do things”, because it’s true and sometimes we forget that. Yes, it can be daunting, and it’s worth considering your own personal circumstances, but all things considered, I want more people to be willing to take those kinds of risks.
Similarly, you might even want to implement someone else’s idea, or replicate or improve on an existing project—there are plenty of excellent ideas out there that need more people executing them.
Hello!
Thank you for the opportunity to ask a question about career advice here.
I’m 35 years old and currently working in the field of human rights. I lead a project focused on human rights education for teenagers via social media. Recently, I also started a new role as project manager for a project that is developing an ethical AI chatbot.
I began my career as a social worker and, alongside my work, completed two master’s degrees—one in legal philosophy and one in law. During my studies, I worked at a university-based human rights institute, where I gained experience in legal research, created educational content for students, and co-authored a few articles.
After that, I transitioned into my current role, where I work on various human rights projects. For my final law thesis, I focused on AI bias and women’s rights, which sparked my deep interest in the intersection of AI, data protection, tech policy, and human rights.
Since then, I’ve continued building my knowledge in this area through various courses. I completed the AI Governance training by BlueDot, another training focused on the EU AI Act, and one that explored AI from a human rights perspective. As a final paper for the BlueDot course, I wrote a policy toolkit on applying a human rights-based approach to AI governance in content moderation -this really encapsulates my main area of interest. I also recently completed a policy writing course.
I would love to transition more fully into the fields of tech & law, tech policy, and/or advocacy in these areas. However, despite putting a great deal of effort into each application—carefully tailoring each one—I haven’t had any success so far. Over the past six months, I’ve applied to nearly every relevant fellowship and many early-career positions, including internships and traineeships.
I approach things with a strong intersectional lens, which I believe could be a unique asset in this field.
Could you advise me on how to move forward and where I should continue looking to make this career transition?
I’m currently based in Canada but working remotely for an Austrian NGO. I’m open to relocating to most European countries.
Thank you again!
Hi Stephanie,
Thanks for writing in. It’s great that you’re thinking of using your career to help AI go well, and have been building skills and applying for roles to that end.
I’m sorry to hear you’ve been struggling with landing a role. Here are some ideas:
Are you getting enough feedback on your application materials? It’s good to solicit input from trusted sources, mentors, others on similar journeys as you, so that you’re sure that you’re not missing some key pieces in your applications.
Are you talking/connecting to people in roles/orgs you’re interested in? As we get more experience, it’s more likely that we’ll find roles through our network and collaborators; so it’s useful to invest in those relationships, not just by being a jobseeker, but by aiming to help out and add value wherever you can (maybe by giving feedback/critiques, exchanging your expertise for something you want to learn, or volunteering in some way).
Are you continuing to make your skills and experience legible? As my colleague @Matt Beard puts it “you should obsessively improve at an in-demand skill set in a legible way”. Those skills could be within writing, speaking, research, analysis, code, hardware, interpersonal collaboration, project management, organisation building, strategic thinking, and so on. The idea here is analogous to “build it and they will come”, and countless folks have translated their visible expertise into high-impact roles. Check out our skills pages for more details.
A related thing is to use such public productivity and output as a way to increase your feedback surface area, to pick up on where you can grow. Aim to post your work in places where folks are happy to engage in good faith and offer constructive input. The EA Forum and LessWrong are great places for this!
Are you maybe the right person to start a new org working on something because nobody else is doing it, and it’s incredibly important? I often say in advising calls “You can just do things”, because it’s true and sometimes we forget that. Yes, it can be daunting, and it’s worth considering your own personal circumstances, but all things considered, I want more people to be willing to take those kinds of risks.
Similarly, you might even want to implement someone else’s idea, or replicate or improve on an existing project—there are plenty of excellent ideas out there that need more people executing them.
Some more resources:
Advice for mid-career folks looking for high-impact roles
What to do when the job market isn’t cooperating
A (maybe slightly stale) list of social impact job boards
Hope this helps! All the best.