Nitpick: I would be sad if people ruled themselves out for e.g. being “20th percentile conscientiousness” since in my impression the popular tests for OCEAN are very sensitive to what implicit reference class the test-taker is using.
For example, I took one a year ago and got third percentile conscientiousness, which seems pretty unlikely to be true given my abilities to e.g. hold down a grantmaking job, get decent grades in grad school, successfully run 50-person retreats, etc. I think the explanation is basically that this is how I respond to “I am often late for my appointments”: “Oh boy, so true. I really am often rushing to my office for meetings and often don’t join until a minute or two after the hour.” And I could instead be thinking, “Well, there are lots of people who just regularly completely miss appointments, don’t pay bills, lose jobs, etc. It seems to me like I’m running late a lot, but I should be accounting for the vast diversity of human experience and answer ‘somewhat disagree’.” But the first thing is way easier; you kinda have to know about this issue with the test to do the second thing.
(Unless you wouldn’t hire someone because they were only ~1.3 standard deviations more conscientious than I am, which is fair I guess!)
Yeah this is a good point; fwiw I was pointing at “<30th percentile conscientiousness” as a problem that I have, as someone who is often late to meetings for more than 1-2 minutes (including twice today). My guess is that my (actual, not perceived) level of conscientiousness is pretty detrimental to LTFF fund chair work, while yours should be fine? I also think “Harvard Law student” is just a very wacky reference class re: conscientious; most people probably come from a less skewed sample than yours.
I agree with the overall point from tlevin, but, I think that “evidence you are not a good fit” is still a reasonable way to describe this and my guess is that fewer good applicants will rule themselves out than “rule themselves in” as a result of this line.
I’m pretty unsure though—I think often people who are a good fit don’t apply for small reasons like the one that tlevin said, but also making the bar seem really low or very vague is bad for managing applicant expectations and doesn’t sufficiently take advantage of selection effects.
Nitpick: I would be sad if people ruled themselves out for e.g. being “20th percentile conscientiousness” since in my impression the popular tests for OCEAN are very sensitive to what implicit reference class the test-taker is using.
For example, I took one a year ago and got third percentile conscientiousness, which seems pretty unlikely to be true given my abilities to e.g. hold down a grantmaking job, get decent grades in grad school, successfully run 50-person retreats, etc. I think the explanation is basically that this is how I respond to “I am often late for my appointments”: “Oh boy, so true. I really am often rushing to my office for meetings and often don’t join until a minute or two after the hour.” And I could instead be thinking, “Well, there are lots of people who just regularly completely miss appointments, don’t pay bills, lose jobs, etc. It seems to me like I’m running late a lot, but I should be accounting for the vast diversity of human experience and answer ‘somewhat disagree’.” But the first thing is way easier; you kinda have to know about this issue with the test to do the second thing.
(Unless you wouldn’t hire someone because they were only ~1.3 standard deviations more conscientious than I am, which is fair I guess!)
Yeah this is a good point; fwiw I was pointing at “<30th percentile conscientiousness” as a problem that I have, as someone who is often late to meetings for more than 1-2 minutes (including twice today). My guess is that my (actual, not perceived) level of conscientiousness is pretty detrimental to LTFF fund chair work, while yours should be fine? I also think “Harvard Law student” is just a very wacky reference class re: conscientious; most people probably come from a less skewed sample than yours.
I agree with the overall point from tlevin, but, I think that “evidence you are not a good fit” is still a reasonable way to describe this and my guess is that fewer good applicants will rule themselves out than “rule themselves in” as a result of this line.
I’m pretty unsure though—I think often people who are a good fit don’t apply for small reasons like the one that tlevin said, but also making the bar seem really low or very vague is bad for managing applicant expectations and doesn’t sufficiently take advantage of selection effects.