Thanks for sharing! I really agree with this too, i think there is a lot of pressure in the EA community to get a job in EA to feel part of the community and this often leads to people just trying to get jobs immediately, when often you can do the most good by gaining some experience first. I will caveat that i still think there is a spectrum of certain jobs where you can learn more or less and it is still important to try to find those ones or have some idea of what you want to try your fit for first. In addition its not the case for all roles, e.g. i think campaigners in the animal space would be better going into this role straight out of university-ish because a lot of it is learning on the job/ from others and there aren’t many campaign type jobs in for-profits :)
For me personally, even though I think I had the steepest learning curve in my current role as a founder, I learnt a lot in my previous years of work that was transferable. More importantly, I built up financial stability that helped me take bigger risks, like starting my own organisation (I am PRETTY certain i would not have done this if i didn’t have the buffer i had and a fall back job)
I wonder how as a community we can help people to feel okay about this and less pressure to get an EA job straight away? More case studies?
Thanks for sharing!
I really agree with this too, i think there is a lot of pressure in the EA community to get a job in EA to feel part of the community and this often leads to people just trying to get jobs immediately, when often you can do the most good by gaining some experience first. I will caveat that i still think there is a spectrum of certain jobs where you can learn more or less and it is still important to try to find those ones or have some idea of what you want to try your fit for first. In addition its not the case for all roles, e.g. i think campaigners in the animal space would be better going into this role straight out of university-ish because a lot of it is learning on the job/ from others and there aren’t many campaign type jobs in for-profits :)
For me personally, even though I think I had the steepest learning curve in my current role as a founder, I learnt a lot in my previous years of work that was transferable. More importantly, I built up financial stability that helped me take bigger risks, like starting my own organisation (I am PRETTY certain i would not have done this if i didn’t have the buffer i had and a fall back job)
I wonder how as a community we can help people to feel okay about this and less pressure to get an EA job straight away? More case studies?