What do you specifically mean by “maturing in management, generally”? I noticed that people tend to have very different things in mind when they are talking about “Improving management in EA” so could be worth clarifying
I think EA has a particular problem where the emphasis on getting people who are “value aligned” means they don’t get in experienced people from outside. Software startups have at least learned to bring in an experienced COO to help run day to day things
In the early days, it was hard to get people who were sufficiently “value aligned” with experience. I don’t think that’s the case anymore. For example, there are many value-aligned highly-experienced people on the EA Good Governance Project’s Trustee Directory. The issue is that many people don’t want to give up partial control of something to somebody outside their clique and/or prior to October didn’t have an easy way to find them
I think good startups often do this, but lots of startups have trouble about this stage. Many do have their own cultures that are difficult to retain as they grow.
I think EA is more intense as there’s more required material to understand, but it’s a similar idea.
Thanks for clarifying! I think Training for Good looked into “scalable management trainings”, but had a hard time identifying a common theme, which they could work on (This is my understanding based on a few informal chats. This might be outdated and I am sure they have a more nuanced take). Based on my experience, different managers seem to have quite different struggles which change over time and good coaching and peer support seemed to be the most time-effective interventions for the managers (This is based on me chatting occasionally to people and not based on proper research or deep thinking about the topic)
I think there’s no substitute for role models and experience. Whenever I advise people in EA on careers, I always suggest spending some time in ‘normal’ organisations first
Hmm. Obviously, career advice depends a lot on the individual and the specific context, all things equal, I tentatively agree that there is some value in having seen a large “functioning” org. I think many of these orgs have also dysfunctional aspects (e.g., I think most orgs are struggling with sexual harassment and concentration of formal and informal power) and that working at normal orgs has quite high opportunity costs. I also think that many of my former employers were net negative for some silly which I think are highly relevant, e.g., high-quality decision making
Re: “I think many of these orgs have also dysfunctional aspects (e.g., I think most orgs are struggling with sexual harassment and concentration of formal and informal power)”
I agree with that, but I also think there’s something to be learned from dysfunctional orgs. Why are they dysfunction? How did they become dysfunctional? Why have attempts to make them less dysfunctional failed?
There is just as much — possibly more — to be learned from failures as there is to learn from successes.
On the whole I think there’s less to learn from failures than successes because there are many different ways to get things wrong, so ruling out just one doesn’t help you that much. The lesson is only valuable if you would have been dysfunctional in that specific way, and are now able to avoid it.
Working in dysfunctional workplaces can still be educational if:
their dysfunction is the biggest / most obvious trap to fall into, and learning to avoid it really does affect your chances of success,
they’re not dysfunctional in all ways, and have enough other good examples to learn from.
I suspect that in reality a lot of organizations are dysfunctional in ways that aren’t useful, e.g. incentive problems. While incentive problems do exist in EA, the incentive landscape is pretty different and I’d guess a lot of the traps don’t straightforwardly translate.
What do you specifically mean by “maturing in management, generally”? I noticed that people tend to have very different things in mind when they are talking about “Improving management in EA” so could be worth clarifying
I defer a lot to experts / well respected managers.
To me, EA has a bunch of young people optimized a lot for some specific non-management talents. It seems a lot like a startup in that way.
Many startups go through “growing up” periods. Some totally fail at this, but when it works well, the outcome can be very successful.
I imagine as we get good consultants here, they will recommend some fairly straightforward and correlated recommendations that I’d agree with.
I found the Personal MBA reading list to be interesting. There are really a lot of “serious organization” skills that are hard to get good at.
https://personalmba.com/best-business-books/
I think EA has a particular problem where the emphasis on getting people who are “value aligned” means they don’t get in experienced people from outside. Software startups have at least learned to bring in an experienced COO to help run day to day things
In the early days, it was hard to get people who were sufficiently “value aligned” with experience. I don’t think that’s the case anymore. For example, there are many value-aligned highly-experienced people on the EA Good Governance Project’s Trustee Directory. The issue is that many people don’t want to give up partial control of something to somebody outside their clique and/or prior to October didn’t have an easy way to find them
I think good startups often do this, but lots of startups have trouble about this stage. Many do have their own cultures that are difficult to retain as they grow.
I think EA is more intense as there’s more required material to understand, but it’s a similar idea.
Thanks for clarifying! I think Training for Good looked into “scalable management trainings”, but had a hard time identifying a common theme, which they could work on (This is my understanding based on a few informal chats. This might be outdated and I am sure they have a more nuanced take). Based on my experience, different managers seem to have quite different struggles which change over time and good coaching and peer support seemed to be the most time-effective interventions for the managers (This is based on me chatting occasionally to people and not based on proper research or deep thinking about the topic)
I think there’s no substitute for role models and experience. Whenever I advise people in EA on careers, I always suggest spending some time in ‘normal’ organisations first
Hmm. Obviously, career advice depends a lot on the individual and the specific context, all things equal, I tentatively agree that there is some value in having seen a large “functioning” org. I think many of these orgs have also dysfunctional aspects (e.g., I think most orgs are struggling with sexual harassment and concentration of formal and informal power) and that working at normal orgs has quite high opportunity costs. I also think that many of my former employers were net negative for some silly which I think are highly relevant, e.g., high-quality decision making
Re: “I think many of these orgs have also dysfunctional aspects (e.g., I think most orgs are struggling with sexual harassment and concentration of formal and informal power)”
I agree with that, but I also think there’s something to be learned from dysfunctional orgs. Why are they dysfunction? How did they become dysfunctional? Why have attempts to make them less dysfunctional failed?
There is just as much — possibly more — to be learned from failures as there is to learn from successes.
On the whole I think there’s less to learn from failures than successes because there are many different ways to get things wrong, so ruling out just one doesn’t help you that much. The lesson is only valuable if you would have been dysfunctional in that specific way, and are now able to avoid it.
Working in dysfunctional workplaces can still be educational if:
their dysfunction is the biggest / most obvious trap to fall into, and learning to avoid it really does affect your chances of success,
they’re not dysfunctional in all ways, and have enough other good examples to learn from.
I suspect that in reality a lot of organizations are dysfunctional in ways that aren’t useful, e.g. incentive problems. While incentive problems do exist in EA, the incentive landscape is pretty different and I’d guess a lot of the traps don’t straightforwardly translate.